Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/CHERUB: The Recruit


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.  

The result was No Consensus to delete. Eluchil404 06:15, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

CHERUB: The Recruit

 * – (View AfD) (View log)

There is no assertion of notability, nor reference to independent sources, for any of these books, apart from belonging to the CHERUB series. I am also nominating the following articles, one for each book of the series, some of which not yet published. In each case apparently there is not more to say than summarising the plot, and in some cases a bit of OR.

--Goochelaar 13:11, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep - after looking at the CHERUB article, I get the feeling, with some reliable sources, most (if not all) of these books will meet Notability (books). However, the CHERUB: Dark Sun (yet to be released) should probably be deleted until it's closer to it's release date, because right now, it's pure WP:CRYSTAL.  Jauerback 13:53, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep very notable book series, bestselling, award-winning, published in a number of countries. Notable enough that each book deserves an article IMHO, although a merge would also be acceptable provided no major information is lost. Andrew Lenahan -  St ar bli nd  14:08, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Strong delete - After reading the main CHERUB article and its talk page, it's obvious that a fan base exists which is maintaining and puffing up the series' importance. There is no way, however, to make a case for the notability of each constituent volume. If it becomes a serious major phenomenon, perhaps then; but for now, what we mostly have is peacockery and unsubstantiated claims. There's more than enough material in the main article; these articles are overkill and fanboyism (apparently literally by fanboys, rather than post-adolescents; not that there's anything wrong with younger editors participating in this project, of course). -- Orange Mike 14:16, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I disagree with your assessment. I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "major phenomenon", but the latest book is currently ranked 86th on Amazon.  They might not be Harry Potter (which for comparison's sake is ranked 40th), but they're not some vanity-press dreck that we delete by the bucketload here on AfD, either. Andrew Lenahan -  St ar bli nd  14:25, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I didn't mean to imply that the series fails notability; but the individual volumes simply do not qualify; that's all I meant. The series' advocates should concentrate on sourcing and cleaning up the parent article and the one about the author (which latter is still too chummy/cutesy for words). -- Orange Mike 14:32, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete - The individual volumes of the series have no significant coverage in reliable secondary sources. See WP:N. Subdolous 14:46, 1 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep  I came here to vote Delete, for I feel towards this kind of stuff the way I do about television series episode articles. This is one of the places where I think our rules followed literally may give slightly absurd results. There will be a few reviews at least for every individual one of these titles--and for a great many less important books as well, especially childrens books. But it will be very difficult for the articles to be more than plot summary (that what the reviews tend to be as well)there is more to say, but the usual editors of these articles may not be prepared to discuss influences from other series, such character development as there may be, the structure of the plot in the terms used by professional authors, the publishing history, and so one. Now, this is true for almost any book--if it has 2 reviews, it is justified by N:Fiction, and an article could be written, potentially a good one if people are prepared to do the work. But what books are worth doing? Especially in a series  like this?  I don't have an answer to this one.
 * but there are some interesting things about these particular articles. After the first, they are unusually compact and well written for articles about fan fiction. They are also unusually consistent. They are not being done by random fans, but by a relatively small group of people, mostly at ip addresses, some of whom obviously have considerable sophistication at WP. (They have also consistently taken the first paragraph of each article by copy and paste from the series web site. But the rest seems from the edit history to have been written as originals). They also seem to be still under development--a section on reviews seems to be being added, and possibly one on characters. So they are rather good articles of their kind.
 * So we have a choice--do we accept these articles, or do we change our rules. The sales rank is high enough to be notable, and there are available sources. if we don;t want to include them, we need a different rule.
 * Perhaps the problem is that notability is linked to the articles level--perhaps instead it should be linked at a appropriate standard to content, and the question of whether or not something is an article be a minor decision. This would be different from our present merge, which usually operates to destroy content altogether. DGG (talk) 15:58, 1 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep all, as notable fiction per DGG, except delete CHERUB: Dark Sun per WP:CRYSTAL. Bearian 16:42, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete all unless citations from reliable sources are added to verify notability. Stifle (talk) 17:06, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * As long as these articles do not (or cannot) establish notability, why not just Merge them all into a List of CHERUB books? – sgeureka t•c 18:32, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * weak Delete per nom. If not, is there a tag that can prompt editors to reduce an article's length? Often times insignificant articles become exaggerated or just way too long in general, but may still be notable enough to merit an entry. -RiverHockey 23:16, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom and Orange Mike. Doctorfluffy 04:55, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep - If Wikipedia has articles about other books, why not keep this one? Weirdy   Talk  06:12, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep all. I think that these books are notable enough and seeing as Wikipedia has articles on books, I think that they should be kept. However, I agree that Dark Sun should be deleted due to WP:CRYSTAL. I will also try and improve all the articles as a fan of the series and have them set out in a way similiar to the Alex Rider books. Kyriakos 08:58, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. Interesting and notable. (I only arrived at this page because I was looking up the author and the various titles.) &lt;K  F&gt;  19:39, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep all, except CHERUB: Dark Sun per Jauerback and DGG. If CHERUB: Dark Sun is being released as part as World Book Day, that shows that the series as a whole is very popular among young readers. Some of the books have won also won awards. I think DGG's point about children's and young adult books is important; a lot of extremely popular children's books are not going to get a lot of coverage in WP:RS unless those books also appeal to adults (like Harry Potter or His Dark Materials) or they are books that adults think are "worthy" reading material for children. Deleting articles like these reduces Wikipedia's utility for our younger readers and editors (if I was 12, these are exactly the kind of articles I would read) I think in these cases, individual articles for each book with a concise plot summary, publication information, and information about any awards are OK. If there were separate articles about characters or story arcs from the books, then there would be a problem IMO. Bláthnaid  11:33, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Comment - I am the nominator, and I'd like to comment on some of the above comments. I have nothing against these books, and if they are actually notable, I am the first one to wish that good articles are written about some or all of them. But as things stand, most of the remarks are either on the lines of it's interesting and the like, or mention vast popularity, awards and other merits I can't find any source about in the articles. If those awards and merits are real, and notable, there should be some kind of source about them. I understand that some editors of these article are young enthusiasts of the series, more knowledgeable about its content than about Wikipedia standards: this enthusiasm is very good indeed, but perhaps some of the more mature editors supporting the notability of these books could spend some time sourcing the articles? Thanks, Goochelaar 13:01, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I've added a source about CHERUB: The Recruit winning the Red House Children's Book Award . That award was voted for by children and proves that the series is popular amongst them, as does a book in the series being part of World Book Day . I think that if a children's book is published by a prominent publisher, is obviously popular (eg these Amazon reviews), and translated into other languages de:CHERUB they should be allowed to have articles, at least until 12 year olds start writing WP:RS. Also, there is an article about a character in the books, James Adams (character), which I think should be merged into the main CHERUB article.  Bláthnaid  00:24, 5 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.