Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Hardscrabble Road


 * 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 delete. If anyone would like the content restored to user space in order to write an article on George Weinstein, let me know. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont)  13:17, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

Hardscrabble Road

 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

Fails WP:GNG and WP:BK. Unable to locate reliable secondary sources to support notability. This article is supported by three sources:


 * This bio, from the books publisher.
 * This review in Paste (magazine). It's hard to tell if this is a user-submitted magazine, but this was the reviewers only review.
 * This review in "Southern Literary Review", which appears to be a user-submitted literary blog. Magnolia677 (talk) 22:49, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Fictional elements and United States of America. Magnolia677 (talk) 22:49, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Magnolia677 hello there, this article was created as a response to another article which I intended to create for the Author George Weinstein, I created and submitted a page for him using citations that were available, but it was rejected all three times I submitted it. During a discussion with the final Editor who rejected it, it was suggested that I instead create an article for Hardscrabble Road as the sources which were book "reviews" and therefore valid sources, as opposed to author "interviews" which apparently are not valid, all pertained to one of the authors five books, which was Hardscrabble Road. As such I took the Editor's (Theroadislong) advice and created an article for the book instead of the author. As far as the sources go, there were a few other sources, but this Editor told me to include the ones that were for "book reviews".
 * Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 22:58, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Magnolia677 also, I can see why people definitely get annoyed and quit editing for Wikipedia..... When the first draft of the George Weinstein article got rejected, i made the changes the first Editor suggested and then when it got rejected by the second editor I made the changes they suggested and it got rejected by a third editor, who as mentioned suggested that I create a page for Hardscrabble Road instead, which is presently being nominated for deletion by you. And the article from Paste Magazine, was actually suggested by the 2nd editor to reject the initial George Weinstein page I intended to create.... Yes there are rules and guidelines and so on.... But there is no rhyme, reason or method to this.... It's gets rejected by one Editor and they tell you what to fix it will be rejected by the next Editor for making the changes the first Editor told you to make. Just a bit frustrating and confusing and therefore annoying is all. Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 23:23, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Raleigh80Z90Faema69 Hint. WP:AFC is evil. Don't use it. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 20:19, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment It would have been better if you had created a draft of this first, then it could have been improved before submitting. Theroadislong (talk) 06:43, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Theroadislong I thought I did, I realized the initial draft still had a few mistakes including the reflist that I told you about.... I thought when I hit publish that it was going to take me back to a "draft" preview page.... But instead it created a Wikipedia page Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 14:02, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * I was unable to locate enough sources to support notability. If I had, I would added them to the article. Not sure how sending this to draft will help; the two non-primary sources in the article are from 2013 and 2014, so I doubt new ones are going to pop up. Magnolia677 (talk) 14:38, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Magnolia677 what I wondered about whether or not a book is noteworthy enough to be included is.... are there sales number requirements? Do sales count, or proven reviews on Amazon. While creating the page for this author I noticed most of his other books only had about 250-300 reviews, which is pretty good, if 300 people have reviewed a book then it stands to reason over 1,000 people probably bought it, but that's not exactly bestseller territory or worthy of a Wikipedia page.... But with this Hardscrabble Road book the reviews were considerably higher. Both the E-Book and the Hardcover Paperback had over 1,000 reviews EACH.... And they're all in the 4.5 out of 5 range for ratings. This means over 2,000 reviews with an average rating of 4.5. that's pretty impressive, and in addition to this it means the book probably sold close to 10,000 copies between all formats. That seems to be worthy enough to be included in Wikipedia, but is there actually a specific numbers of sales Wikipedia wants to see to reach a certain level of notability? Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 15:25, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Magnolia677 I just went to double check these numbers as it was a few weeks ago when I initially looked it up, and there were also an additional 1,400 reviews rated at 4.5 from Goodreads.... This book likely sold well over 10,000 copies considering the majority of people who buy books don't review them. This seems to be pretty impressive sales numbers with fairly high ratings. This seems like it should matter, with movie pages most every movie has a section on its "reception" and they post a few movie reviews as well as its rating from Rotten Tomatoes... Amazon and Goodreads are the book equivalent of Rotten Tomatoes aren't they? More or less? This seems to be relevant for movies, but not so much for books? Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 15:33, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Raleigh80Z90Faema69 That is a fair point. I would agree we should treat book review aggregator scores just like we do for movies or games. Feel free to raise this at WikiProject Books discussion and do ping me if you do. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 09:51, 26 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Piotrus if I was there contributing I certainly would, but I'm not a pro Wikipedia editor like most of the people here seem to be. Normally my maximum commitment to Wikipedia is writing Tour De France and cycling history articles as a lot of those articles, especially back in the 70s and 80s were written by people who have English as a second language and are brief snippets which need expansion. This Hardscrabble Road page I created is an exception, it's the second time I've ever created a page. The first time was for the author John Gilstrap and I basically wrote one paragraph with no infobox and it was approved and in the main space within an hour and a team of Editors swooped in and created the page into what it is within about twenty minutes. That's how I learned how to make an infobox, I copied and pasted their edits and studied them. In any case, I appreciate the offer and wish I had more time to dedicate to this but the Tour de France takes up several hours a week as it is!! Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 11:56, 27 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Raleigh80Z90Faema69 No worries. The hobby can drag you in, you start small and, whoosh, ten years pass and you have hundreds of articles written... enjoy the ride. PS. If you want to see this saved for later, you can ask for userspace WP:DRAFTIFICATION. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 13:00, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Modussiccandi (talk) 08:41, 3 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Delete Sorry but this just doesn't come any where near close to passing WP:NBOOK. Theroadislong (talk) 15:40, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment. All we have here are two book reviews, neither of which looks very impactful. The Paste Magazine review is signed, but I can't find confirmation that the magazine has any form of peer review of editorial controls (although it probably does). The Southern Literary Review looks less professional, but maybe it's just page design, they do have a serious submission info: . Anyway, the reviews do appear reliable, and together they meet the minimum GNG requires, which is covered in multiple reliable sources, but well, it's the very bare minimum. Given how niche those two publications appear, I am on the fence here. Is a book which best reception are two niche reviews really encyclopedic (notable)? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here  20:17, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Piotrus that's why I brought up the apparent sales numbers and several thousand highly rated reviews.... I wondered about the NY Times bestseller list, if a book reaches this list would that pretty much immediately meet the notability requirement? This book did not reach this list, but it just came to mind because I think you need to sell about 2,000 books a week to get close to top 10 and 5,000 books in a week to reach near the top during the months of January-February then in August-September you need to sell closer to 10,000-15,000. I'm not certain if this matters for Wikipedia, but when i think notability I think sales and while it's over the course of several years Hardscrabble Road does appear to have sold several thousand.
 * Also, would articles about this author and not necessarily about the book be of any use, I did notice at least a few other articles on him, where Hardscrabble Road is certainly mentioned, but they seemed to be from small town newspapers or local magazines promoting an upcoming conference or literary retreat. Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 22:37, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * The sales number can matter, but I am not sure where o draw the line. NYTB list probably would be helpful, although I'd need to research it methodology, but if you say it's not on it, then the numbers aren't that good, are they? As for user reviews, given that they can be faked (google for paid fake books reviews, or see https://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/business/book-reviewers-for-hire-meet-a-demand-for-online-raves.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0, https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/features/amazons-never-ending-fake-reviews-problem-explained/, https://www.murderati.com/book-community-scandal-paid-and-fake-reviews/ , etc.) I wouldn't count them for anything. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 07:41, 24 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Piotrus yes I'm certain that happens with fake book reviews.... Any book worth reading of naturally doesn't need them, but the number of total reviews seem a bit high being as there seems to be three different reviewing sites that have over 1,000 reviews each.... Unless goodreads is somehow combined with Amazon, which I don't think it would be, but I'm certainly no expert on the matter...
 * On the sales yes that's correct, it did not have the numbers necessary to make the NYTB list, as those sales numbers have to be achieved in one week. Plus if it did make the list, well that's the sort of award that is listed whenever you look up a book. It does appear to have sold over 10,000 copies total, but obviously this is across about 8 years or so. Even still it's a considerable number of sales that most books don't reach, especially in this modern self-publishing world where 999 out of 1,000 won't sell 100 copies nevermind 10,000. Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 16:53, 25 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here  20:18, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment, re SLR review, of concern is this from their submissions page - "It’s fine to mention a weakness or two, if these stood out. However, if the book’s overall presentation is weak, we would prefer not to review the book in SLR.", so they only accept "good" reviews?, also with library holdings (yes i am kinda obsessed with this for books:)) of less then 10, and with the lack of reviews suggest it dont look good. Coolabahapple (talk) 16:21, 24 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Coolabahapple are you referring to reviews that would come from like USA Today, Washington Post or NY Times type reviews? If so I did not see any from sources like that, just Paste Magazine, which is apparently credible, and I've seen several modern authors proudly displaying reviews from Paste on Twitter these days, and then the Southern Literary Review and a few local magazines in the region the book comes from in Tennessee and Georgia.
 * It also seems like perhaps if this page was created back in 2013 or 2014 shortly after it was released it might have made more sense being as that's likely when the majority of the sales and the reviews come from. Although I suppose this doesn't actually matter as Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, but I guess another thing I would wonder is, do people, places, events, works of art, books etc... that have regional significance qualify for Wikipedia pages, or do they have to have national or international significance? I suppose not, because sports players, who played Triple A baseball for the Toledo Mudhens and never even made the major leagues often times have Wikipedia pages, as do small town politicians (mayor/state congressmen) whom nobody outside their state or district knows anything about. Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 17:05, 25 May 2022 (UTC)
 * This is worrisome, as it does suggest SLP is biased. Do they get paid for publishing good reviews only? I can't imagine any other reasons for focusing on "good" reviews only. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 09:50, 26 May 2022 (UTC)
 * @Piotrus this is a good question is SLP the southern literary magazine... If they get a book and it's hacked together, doesn't make sense, flow right, read well or just flat out isn't a good book would they review it accordingly, should I investigate? Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 12:07, 27 May 2022 (UTC)
 * How could we investigate it? I mean, we could ask for clarification by email, but can we even trust what they say? If they are a forum to shill paid adverts and if they think we are trying to expose them, they'd deny everything - just as if they'd do if they're a genuine review outlet with just badly written submission guide, sigh. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 13:02, 27 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Yes I suppose that's a good point. Aside from researching individual reviews from various reviewed books from the past to check and see. I guess with this book here I would question it more if it didn't have several thousand sales and reviews.... but then again if it only had 200 reviews it never would have been considered for a Wikipedia page in the first place.... And yes I see what you mean regarding the evolution of editing.... for sure, when I initially created my account I did so just intending to correct the typos and questionable grammar in a few of the articles I was reading from the 70's and 80's Tour de France. A few years later and I'm writing entire 5,000 word articles and adding citations, linking pages, editing and verifying stats and records for accuracy... in another five years who the hell knows lol! Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 13:43, 27 May 2022 (UTC)
 * It's mildly ironic at best, and sort of ridiculous at worst, that delete !voters in discussions about books and authors frequently want us to discount reviews in publications like Kirkus and Publishers Weekly on the basis that they purportedly review anything and everything, but here we have the entirely contradictory argument that exercising selectivity and only reviewing quality books is just as much of a disqualifier! I've no idea if either of you (Coolabahapple and Piotrus) have made those sorts of arguments, so this isn't to accuse anyone of hypocrisy, but it's worth emphasising that only reviewing books that meet certain standards, and asking contributors to not completely slate those books, is entirely normal and par the course in a literary magazine. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 16:03, 27 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep: the two sources are a bit less than we'd ideally want, but nonetheless adequate for WP:NB. Paste is a well-known and well-established publication; I don't have any qualms about its viability as a source. I hadn't previously heard of the Southern Literary Review, and its website is indeed a bit shonky, but the "about" page and submission guidelines are sufficient to convince me that it has some editorial controls, and the reviewer's prior published work, as indicated in her profile, could tip the review into WP:EXPERTSPS territory if the SLR wasn't itself a reliable source. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 16:03, 27 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep AfD appears to hinge on an unfounded assertion that a source is invalid. Artw (talk) 20:32, 28 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Question for anyone who happens to read this.... How long does this process last for taking votes for or against deletion? And also, if the article is kept I noticed it says "orphan article" with no other articles linked to it. I added 2 links, one under the Southern Gothic page and another on the author's hometown.... how many articles should it be linked to before removing the Orphan article tag? Raleigh80Z90Faema69 (talk) 14:59, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
 * AfD discussions last a week by default, but can be extended ("relisted") for a further seven days if consensus isn't clear, as has now happened here. It won't be closed before 10 June, but could be relisted again then. Your edits to Southern Gothic and Marietta, Georgia were reverted by Magnolia677, so the article is once again an orphan and the tag should stay for the time being. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 16:28, 3 June 2022 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.


 * Delete Southern Literary Review is an author submitted reviews site, adding zero notability to this. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 10:14, 3 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Weak delete Paste magazine is a reliable source, but it's not really enough to establish notability. The other sources are not reliable unfortunately. Shooterwalker (talk) 02:57, 7 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Delete because nothing in there establishes notability. Doczilla  @SUPERHEROLOGIST 06:44, 11 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Move to George Weinstein and refactor into a section on an article on the author, for whom some additional coverage exists to support a biographical article. BD2412  T 22:39, 12 June 2022 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. <b style="color:red">Please do not modify it.</b> 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.