User talk:BrendanMoody

Welcome!

Hello, BrendanMoody, and welcome to the ISFDB Wiki! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

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• Field-by-field guide to entering new publications into the database
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• Help:How to upload images to the ISFDB wiki

Note: Image uploading isn't entirely automated. You're uploading the files to the wiki which will then have to be linked to the database by editing the publication record.

Please be careful in editing publications that have been primary verified by other editors. See Help:How to verify data#Making changes to verified pubs. But if you have a copy of an unverified publication, verifying it can be quite helpful. See Help:How to verify data for detailed information.

I hope you enjoy editing here! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will insert your name and the date. If you need help, check out the community portal, or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome!Kraang 23:56, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Madder Mysteries

I approved your addition of Madder Mysteries but I changed the price from $45/$50 to $45.00 per Template:PublicationFields:Price which defines the formatting of this field. I added a note explaining the availability of the $50 edition.

I also added a link to the publisher's web page plus a note that the book is sold out.

If you have a copy of this publication then it would be great if you could add a note explaining that it does not state a price. --Marc Kupper|talk 03:09, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

W. F. Harvey/William Fryer Harvey question

Hi Brendan, the cover credits the author as "W. F. Harvey" is the title page "William Fryer Harvey"? or do you want to make this a variant title of "William Fryer Harvey"? Thanks!Kraang 02:40, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

"Beast With Five Fingers" variant

This variant already exists, so I rejected the submission. Trouble is, it's hard to see this because once a variant is created it's removed from the summary page of the non-parent author (W. F. Harvey). The only way to catch it is to click on "Show All Titles" on the non-parent author's summary page. This will list all titles, variant and not. Matching records can then be merged. I've merged the two matching records for this story. Thanks. Mhhutchins 13:40, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Mary Wilkins

Your creation of the variants was correct but a bit out of order. The author needs to have the pseudonym created first then the titles next, if not then the titles don't display correctly. I saw the two titles first, checked the author and found no pseudonym so created one. Found your last submission a little further down later, this would create a duplicate pseudonym for Mary Wilkins, not a problem to fix now but in the pass couldn't fix these easily. Thanks for editing!Kraang 02:41, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Looks like Ahasuerus beat me to the reject button! :-)Kraang 02:44, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Parricide/Parracide

Did some checking and the relationship for these two titles would have gone the wrong way with the merge submitted. The only appearance of the first spelling was in the 1946 edition of Shocking Tales [checked OCLC and the story was with that spelling and with the full author name]. How it came to have an unknown date in the pub isn't clear [may have been added at a later date to the record]. Changed the date to 1946, then made the title a variant under the author's canonical name [minus the middle name; think that should be reversed but that's a different situation]. Then made the later 1971 printing of the story a variant of the 1946 title. Thus the relationship/variance runs in the correct time-line. --~ Bill, Bluesman 17:28, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Credo by Oliver Onions

You want to change "Credo" by Oliver Onions from a work of short fiction to an essay. It is currently listed as fiction in three different publications, although none of them is verified. Do you have the book in hand? If not, what is the source for this change, please?

I have the edit on hold, pending your response. -DES ^Talk 02:12, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I own a recent volume in which "Credo" is included. I've read it, and it's most definitely an essay. Best, BrendanMoody 03:01, 7 September 2010 (UTC) (Copied from User talk:DESiegel60)

Fine that was all I needed to know. it seemed just odd enough to warrant asking. I will approve the edit promptly.

By the way, unlike on some other wikis, most people on the iSFDB wiki prefer to respond to comments where they are made, so that conversations stay together. Thanks. -DES ^Talk 03:15, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Ah, good, that's my own preference as well. Thanks. By the way, a related question. Two of Onions' stories ("The Ether-Hogs" and "The Mortal") originally appeared with the group title "Two Trifles." In addition to those separate listings, there's one for "Two Trifles" itself. I assume there should be some indication of the connection among the three titles, but I'm not sure what the best way to do that would be. A note in each title data entry? BrendanMoody 03:38, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

That is a problem we have come up against several times. Currently the ISFDB has no good way to show group titles within a collection, anthology, or magazine. There is a feature request for software support for such a thing, but no knowing when or if it will be implemented -- all development is, after all, done by unpaid volunteers. In some cases the group title has simply been ignored, in some the detail titles have been ignored. In some a fake essay or story has been used to record the group title, and when this is done title-level notes are generally used, and they may be used in the other cases as well. In some cases an editor has created a series to show the linkage. All of these have pros and cons. I would advise title level notes, and possibly the "fake" entry for the group title. -DES ^Talk 04:31, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

One good example of a group title is here. Putting "The Ether-Hogs" and "The Mortal" into a "Two Trifles" series may help. But notes at all levels (title, series and even publication level where possible) as well would be good. This is a comparatively simple case, look at Brian Aldiss' "Three Enigmas" series for a REALLY complicated one! ;-) BLongley 19:30, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Recent submissions approved

I have approved several recent anthology/collection submissions. I added an OCLV record number to one of them.

Please don't forget to do the appropriate title merges. -DES ^Talk 22:43, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

The Bohemain Astrobleme merge

I notice that in merging two title records for "The Bohemain Astrobleme" you kept the less specific date (2010-00-00 instead of 2010-10-00). I am going to approve this, but edit to restore the more specific date, which seems consistent with the publications involved. If there is a reason why the less specific date was chosen, let me know and I will restore it, or you may restore it yourself. -DES ^Talk 02:25, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

I hesitated over it, then went with the less specific date because that corresponds to the earlier publication, the Winter 2010 issue of Subterranean Online, where the novelette appeared early this year. Until/unless someone finds a more specific date for that, though, I personally don't see a problem leaving the October date in place. Best, BrendanMoody 02:39, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Oh I see. I was thinking of Winter 2010 as being near the end of 2010, i didn't realize it was the winter of 2009-10. I'll think about this one. We really should have an exact pub date for an online magazine, but it seems we don't. Thanks for your info, and your work. -DES ^Talk 04:09, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Part of the problem is that, instead of posting the entire magazine on a specific date, Subterranean apparently adds content one or two items at a time over the three month period each magazine covers. Their news archive records the approximate dates when some items were added to that issue, but the Baker novelette isn't one of them. BrendanMoody 14:23, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

100 Creepy Little Creature Stories

I approved your submission of 100 Creepy Little Creature Stories. Please don't forget the needed merges. Thanks. -DES ^Talk 18:48, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Bradbury's "That Woman on the Lawn"

I had to reject the submission wishing to "unmerge" this poem from several of Bradbury's poetry collections. Although the system gives you an option to do this, the method is very unstable, and requires a clean-up that entails the replacement of certain fields that are lost when such an "unmerge" is performed. The best way to remove a content from a collection is to use the "Remove Titles From This Pub" function for each pub.
Another reason to reject is that I have a verified copy of this collection and that poem is actually printed in the book. Is there another purpose to your submission other than to remove this poem from this and three other collections? Mhhutchins 04:36, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

The issue is that there are actually two works by Bradbury titled "That Woman on the Lawn." They have the same general theme, but one is a poem and the other a short story, and they were first published 23 years apart. (I have copies of both in different publications.) I submitted the unmerge because I was under the impression that it was the first step in separating them, but I may well have misunderstood the process. BrendanMoody 04:49, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

The "unmerge" function should be used to remove a publication record from its title reference record. To remove a story (content) from its publication record you should use the "Remove Titles from This Publ" function which appears as a link on the Tools menu of every publication record. Because the problem with "That Woman on the Lawn" will involve several submissions (one for each pub in which it appears as the wrong type), I will do the work as it will be easier to moderate my own submissions. I'll let you know when its down so that you can see if it's back in shape. It looks like of the 11 pubs in which it now appears, 7 are short story collections or magazines and 4 are poetry collections. I will change the title type to shortfiction, remove the four poems from their pubs, merge those four as a poem, and make a note in each title record's fields that these are not to be merged. This is what caused the problem to begin with. A moderator accepted a submission which merged the poem and short story into one title record with a poem type. Mhhutchins 02:39, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

I've created two title records: this one is for the 1973 poem, this one is for the 1996 short story. Let me know if everything looks OK. Thanks for finding the error. Hopefully the warning I've placed on each record will prevent another editor from attempting to merge the two titles in the future. Mhhutchins 02:50, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

That looks great, thanks. I don't mean to throw more work at you, but for the record Bradbury's "Interim" is another case where a re-used title resulted in separate stories being incorrectly combined. As far as I can tell, Bradbury used "Interim" as a title for three different stories: a very short horror piece, a Martian Chronicles vignette, and a time travel story. In most cases it's obvious from context which one appeared in which publication, but not always. Anyway, if you're ever feeling ambitious you can tackle that problem. Thanks again, BrendanMoody 03:02, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Looks daunting because of the sheer numbers involved, but it looks like most of them are in the Martian Chronicles. Frankly, this looks very familiar. I think I separated these a few years ago. If so it makes me frustrated that someone is merging these and moderators are accepting the submissions without question. Please give me a breakdown of the time travel story and the short horror piece (which I assume is the story in Dark Carnival). I'm going to leave the Martian Chronicles piece as the base story for this title record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 03:43, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

The short horror piece appeared in Weird Tales in July 1947, and was subsequently reprinted in a bunch of anthologies with Weird Tales in the title, as well as the anthologies Fiends and Creatures and A Fantasy Reader. It also appeared in various editions of Dark Carnival, but hasn't been in any of Bradbury's other collections (because he no longer likes the story). The time travel story, which has also been published as "Time Intervening" and "Time Intervening/Interim," was in the anthologies Timescapes and Time Travelers, and then reprinted in various editions of the collections One for the Road and Bradbury Stories. I think that covers everything. BrendanMoody 03:53, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Chadbourne pseudonym

Hi. In researching your proposed Glen -> Glenn Chadbourne pseudonym, I found both instances of Glen misspelled his name (one the publisher site lists with two n's, the other the publisher's site spells with one n but then has a scan showing the copyright page spelling it with two n's). I corrected those, and "Glen" went away, so I rejected the pseudonym submission as no longer needed. Thanks for catching it. --MartyD 01:14, 17 October 2010 (UTC)