Hello everyone! Whether you're one of our Sunflowers or you're considering joining, feel free to interact with our polls below! Since this is a new book club idea for us, we want YOUR input, as our new (or, hopefully, will-be) members!
So here are some ideas we have. We'll eventually make these decisions and unpublish this chapter, but until that happens, feel free to respond. If no one responds, we'll make these decisions on our own.
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1 - Spotlights vs Pairs
So we thought about this one a lot prior to making this book club... Should we spotlight one book a week in each group or pair you in your groups?
I want to clarify that your groups remain the same regardless, it's just a question of when you receive feedback.
With spotlights, which we currently have, you receive feedback from all other group members when you're spotlighted. But you receive no feedback when you're not spotlighted, unless you're the Book of the Week. It's essentially all or nothing.
With pairs, you'd be paired with someone in your group every week, so one person is reading two chapters of your book weekly, while you're doing the same for them. It's a little bit every week.
Logistically pairs makes more sense. Let's say there are five people in your group: with pairs, you're rotating back to the first person after four weeks; with spotlights, we're rotating back to the first person after five weeks. We'll complete more rotations with pairs than with spotlights, and you have more incentive to stay in the club (I'm being honest here) when you're receiving feedback weekly.
Cons of pairs: the BotW isn't as big of a deal when you're receiving weekly feedback, and you won't really have the week off when you're spotlighted anymore. We won't change our time off because we're working in terms this time, so in the long run you are doing more work. More rotations = more work for you. But I suppose you're also reaping the benefits of that work.
I leaned towards spotlights because it's different than other group-based book clubs I've seen, and it's also more different than our other two book clubs. However, I do think you should have a say: spotlights or pairs? We'll probably start with spotlights just to see how that works and make our decision some weeks later, after forming more of an opinion about spotlights. But let us know now how you're feeling in the comments!
2 - Demerits?
We've also thought about changing the warning/strike system up a bit. You'd still get warnings and strikes, and the ultimate consequence of having to sit out a term (for warnings) or leaving entirely (for strikes) doesn't change, but we've thought about other potential "punishments"—I don't like that term, let's use "demerits"—for both strikes and warnings.
Let's say after one strike or three/four warnings you can't be spotlighted for the following round. So next time you're supposed to be spotlighted, too bad. Moves onto the next person. Your next strike and/or next three/four warnings, same thing happens. Of course, strikes and warnings clear between terms, but if you get enough warnings or another strike at the very end of a term, you will miss your first spotlight the following term.
I do like this idea. It's more of an incentive to follow the rules, and if we change to pairings, we can easily make you a reader only for a couple of weeks to produce the same effect. Now, that does leave the question of how this applies to readers only, which I don't have answered.
It does make me want to add more positive incentives besides the BotW, but I can't think of any. So what interests you? Let us know in the comments!
3 - Golden Group?
I don't really like this idea but decided to voice it anyway. I suppose this is a positive incentive, but one we probably won't do. I'll explain below.
The BotW isn't a big thing, only one extra chapter per week (granted, from everyone in the reading group, but it's also only one chapter). It's hard to make it too many chapters because we don't want overloaded members, and since we're doing it weekly, we've decided to make it only one chapter.
The Golden Group would be an additional way of saying thanks for your detailed feedback, a group with only the best feedback-givers. That group wouldn't be based on genre or book similarities, of course. But you'll actually receive the level of feedback you give. If you're tired of going above and beyond the requirement when you feel your group members barely reach it, this group would make up for that.
With this group, we'd be much more lenient about warnings (not strikes though, you still have to do your assignments) and time off. So you're not only getting better feedback in return for giving better feedback, but you're also receiving other benefits. The ultimate con is that the books won't be similar to yours, so I guess you have to ask yourself which matters most to you.
Just like how regular groups are re-evaluated at the end of every term, so would be the Golden Group. If you're caught slacking, you go back to regular groups. And you have to be in at least one term—that gives us plenty of time to evaluate your feedback—to be considered for the Golden Group.
The big reason why I don't like this idea is because it ostracizes the "best" people from the average, and I don't really want to create those hierarchies. To balance it out, we might also base it off of who's the friendliest and has reached out to others the most, who knows the most about their fellow members. So it could be based on multiple factors, not just feedback skill.
But I also don't like that, potentially, the ones who need to learn from the best are the ones who aren't grouped with the best. How will they learn how to give better feedback if they're not with people who give good feedback?
As for the BotW, I'm not 100% sure how that'd factor in. I say now that we would still have the BotW, but we might get rid of it and completely replace it with the Golden Group. Not sure if we should just keep the BotW, have both, or just the Golden Group.
I don't know, I'm very on the fence. I suppose it's just something to think about, some food for thought. Let us know your thoughts in the comments!
4 - Discussion Questions
This suggestion was actually made by a member, holysacrilege ! Personally, I like the idea, but I'm open to hearing more opinions on it.
So their suggestion is weekly discussion questions. Halfway through the week, in a separate chapter in this book, the admins (me) will post a question about craft (examples: setting, characterization, time devices, dialogue, so many other things) that you will have to answer about the Spotlighted Book. These questions may be group specific, they may be the same for everyone. But it will be a requirement.
Your spotlighted author will have a chance to ask one or two questions as well in these discussion posts. These are questions they can come up with, anything they feel they want feedback on. We can't really require them to create any questions, but it's all to their benefit, and it will be a requirement to answer any of their questions as well. They won't have more than two, meaning possibly three questions total.
I'm thinking the admin question will change every rotation rather than every week, so you'll only have a new admin question after you've answered it for every book. Author questions would change weekly.
You will have a week to answer any questions, until the next one is posted. If you answer it before the next bloom (the next assignment), it'll significantly help your chances of becoming the next Book of the Week. The more detailed your response, the better your BotW chances will be. Either way, you will have to answer it within a week, so you might as well do it early for extra benefits.
The ultimate downside is more work. Let's say we require 5 sentences for the admin question and 5 sentences for any author questions, that's 10 more sentences total, meaning 25 sentences each week rather than 15.
This would be very hard to do if we do pairs rather than spotlights, so this is really a spotlight-only scenario. You'd be the ones doing more work, not me, so I want to open the floor to all of you about this opportunity. Give your thoughts in the comments!
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