Talk:The Other Hand

The Other Hand has been listed as one of the Language and literature good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
April 1, 2010	Good article nominee	Listed

A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on February 7, 2010.

The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that The Other Hand by Chris Cleave was the only literary fiction novel on the 2009 British bestseller list without a Richard & Judy Book Club recommendation, a literary award or a film adaptation?

Novels Mid‑importance

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Good job

I am a member of WP:Novels, and came here to assess the page. I like the article, here are some recommendations:

1. Include a more thorough publication history
2. expand the themes section
3. if reviewers discussed the development of certain characters at length include a "Characters"
4. If reviewers discussed the style of writing, build a more thorough approach of "literary style" discuss genre, comparisons made to other books etc.
5. Focus the reception more to what people thought, use the excess information to develop recommendations in 2,3,4.

I think you will be fine on the GA review, good job, hope my comments help. Sadads (talk) 15:44, 13 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:The Other Hand/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Sadads (talk) 01:48, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, I am User:Sadads and I will be reviewing your article per the GA criteria. Below is an outline which I will use to check off criteria that are covered/completed. I and only I can check it off. Below the criteria section I will make comments about what I think is right/wrong with the article. Please be patient, the coming week I have several major things happening in my real life (including a number of major papers/projects). I realized I gave you a little advice about this on the talk page, but I have not done a thorough overview of your work yet.

A little information on myself: I am a student of History and Literature, working on my BA in both subjects. I am also an active participant in WP:Novels and a coordinator for several task forces there. I am currently studying African literature and have experience with many modern styles and artists. I hope I can bring this experience to my review. If at any time you wish to request another reviewer, I totally understand, however I do not forsee that need. If I am negligent for any reason please contact me on my talk page.

Hi, thanks for starting off the review. I want to begin immediately with an apology - until this popped up on my watchlist just now, I'd completely missed the helpful comments you left on the article talkpage back in February. I'm only reading them for the first time now, and I hope you didn't think that I was ignoring them, because your input and recommendations are very much appreciated. This was my first time writing an article on a novel, so I'm very grateful for the guidance. It's currently 3am my time, so I can't dive into it immediately, but I'll get right on with your suggestions tomorrow. I'm a little mortified that I could have got it all done weeks ago if only I hadn't missed it on my watchlist, but better late than never I suppose. Sincere apologies, and thank you again. Frickative 02:30, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No problems, I am guessing the first round of reviewing will take about 3-5 days and then we can work on revisions together until everything fits the guidelines. Sadads (talk) 03:06, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Checklist

Well-written:

(a)

Done the prose is clear and the spelling and grammar are correct; and

(b)

Done it complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, jargon, words to avoid, fiction, and list incorporation.

Factually accurate and verifiable:

(a)

Done it provides references to all sources of information in the section(s) dedicated to the attribution of these sources according to the guide to layout;

(b)

Done it provides in-line citations from reliable sources for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons—science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines; and

(c)

Done it contains no original research.

Broad in its coverage:

(a)

Done it addresses the main aspects of the topic; and

(b)

Done it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).

DoneNeutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without bias.
Done Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.
Illustrated, if possible, by images:

(a)

Done images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content; and

(b)

Done images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.

Content

I notice that you don't cover Style very thoroughly anywhere, though you mention that some of the reviewers comment on it and articles like [1] seem to focus on this alot. Could you do a section title Style similar to the theme section (See Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Style guidelines for hints). Though I have not read the book I would think Also, that an African narrative style could affect the style. Do any reviewers mention this? Sadads (talk) 02:36, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I like the additions, the Characters section is particularly well done. That is a good way to focus it without simply listing characters. Publication history is good to, but the style section needs a little more work, especially in expanding the breadth of the coverage. Do any reviewers mention the style of narrative? Discuss the type of language that dominates? I realize a lot of contemporary reviewers take language and style for granted, unless it is exceptional. So don't feel too obliged to expand it.

Also, you might want to move the Background section before the plot. That is a call by the author of the article, but I think we could do that to begin to introduce the reader to themes before they deal with the plot itself, that way they are aware of what is important.Sadads (talk) 16:20, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Great, I was considering moving "Background" up into first place for context but I wasn't totally sure about it - thanks for confirming that would be okay. Good to know the "Characters" section is on the right lines, too. I'll be adding some detail there on development of some of the supporting characters, but obviously the main focus will remain on the two lead characters. I'm still working on fleshing out "Style" and "Themes", but "Style" particularly I can hopefully give better breadth of coverage on. I've found some reviews I'd never seen before through the American publisher's website, so I'm just going through the new material working out what I can use. Frickative 16:55, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Suggestion - put the "Blurb" section as subsection of "Publication history." It is really part of the publication decisions, no? Sadads (talk) 17:21, 3 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, good thinking. By the time I was done it didn't seem to fit properly in "Style", but didn't really seem substantial enough as its own section. A subsection of "Publication history" works well, thank you. Frickative 18:42, 3 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

References

I notice that no African reviewers are present within the references. Do you know of any? I would think that such a topic would get an African review. Sadads (talk) 02:36, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've spent quite a while today searching to try and find some, but I'm coming up blank. I've found a fairly extensive list of reviews through Simon & Schuster that covers both major and more niche publications, but that doesn't seem to list any either. So far, the only review I've found not written by a British, American or Canadian writer is this one in the Indian Business Standard. Frickative 16:55, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That is alright, the literary communities are really polarized right now: the Africans are trying to establish themselves as a distinct group and the Europeans not being very receptive about African stylistic techniques.... Thought there might have been something though. Sadads (talk) 17:27, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What about the film?

I notice the piece about the "upcoming film". That section is four years old. What has happened with the film? Tanzania (talk) 12:04, 22 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The article comes off as hopelessly dated given the breathless discussion of a movie that was never made -- indeed, this section reads as if it was written by a publicist for Kidman or Cleave. I edited the section to put references to the film in the past tense with passive voice rather than the future tense, but better would be for someone to cut the section down to a single sentence. PaulAlanLevy (talk) 23:03 20 June 2017) (UTC)