Talk:Sherry Thomas

Sherry Thomas received a peer review by Wikipedia editors, which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article.

Sherry Thomas was nominated as a Language and literature good article, but it did not meet the good article criteria at the time (November 21, 2015). There are suggestions on the review page for improving the article. If you can improve it, please do; it may then be renominated.

A fact from Sherry Thomas appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 27 June 2015 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that critically acclaimed historical romance author Sherry Thomas was born in China, lives in Texas, and writes about Victorian England?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2015/June. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Sherry Thomas.

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Sources[edit]

If more sources are needed to back up statement about her works often cited by others as faves and/or their descriptions on her writing [1] - [2] - [3] - [4] plange (talk) 04:44, 11 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review[edit]

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

Reviewer: Notecardforfree (talk · contribs) 20:34, 11 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Rate	Attribute	Review Comment
1. Well-written:
	1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.	This article is well-crafted and generally free of errors.
	1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.	The article satisfies these policy requirements.
2. Verifiable with no original research:
	2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.	See comments regarding unsourced assertions.
	2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose).	See comments.
	2c. it contains no original research.	See comments regarding assertions not substantiated by sources.
3. Broad in its coverage:
	3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.	See comments regarding criticism of her writing.
	3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).	This article does not lose focus.
	4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.	See comments regarding criticism of her writing.
	5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.	This article has been stable since June, 2015.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
	6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.	All images are properly licensed.
	6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.	No issued with MOS for images.
	7. Overall assessment.	See comments below.

Comments from Notecardforfree[edit]

This article is interesting and well-written. However, there are a few issues that need to be addressed before this article can be approved for GA status. Most of the comments listed below pertain to rule 2 of the Good Article Criteria, which require all assertions to be supported by citations to reliable sources. Many paragraphs include a group of citations at the end of the paragraph, rather than after the end of the sentence in which the assertion is made. Per WP:CITEDENSE, you need to include the relevant citation after the portion of text in which the assertion is made, rather than at the end of the paragraph. Aside from those general considerations, here are my specific comments:

Biography

Can you provide a source that says she was born in 1975? The Romance Bandits interview says she came to the U.S. when she was thirteen, but I didn't see her age or birth year stated anywhere in that interview. The Library Journal interview says she was 13 years old in 1988, but that could also mean she was born in 1974.
The Kirkus interview confirms she learned English by reading science fiction and romance novels, but it does not say that she read Rosemary Rogers novels. Can you provide a source for the claim about reading Rodgers' novels?
The "personal life" section consists of only one very brief sentence. Sections that only consist of a single sentence are usually discouraged (see WP:PARAGRAPHS). Can you merge this with the "early life" section to make a single biography section?

Writing career

Can you include a source that says she sold her first book to Bantam in 2006?
Can you include a source that says she revamped "Heart of Blade" into The Hidden Blade and My Beautiful Enemy?
Can you include a source that says "Schemes of Love" was retitled as Private Arrangements?
In the "writing career" section, when discussing her first novel, you say "Nelson sold it in a preempt to Bantam". Do you mean that Nelson sold it so that Bantam couldn't represent her? Or do you mean that she sold the book to Banta to preempt Nelson? It sounds like you are taking the language from the Nelson Agency blog, but can you rephrase this sentence to clarify what you mean?
The pub rants blog does not substantiate the fact that Private Arrangements was scheduled for release in 2007. Can you provide another source for this?
The Publishers Weekly source calls the book a "best of" 2008 book, but I did not see them list it as "Best First Historical Romance of 2008". Can you clarify this?
Can you provide a source that says Not Quite a Husband won a RITA award in 2010? You provide a source in the lead but you need an inline citation in the body of the article.
Can you provide a source to substantiate that "His at Night" won a RITA award? You provide a source in the lead but you need an inline citation in the body of the article.
The paragraph that begins "Up until then, she had been releasing stand-alone historical romances with Bantam ..." needs citations to support the assertions made in this paragraph (with the exception of the claim about the Seal of Excellence award).
I don't think the Kirkus review of The Luckiest Lady in London actually called it "one of the best romances of 2013". Can you clarify this?
Can you include a citation to support the assertion that "2015 marked another departure with her self-published release in April of a contemporary romance, The One in My Heart"?

Thomas' views on writing

Can you provide a citation for the assertion that "Rogers's novels acted as her gateway to the romance genre"?
The citation in footnote 36 to this RT article is broken. Can you fix this?

Writing style

You have a block quotation followed by five inline citations. A block quotation should only include one citation to the source of that quotation. If the other references support assertions earlier in this section, they should be placed immediately following the sentence in which that assertion is made. In any event, you need a citation after the first sentence to show which reviewers are making those descriptions.
You only include one brief sentence about criticisms of her writing style (albeit with four citations). Can you expand this a bit? WP:BLP requires fair and balanced coverage, so if there is substantial criticism of her work, you should explain this in more detail.

Writing themes

You say that a "betrayed couple" is a common motif in her work. Can you provide a citation that says this is common among her works? You cite a review of her first novel to make a claim about themes in all of her books, but it seems that the author of that review wouldn't be able to make such claims without reading her other books.

Bibliography

Why do you number some of the books as "x.5"? Are they half books? I would recommend using only whole numbers.
You need to cite a source that states this is her complete bibliography.

Awards and reception

You need a citation for every award.
You need to provide a citation for the claim that "Her books are often cited by other romance authors as their top favorites". Simply citing a few authors who list Thomas' books as their favorites does not substantiate the assertion that this happens "often".

Otherwise, please let me know if you have any questions. I will place this review on hold for one week so that necessary changes can be made. Best, -- Notecardforfree (talk) 20:34, 11 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Closing remarks[edit]

Ten days have passed since my initial review of this article, and I have not heard back from the nominator (in fact, it looks like Plange has not been active on Wikipedia for the last three months). I posted a request for help at Wikipedia:WikiProject Romance/Notice Board, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Women writers, and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Women/Women in Red to see if another editor would be willing to step in and make the necessary improvements, but no one was interested in taking on the project. As I explained in the comments above, there is still significant work that needs to be done to improve this article. I hope that one day someone will be able to improve this article to GA status, but right now, it is not ready. -- Notecardforfree (talk) 19:13, 21 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]