Talk:Paper Girl

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. You can locate your hook here. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by HurricaneZeta (talk) 21:55, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

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• Comment or view
• Article history

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• ... that according to the author of Paper Girl, the super rich are removing the "ladder of upward mobility" from the reach of lower-class hands?

• Source: "Her more compelling argument is that the one-percenters are squeezing out the middle class. By excluding low-wage families from college education and other opportunities, they're removing 'the ladder of upward mobility,' as she writes." Byron, Grace. (October 22, 2025). "The Muscular Compassion of Paper Girl". The New Yorker.

• • Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Crystal Springs Dam

Moved to mainspace by DrOrinScrivello (talk). Number of QPQs required: 1. Nominator has 19 past nominations.

DrOrinScrivello (talk) 19:05, 3 December 2025 (UTC).

• QPQ is done. Article is long enough and was moved to article space on December 1 and nominated on December 3 and is therefore new enough. Inline citations to WP:RS throughout, no copyright violations detected, and article is compliant will all policies. Hook fact is interesting and is an acceptable length. The only issue I have is that the source is not accessible and requires subscription access. Per WP:DYKCRIT I will need a quote provided from the source in order to verify the hook. Please ping me here when replying with a quote so I can finish reviewing.4meter4 (talk) 04:18, 4 December 2025 (UTC)

@4meter4: A quote was already provided above, does that suffice for the purposes of this review? Narutolovehinata5 (talk · contributions) 09:55, 4 December 2025 (UTC)

Sorry, 4meter4, that source is occasionally accessible for me when I try to access it and occasionally behind a firewall, with no discernible pattern as to why. I was hoping it might be available when a reviewer took a look, but alas. As NLH5 mentioned, though, I made sure to provide a quote with the hook here just in case – let me know if there's anything else you need. Thanks for the review! DrOrinScrivello (talk) 13:51, 4 December 2025 (UTC)

Yes, works for me. I must have been tired when reviewing this yesterday. Not sure how I missed the quote. I like it. It's good to go.4meter4 (talk) 14:43, 4 December 2025 (UTC)

GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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

Nominator: DrOrinScrivello (talk · contribs) 18:47, 21 April 2026 (UTC)

Reviewer: InfernoHues (talk · contribs) 04:10, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

GA review

Last updated: 01:08, 1 May 2026 (UTC) by InfernoHues

See what the criteria are and what they are not

1) Well-written

1a) the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct

"The book blends memoir with journalism, and follows Macy, who grew up poor in Urbana, Ohio, as she returns to her hometown in an attempt to discover how and why she has become politically divided from family and former friends who remained there." - might want to break this up into two sentences

 Done

"subject experts" - subject-matter experts?

 Done

"Silas, who is trans, is having to be a parent to his siblings..." - maybe change to "has to be a parent", reads a bit awkward

 Done

"...who in his memoir Hillbilly Elegy simply laid the blame for rural decay at those regions' residents." - remove "simply"

 Done

1b) it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation

• Citations should either be in the entire lead or not present (my preference). Currently only three sentences have them.

• MOS:LEADCITE says The verifiability policy states that all quotations, and any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports it, which is why I had the footnotes where I did, but I'll allow that the analysis/opinions are cited in the body so I've removed those, and left the one by the quotation.

• I don't think anything in the lead is really "likely to be challenged", but it's good now.

• Ideally lead should be shortened a bit, but it's not a huge deal.

• I try to stick to a rule of thumb of approximately one lead paragraph per major section or couple of minor sections in the body. I trimmed one clause, but I think what remains is a reasonable summary of the article. Let me know if you disagree, I'm happy to reconsider.

• I took another look, and I think that was just my personal preference talking. Looks good.

• Layout looks good. Maybe differentiate Analysis and Reception more, or consider merging the sections. They read pretty similar right now.

• One of my early GA reviewers argued for the separation of Analysis and Reception sections, saying that the former should focus on how critics analyzed the content of the book and the latter more about general reception and opinion. I agree that a fair bit of gray area exists between those two, and it can sometimes be a little arbitrary what goes where. If you believe strongly that the two should be merged, or if you have suggestions on how to differentiate more, I'll be glad to work on it.

• Good points, I wasn't aware another review had been done. I think the structure is okay, given the difficulty in separating them. I don't really have a strong opinion either way.

• Sorry for the confusion, I actually meant a review for one of my early GAs (Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr., to be specific). Yours is the first review for this particular article.

• No "words to watch" present.
• No lists present.

2) Verifiable with no original research, as shown by a source spot-check

2a) it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline

• References are present and match format.

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)

• Sources are all reliable, and cited inline properly. All lines are sourced.

2c) it contains no original research

• See source spot check.

• Looks good now.

2d) it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism

• See source spot check.

Spot Check

I selected five sources using a randomizer: 1, 4, 7, 10, 13.

Source 1: "...detailing the author's research into rural decay..." - change to despair to match source

 Done

Source 4: "...and earn his welding certificate." - source just says he's working as a welder

Y I didn't think I'd pulled that out of thin air, and sure enough, it's in Szailai 2025. I added footnotes to clarify.

"...the left only deepened the wedge between the two sides." - this implies that the sides are Democrat and Republican, but the article says the sides are urban and rural

Fixed

Source 7: looks good

Source 10: looks good

Source 13: looks good

3) Broad in its coverage

3a) it addresses the main aspects of the topic

• Covers everything relevant.

3b) it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style)

• Does not go into extraneous detail.

4) Neutral:

4) Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each

• Maybe include a more mixed review, such as this one from The Decatur Daily.

@InfernoHues: Not at all opposed, but I'm afraid that review is behind a paywall for me and Newspapers.com doesn't have modern issues of that paper. Any chance you know of a way that I can access it? (And I'll be working on your other suggestions shortly.) DrOrinScrivello (talk) 18:58, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

Weird, there's no paywall on my end. Only the first and last paragraphs have any sort of analysis, the rest of it is just a summary of the book. I'll just copy them here.

First paragraph:

Beth Macy’s new book, Paper Girl, is a difficult one to classify. It is part memoir, part sociological treatise, part exposé, part political commentary and, in large part, a chronicle of a dysfunctional, dying town. It is the story of Urbana, Ohio, the author’s hometown and, unfortunately, an example of more than one community in the American Midwest.

Last paragraph:

This is not a joyful book to read, but it is an honest, no-holds-barred look at a significant segment of American society today. The book could have benefited from a good editor, for Macy tends to jump unexpectedly from one subject to another and people appear, then reappear, in a sometimes confusing manner. Nevertheless, in spite of its flaws, it tells a story which needs to be heard, especially by politicians of all stripes. It is worth the time invested.

InfernoHues (talk) 19:07, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

Added

Source has been added, now good.

5) Stable:

5) Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute

• Article is stable.

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

• Book cover is tagged correctly and has a rationale provided. However, the book cover fair use template says "...the copyright for it is most likely owned either by the artist who created the cover(s) or the publisher of the book(s)." The book's front matter says that the cover design was done by Sara Wood, but the file says the copyright holder is Beth Macy.

Fixed Well I'll be. The file upload wizard asks for the author of the work, I've never interpreted that to mean anything other than the author of the book, but it looks like you're right. TIL.

Now fixed, all good.

6b) media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions

• Image is relevant as it's the book cover.

Overall:

Comments:

@InfernoHues: Thanks for taking up this review! Appreciate the feedback thus far, and I've added my comments above. DrOrinScrivello (talk) 15:45, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

I responded to your comments and finished up the rest of the sections. This is my first ever GA review so it might be a bit rough. InfernoHues (talk) 18:09, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

Not rough at all, I think you've done a bang up job, first review or not. I believe I've addressed everything so far, let me know what you think. DrOrinScrivello (talk) 21:23, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

Thank you! You've fixed everything I pointed out, happy to pass this. InfernoHues (talk) 01:07, 1 May 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.