Five Sites to Help You Find Your Next Read
It’s long been said that readers don’t have a problem with finding their next book, but given the number of sites that have set out to solve that problem I’m not so sure that’s true.
Earlier today one such site came across my desk, and that got me thinking that I knew of at least a dozen similar sites that all help you find the next book you want to read.
Here are 5 of them.
To be honest, I’ve never tried any of these sites; I’ve rarely needed help finding another book to read, and when I want ideas I go ask on Twitter.
I prefer Twitter because I see it as the modern equivalent of asking a friend in that it adds a random human element which I like and I’m not sure is provided by any of the following sites.
What’s your favorite method for finding a new read?
Comments
AltheGreatandPowerful February 6, 2015 um 8:42 am
Is this a real problem for people?
Seriously?
I cannot imagine how someone cannot find another book they want to read.
Name (required) February 6, 2015 um 3:51 pm
Yes. Seriously.
I have always been an opportunist. As a kid I started to use library, later multiple libraries. Once you read through the most obvious choices you look for books in piles of freshly returned books. You are not looking for a specific book, just to discover something interesting.
Nowadays I have more choices and sometimes I want a specific book.
I very much liked books by Brian Haig, but I have read the entire Sean Drummond series and want something similar. In such situation those sites can be helpful.
Other usecase is too much choice. When you have one bookcase of new books in a library you can select a few books to take home and you are very likely to like some of them.
When you have choice of couple of million e-books that are available on Amazon, some people do need help with locating the right one.
PHaDventure February 6, 2015 um 8:59 am
Is Goodreads missing on purpose, or is that website just to obvious? 😛
Nate Hoffelder February 6, 2015 um 9:00 am
I left out all the more obvious ones, yes.
Scott Lewis February 6, 2015 um 9:11 am
I give up. If I needed help finding a good read, it’d be just as likely I didn’t know about Goodreads than that I did. And I don’t know what you’re doing here, five sites that could be great or bad, but you don’t know because you haven’t used them?
Nate Hoffelder February 6, 2015 um 9:34 am
I knew Goodreads would be mentioned in the comments, and I avoided expressing judgement on the other sites because the most important detail is whether they work for you, not me.
Scott Lewis February 6, 2015 um 9:45 am
I just don’t get it. You are a blog, not Google. You can express "judgement on other sites". Or even if you don’t, you can still describe those sites. I don’t know why everyone comes here, but in my case, it’s because you cover a lot of tablets and eReaders that many mainstream sites won’t, and you provide a good daily aggregation of "reader-centric" articles on other sites. There are other things you do, but those are the reasons why I come.
Your reviews express judgments. That’s a good thing. And your links to other articles of interest mention what the article is about.
This is just a random listing of 5 sites. Incidentally, if I Google "find your next read", the second result is a GigaOm article talking about a couple of sites (without overtly mentioning if the author loves or hates them), but it gives details on what they do and how they do it. Very informative.
A similar search for "What should I read next" finds a bunch of sites that offer to tell you just that, and about five links down, a Boston.com article, not nearly as informative as the GigaOm article above, but still more informative than yours.
I can go click on your five sites, investigate them, and maybe even come back here and leave a comment on what I found, but hey… you’re the blogger!
Jim Self February 6, 2015 um 1:53 pm
Doing that probably would have taken less time than writing a long comment complaining about the article, too.
Scott Lewis February 6, 2015 um 1:53 pm
Presumably, it’d provide quite a bit less feedback to Nate too.
Mackay Bell February 6, 2015 um 6:10 pm
It’s a time management issue. I visit this site because Nate keeps up on the latest technology and self-publishing issues and occasionally writes in depth pieces with a lot of insight.
But it’s okay if a few posts are throw aways to get some discussion. He shouldn’t have to research everything like it was the Pentagon Papers.
I like Bookbub. Sign up for the categories you are interested, and you get cheap or free offers everyday. You will definitely find more than enough good stuff to keep you as busy reading as you want to be.
Library_Anthony February 9, 2015 um 9:52 am
As a librarian I know how hard readers advisory can be, and that so far there is no silver bullet solution to the problem.
I appreciate posts like this, I don’t mind you haven’t exhaustively checked each one, that is for the individual user to decide, it’s a personal thing.
I recently read this article which sounds promising,
http://thoughtcatalog.com/porter-anderson/2015/01/a-new-architecture-of-algorithms-could-trajectory-make-books-discoverable-at-last/
Chris Meadows February 6, 2015 um 10:38 am
My favorite lit-finding site was Alexandria Digital Literature, but it seems to have vanished now. Alas.
Marilynn Byerly February 8, 2015 um 12:24 pm
I use Fussy Librarian which shows book deals, but it mainly offers Kindle reads, and I use a Nook. I get an email a day so I don’t have the hassle of going to the site.
For the same kind of email and selection service, I prefer BookBub where you can specify the type of books you like and the format so I don’t get books only in Kindle format, but also the level of violence, sex, etc.
A majority of the books listed in these emails for both services are self-pubs.
For my big publisher reads, I get a monthly issue of RTBOOKCLUB which covers more than romance these day. Their reviews are dependable. Their website is useful, too.
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