[stylist] Book Networking

[Justin Oldham]

Hello Kerry:

Good Reads and Library Thing are fine hangouts for readers.  Especially 
useful for critics who like to review the books they read.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Kerry Thompson" <kethompson1964 at gmail.com>
To: <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Monday, August 29, 2011 2:41 PM
Subject: [stylist] Book Networking


Something I should have thought of last night during Justin’s presentation:

There are book-related social networking sites. I know of two, Good
Reads (http://www.goodreads.com/) and Library Thing
(http://www.librarything.com). All I know about Good Reads is what it
says on the front page which is in part:

Are You an Author or a Publisher?
Gain access to a massive audience of more than 5 million book lovers.
Goodreads is a great place to promote your books.

There is a button labeled “Author Program” and one labeled “Advertise.”

Being a member of Library Thing, I can discuss it in detail. There are
three aspects to Library Thing.

It is a cataloguing site. You can enter, rate and “tag” or label books
you read, categorizing them in one of several pre-set categories such as
Your Library, that is books you own, Read but Unowned, for library books
and the like, Wish List, etc. Under certain circumstances you can see
other people’s libraries and collections and add books from them to one
of your collections, as for instance to your Wish List. Library Thing
keeps a running total of the number of books in all your collections as
well as the number in each separate collection. For instance, there are
789 books in my Your Library collection, meaning that I have so far
catalogued 789 of the books I own.

It is a social site. You can have friends, as on Facebook. You can join
and participate in any of almost innumerable groups. The one I
participate in most often is “What Are You Reading The week Of...”
where, as the name suggests, participant discuss their current reading.
It is also possible to create discussion threads and groups of your own.
Some of these groups become very lively and close-knit.

Finally, of most immediate interest here, Library Thing is a place where
authors and publishers can publicize their work. Some authors are
designated as Library Thing authors, meaning that they have both
personal profiles and libraries and author pages. A Library Thing author
may be profiled and/or interviewed in the site’s monthly newsletter.
Online chats are also organized with these authors.

I know less about LT’s relationships with publishers. One popular
feature I do know about is the early reviewer program. In this program,
a publisher releases a certain number of books to LT for free
distribution before the official pub date. Early review books always get
a lot of attention and cause a lot of buzz, generating both demand for
library copies and book sales. Non-ER books can also catch fire and
suddenly become the book that everybody is reading this week or this
month, thereby also generating sales.

A presence on Library Thing, and presumably also on Good Reads, can
reach a lot of potential readers.

Kerry

_______________________________________________
Writers Division web site:
http://www.nfb-writers-division.net <http://www.nfb-writers-division.org/>

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