While I like my techno-toys, I am way behind in many areas of technology–I’ve resisted blogging for years, and shun anything that resembles social networking. But now that I’m blogging (thanks a lot, Matt), I thought I might as well play with widgets, which led me to LibraryThing. It’s on the social side for me–I had to make my book list public!–but has generating buzz in the library community for months (years?) now, so I thought I should finally try it out.
The library community has a tendency to get excited about every new tool, but it turns out LibraryThing is pretty cool. You can search for books you own via the Amazon or Library of Congress catalogs, rate them, add dates purchased and read, and create a shelf list of everything you own. If you keep lists elsewhere, say in Amazon or some other book software, you can import your list… but you can only load 200 books per year in the free account.
I’m using it to generate a list of books I’ve read, so I loaded everything I’ve finished in 2007 in chronological order. That means the books you see to the left are–starting at the top–what I’m working on, then the most recently finished.
My list only goes back to January, so be sure to take a look at Matt’s list, which I believe covers his whole life. Few of us can be so dedicated.
Hi Allegra! It’ll be fun to ‘get to know you’ a bit more through this blog. I’m impressed by your reading list. Sometime in college I forgot how to read for fun, and I feel a vague sense of guilt about it. I’m trying to reclaim the enjoyment I used to get out of reading, though. I recently discovered Jodi Picoult and have really enjoyed a few of her novels. Your list inspires me to start reading more.
Welcome to the blogging world! I think it is great that you and Matt have started a blog.
I’ve been using LibraryThing for quite some time now – I’ve had my account since 9/05 (wow, amazing how time flies!). I use it to track what I read as well. I have been tracking ever since I graduated from college, but I don’t have everything entered into LibraryThing. I tried to do it at one point, but then got burned out on all the data entry. I’m missing almost three years worth, and while it used to bug me quite a bit but I’m managing to ignore it for now.
I’m intrigued by a couple of the books you’ve listed – particularly The Last Town on Earth and the Thirteenth Tale. We’re heading to the library today, I think I’ll see if I can find at least one of them!
Take care, and I’m looking forward to continuing to read your blog.
I must warn you, Thirteenth Tale has a few grim pages. I guess it’s no worse than Wuthering Heights… if it were written in 2006. But if you read those few pages with your eyes half shut, it’s well worth it. The Last Town on Earth was a nice surprise–I ripped right through it, could barely put it down.
I also have an answer to Sarah’s comment as well (amazing, considering she didn’t ask a question), but I think it will require a follow up post. It’s percolating.