Week 4: Goodreads

This is the post I gave Rose Frase on the book she rated: Rebecca.

Hey, Rose,
This was one of my favorite books in High School. I liked it so much that I took a course in college on Gothic literature. Since there is a love story in it and, I know you read romance at times, I would have thought you would have given it a higher rating. If you liked Rebecca, you will like Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. Both books use a foreboding atmosphere that permeates throughout this romantic suspense. The Gothic nature of both novels include family secrets, love interests, and psychological drama. Mercedes

My observations with Goodreads:
I had joined many years ago and had not really taken the time to review it closely. It could be, too, that the site has developed throughout the years to become more usefull. What I do find hard it having to always sign-in to the site to review/note my books. If I am with a customer, I find going to Novelist so much quicker. I would use Goodreads more as a place to write down what I have read, but whether a customer would wait for me to open my list to get suggestions for which I can't remember is another matter. Customers don't like to wait around for you. It is an online journal of what one has read, but I also have heard from others that they still like a spreadsheet better for their list of read items.

I have also observed that the subject lists they produce in Listopia could be good for merchandising ideas, not just reading suggestions for me. Going through some of the lists, I also noticed I could easily mark them as read from such lists as the BEST Books of the 21 Century or Best Books Ever lists without having to type in the title and search for them.

The best part of the Explore button, for me, was being able to search the main genre i.e. Science Fiction, and when your receive your results, it gives you related genres/subgenres. Click on the related genres/subgenres and one gets a decent explanation on it. This helps me learn more about genres I couldn't care to read, but for which I still am required to understand/know.

In regards to groups, I don't believe I would ever join them. I like reading on my own time schedule whatever I am in the mood to read and not what others want to read. Also, as generalists in our system, reading from all areas may make one read more from a specific age level more than another depending on what is going on at the moment.