Brain Assassin » books

Shelfari: My Favorite Online Bookshelf

JC — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 19:09:01 +0000

Early this year I was looking for an online bookshelf to manage my books. It had to be online so that I could access it at a whim from everywhere. I did some research and I discovered Shelfari which I’ve been using for almost a year now. Since then Shelfari has come a long way. The folks over there did an awesome job and I’m glad to have found the site. I’m using it quite frequently these days – though I have yet to add all my books – and I thought it’s time to praise the service.

Shelfari features an appealing design and is very easy to use, as long as you don’t use the more sophisticated functions. Searching for books is very easy and you can do so by title, author name, or ISBN. Since they have access to Amazon’s database your searches only rarely come up with nothing. After you found a specific book you can add it to your personal library with a simple click. Additionally, you can provide some information on the book, e. g., whether you own the book or not, how much it cost you, your review, tags, and so on. Some of the additional information is private and only you can see it.

Your bookshelf is split in sex sections, namely “I plan to read”, “I’m reading”, “I’ve read”, “Favorites”, “Own”, and “Wish list”. You can export and import your whole bookshelf to and from an Excel spreadsheet. Even more important, you can create and save widgets and use them on your website. These widgets contain specific books or sections from your library and you can configure the appearance. I am using one widget on my library page. Now that’s a handy feature and part of the reason I chose Shelfari over all the others.

Unfortunately, where there’s light there is shadow. Choosing the right edition isn’t as straight forward as it should be. First, you have to add the main edition and only then can you add another, your own edition. Next, you have to set the latter one to display on your shelf and only then can you remove the main edition of the book. It certainly isn’t a deal-breaker but there are a few of these minor issues and they can dampen your experience somewhat.

Nonetheless, I like the service very much, even though they still can’t provide my personal rating of a book in the widget. Well, I hope they’re going to fix that soon.

Online Bookshelves

JC — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 16:29:52 +0000

During the recent work on my blog I thought that I could come up with some kind of library section. Unfortunately, that was easier said than done. I tried to come up with a solution to display all the books I own – well, at least the English ones – but I couldn’t figure out how to make it user friendly and well arranged. So, I was browsing the internet looking for inspiration when I stumbled over an online bookshelf. Where there’s one, there are usually more. A quick search ended with a few possible solutions.

The first online bookshelf I found is called LibraryThing. I immediately signed up and tried a few things. Unfortunately, I discovered during the registration process that you can only add up to 200 books for free. If you want more books, you have to pay $10 a year or $25 once. I gladly pay for services rendered but I don’t like to pay for something that doesn’t suit my needs. I have to say, though, that LibraryThing is easy to use, offers lots of languages and scanner support. Yeah, well … I decided to do a little more research.

GuruLib is the next site I discovered. After signing up I found that this one offer a quite extensive database. It’s very user friendly too but it looks quite dull. Interestingly enough, GuruLib isn’s specifically for books. One can also use it to manage movies, music, games and software. It’s nice enough and it’s free but it looks way too spartan to me. So, off I was to check out the next one.

The third site I visited was Reader². To be honest, I didn’t really register there. Skimming over the first page pretty soon made it clear that this site specializes in the social aspect of collecting books. Yes, you can create a list of books and put it online but I wanna do more. Plus, a little research with google showed that even though the site supports a few languages it doesn’t find lots of books so you have to enter them manually. Navigation is pretty confusing too, so I didn’t stay all that long.

The next online bookshelf I got to know is Shelfari. It features a nice design and it has some tools to show your collection on your blog. LibraryThing also offers these widgets but they’re not quite what I was looking for. German books don’t work all that well but that’s OK, I only want to catalog my English books. Shelfari is also the first service that offers the option to delete your account. According to the latest blog entry Shelfari recently integrated with Amazon’s search algorithms. Satisfied as I was I chose to go with this bookshelf.

I did found some other services, though. There’s All Consuming which looks a bit funky and seems to concentrate on the social aspect of consuming in general rather than consuming books. Goodreads falls into the same category but focuses on giving recommendations. Last but not least, Revish is also centered on the social aspect of reading. You can review and talk about books while maintaining and sharing your reading lists.

Shelfari: My Favorite Online Bookshelf

Writing a book …

JC — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 10:19:00 +0000

… should be fun. One shouldn’t write a book if it means hard work (looking up some facts hardly counts as hard work here). I always wanted to write at least one book and have it on a bestseller list. Nice dream, you say? Well, I know I’m good at writing if I set my mind to it. Don’t let my not so perfect command of the English language fool you into believing that I’m bad with words. I have been good at writing in my native language in the past and I won’t do bad in the future. That’s a fact.

I should start right now because I’ve planned to start writing before I turn 26. There’s only one problem: I don’t know what to write about. Sounds crazy, eh? You see, I got shitloads of ideas in my head and I simply can’t pick one. Of course, I don’t have everything planned in advance but I have already a very rough outline for every story I want to bring to paper. Right now, in this very moment, I’m trying to settle for the plot I’d like to explore the most, thanks to my multi-tasking capabilities.

Interestingly enough, Evil Spock recommended the TV show Heroes not too long ago and since I’ve finished it my mind is filled with new ideas. In fact, I feel like Peter Petrelli – like not being able to contain all my thoughts. I try and I try, but they desperately wanna get outta my head, with exploding force. To accommodate my writing skills and my future publishers, I will have to invent the Brainlink, enabling me to communicate with my computer wirelessly by thought only …

It’s a small world

JC — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 09:32:00 +0000

It truly is. But that’s not exactly something knew I pulled out of my magic hat. There’s the Small World Project and the Small World Experiment to prove that. In short, experiments showed that the average path length for social networks of people in the United States is about six. Interesting stuff but only mildly related to what I’m aiming at.

I stumbled over – mind you, StumbleUpon really sucks – an interesting site that may prove useful to me. It’s something called Literature-Map. Some guys gathered some information on authors and writers and created an intriguing map because “the closer two writers are, the more likely someone will like both of them”. Provides a great method to get to know new writers, I guess. At least, it sounds better than scouring different forums for some recommendations …

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Buying a book is hard work

JC — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 09:28:00 +0000

It really is, I promise. Yeah, I’ve been away for some time but I had to spend some days with my parents, celebrating my grandma’s 90th birthday. Anyway, long time no post. And so I asked myself what would possibly be worth some complaining? At first, I didn’t come up with something interesting but then, all of a sudden, a recent experience just invaded my current train of thought: Buying a book. I like to read and read a lot, literally scores of books a year. I prefer Fantasy and Sci-Fi because that’s where there are no boundaries. The only limit is imposed by the author of the respective book and that’s why any author in these genres can let his imagination loose.

Unfortunately, I’m a bit picky. You know, been there, read that. I’d like to read something new and I seriously dislike – hate would be to strong an emotion for fictitious things, wouldn’t it? – reading the nth installment of the same old plot created by Tolkien, for instance. I don’t like the classic good vs. evil stories either and I can’t, for the life of me, figure out why so much of the epic fantasy/sci-fi stuff has to be so homogeneous. Thus, I can’t just walk into the next book store, take a look around and buy a bunch of books. If it only were so easy.

I regularly scout the local bookstore for new mind food but that’s all there is to it. I don’t buy thin books and I seldom buy single novels. I like epics and that almost always involves three or more volumes. Anyway, I gather some intel, take some photographs and then it’s up to my usually reliable source of information, the internet, to help me make my decision. I check out sffworld.com and the forum for reviews and some additional thoughts. I like to see some fellow readers to actually recommend or damn the book in question. It’s not that I don’t take chances. Sometimes I forget all about these “rules of buying” and just grab a book that looks interesting to me. The odds are fifty-fifty and that’s the usual result of picking books without further investigation.

I’ve tortured myself over the past few weeks because I’m running out of stuff. I needed some new input and I had to look really hard to come up with some books. First off, I was able to grab a copy of The Fate of the Fallen, Volume One of The Song of the Tears – Ian Irvine’s continuation of the Three Worlds Cycle. Arguably one of the best series in the whole fantasy genre. Next I chose Heroes Die by Matthew Woodring Stover to accompany the rest of my sci-fi novels. Finally, my Amazon order was concluded by R. Scott Bakker’s Prince of Nothing series. I don’t know much about this one but I hope it’ll end in a pleasant surprise. For now, I’m already looking forward to having these books in my possession

Wizard’s Rules

JC — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 14:13:00 +0000

Just last week I started to read a new series called The Sword of Truth. Quite intriguing, I have to admit but it’s starting to become repetitive and slow-turning. I almost regret having bought the first six books in advance. Currently, I’m in the very midst of volume four. I’ve tasted enough to buy the rest because I simply want to know how the story unfolds.A very interesting concept is the introduction of a new Wizard’s rule with every new volume. In this series only wizards know about them and try to live by them. A complete list of these rules can be found here. I like these rules, they seem to be created by simply looking into life itself and Terry Goodkind seems to make them up as he walks along.

Wizard’s First Rule: “People are stupid. They will believe anything they want to be true or fear to be true.”

Wizard’s Second Rule: “The greatest harm can result from the best intentions.”

Wizard’s Third Rule: “Passion rules reason.”

Well, these rules are truly worth knowing. Especially if one doesn’t live in a fictitious world, one should know about them. They can provide guidance for some of us. I knew them all before and I know them today because I learned the hard way. For instance, I use the First Rule to better understand other people. One can learn from everything …

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Buying a new book series …

JC — Fri, 30 Jun 2006 12:32:00 +0000

… now is more difficult than ever. I simply want the whole series looking the same. The series I’m talking about is called The Tawny Man, written by Robin Hobb. As some may already have guessed, I’ve just completed the Faarseer series and I’m eagerly waiting for the aforementioned trilogy to arrive. No, wait, that’s not true. Why is that? As it happens, I can’t find the three books featuring the same cover style. Neither Amazon nor the local book stores can do anything about it. My favorite local store does have book two and book three of the reprint edition. Not even Amazon can provide me with the first book of this series. Dammit.

This is a trend I’ve been watching for almost a year now. It’s getting more and more difficult to get what you want. Sure, I could just buy books with different cover styles. Since the content stays the same it wouldn’t really matter. Well, I don’t want it that way. I want consistency. I want them so look similar, at the very least. They should be recognizable as a series just by looking at them for half a second. As if life wouldn’t be hard enough to do without such inconveniences.

Books

JC — Wed, 03 May 2006 08:58:00 +0000

I’ve read scores of books up to date and there’s only thing I want to state: I love books. You can’t read enough because you never know what information might come in handy. Ok, I confess, I’m not down with tech books or lexica. I read to enjoy, to relax. Got to admit there are quite some books I read for educational purposes. Well, one can’t read for pleasure alone.

I’ve roamed the public libraries of the city I live in and I spend about one hour a week looking for new books, online or in local stores. I’m always on the hunt for a good read, be it in the sci-fi, the fantasy or the (high-tech) thriller genre. I like horror stories too, but Stephen King simply sucks. The only one to ever make me look over my shoulder was Howard Phillips Lovecraft he wrote very admirable, subtle stuff. Over the last few years I’ve bought a whole lot of fantasy books and that’s the genre most of my favorite authors work in. Coincidence? I’m not so sure … I read Memory, Sorrow and Thorn when I was a teen and I quickly came to love Tad Williams.

From this moment on my path has been predestined, I suppose. I read many books – some good, some bad and most of ‘em average – and there they were. A few names who stand for quality and innovation. A few authors capable of creating believable worlds unsurpassed in continuity, appearance and credibility. Ian Irvine stands out most. His Three Worlds cycle is really noteworthy, one of the most exciting reads I’ve ever had. Since I don’t want to plaster this piece of text with the names of my all-time favorites, I should stop now. You can always take a closer look at my profile to see the bunch of ‘em.

Ah, what am I trying to achive with this text? Very good question. I don’t know. I’ve had this nagging feeling for quite some time now. There’s … hmm … nothing new in town. Most of the stories are uniques if you take a closer look but if you strip down the tales to their bare essentials there’s always a very similar plot inside. Even the concept of the antihero isn’t new anymore, too many writers have already adapted this idea. Is there nothing new to be written? Aren’t there some untold stories left? Plots evolving around some unique, innovative ideas?

I’m sure, there is more than enough stuff only waiting to be addressed by some nifty writer. It surely isn’t easy. We all know why even some well-established authors avoid some topics. If it’s too weird, too many people won’t like it and, thus, aren’t going to read it. Ah, the very pitfall of writing. A story is either too lame and unimaginative or it’s too sick. To cut it short, you need some serious writing skills to get it right. I sincerely hope the delivery from Amazon is coming soon …

The Da Vinci Code

JC — Mon, 01 May 2006 21:21:00 +0000

The Da Vinci Code is a popular and very controversial novel written by Dan Brown and first published in 2003. Nowadays, it’s really famous because it generated criticism from the very moment it has been published. Since the movie is going to hit cinemas on May 18th this year, it’s about time to take a closer look at this topic. Well-known actors like Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Ian McKellen, Jean Reno and Paul Bettany, just to name a few, should be able to get some people storming the theaters. Also, there’s a game slated for release on May 19th (the movie will be released in the USA on this day too).

First of all, I’ve read the book in 2004 and I found it quite entertaining. Oh yeah, I’ve been baptized and I was a Catholic Christian until I turned 19. At least, it’s been this way on the paper. My tutors and teachers always encouraged me to think for myself, to question things instead of blindly believing them and so I did. I won’t bother writing about the religious aspects of my life. I’m not religious and I believe that nobody can neither prove nor disprove God’s existence. Either way, I wouldn’t care because belief only matters to the believer as I shortly tried to point out here.

As of March 2006, more than 40 million copies have been sold. Obviously, the book is a work of fiction but it isn’t treated this way. Instead of the usual criticism, this book has generated much more controversial discussions and there has definitely been a lot of publicity; in fact, there still is. The Da Vinci Code has attracted generally negative responses from within the Christian communities throughout the whole world. It has been argued that Brown has distorted – fabricated, even – history to fit his novel best. Because of two lawsuits and the call for boycotting the movie from a Vatican official – there’s even a website refuting the key claims in the novel – Sony won’t have to put that much money in promoting the movie, that’s for sure.

As for the question if your money’s well spent on the book or the movie, I can’t be of any real use. I do like a good read and it’s been quite entertaining, as I already stated in the very beginning. There are many better reads, that you can be sure of. The Da Vinci Code repeats a number of erroneous claims, which only matters because of a statement in the beginning of the book: All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate. If you’d like to know more about these claims be sure to head over there. Eventually, you’ll come to understand what that fuss is all about.

As a reader, I don’t care. I’d never expect a fictitious work to contain an accurate reproduction of the real world we live in, no matter what kinda different claims there may be. I’d like to be entertained. I want the book to thrill me. I need the book urging me to read on until I’ve reached the end. I can’t say that all this applies to The Da Vinci Code. Nonetheless, I’m gonna watch the movie and I’ll try to evade the not so open-minded fanatics boycotting the movie because of some wannabe-claims in a fictitious book. Yeah, I’m gonna laugh out really loud although it’s a very sad world we live in. With all the efforts they’re dedicating to this cause they could help thousands of other people. They chose to boycott the movie and the book respectively in a fruitless effort to cleanse the world of this blasphemous work. It’s a pity.

Buying a new book series …