GREAT TIME TO JOIN GOODREADS if you haven't

LoriLori · ‎03-12-2010

FYI:

I'd never heard of it I avoid social media like um the plague or I hope. I'm not on FB never have been etc. etc. etc.

GR is the social media networking site that is exclusively for booklovers.

You can make friends. I was private for six years and regret it, a family member got me on there. Still there is so much to gain. You can read strangers' reviews of what they're reading, check in some cases tens of thousands of reviews, the average of those, whatever.

And if you decide to "make" GR friends like I did:

Well I started at the end of June and I have over 340 (and I dropped many of the first ones as I learned what friends I prefer, I dropped at last 30 once I had the lay of the land).

I have never received as many friend requests as I have this week. From all over the world. I have GR friends on every continent but Antarctica.

They giveaway books and I mentioned this in the giveaway thread but if you join for this alone and choose to be private -- they are giving away books like never before. Why?

Well, Amazon is focused on first responders and not signing new contracts with publishers for book reviews (which cost a lot of money per review anyway). And, um, publishers are almost all located in NY, Little Brown is in Boston, they're not at work and so ALL the books in the pipeline are going to be affected.

So Amazon (which owns GR) is giving books to GR and so are publishers, ebooks, and some aren't new (among others I got notification about this morning is Daisy Jones and the Six).

You can create a to-be-read list and sign up for email notifications and they will email you when a book on your list is being given away.

It's so great and easy and you can be private all the while.

If you decide to have friends (and if you're sheltering in place and your real life people have issues and you need an oasis, I can't recommend it highly enough):

You can compare books, check what they read and if they reviewed it wit one click, see who their favorite authors and books are, see who else their friends are, read their profiles and send a message with the reqeuest...

And when you get a request you can ignore it and then they're following you. And if you don't want them following you you can get rid of them, even block them (but I've never had a problem).

I could go on but let me give you two examples (and again, anyone who thinks this is too long has a heart at least two sizes too small, is mean and unhappy and I'm not interested in your nasty feedback, I pity you and you know who you are):

Just last two days:

Story 1:

Yesterday afternoon a GR friend in Montreal who has covid and knows I read horror private messaged me (which you don't have to allow) and asked me to recommend some great horror novels to get his mind off the terror of having it and quarantine.

I checked what he's read and had no ideas so I then PM'd a guy in Germany who has so many GR friends I didn't expect to hear back and he is an expert on horror.

This morning I woke up to a lovely long email from the horror guy in Germany who I wasn't even sure I'd hear from with a long list of recs for my guy in Montreal, who was thrilled. Thrilled. Book lover helping book lover with covid and I'm just the middle person. I was so happy. And GR friend in Germany has GR person in Montreal wtih covid on his mind -- because book lovers! -- and has sent me a few more PMs for my GR friend as they occur to him.

Story 2:

A GR friend who I feel somewhat close to lives on an island in the U.S., a very small island with no hospital and a ferry. He has it too. And is terrified. So I recommended Proust. And he ordered the hard copy but although I criticiized him (LOL) he ordered an inferior translation as an e-book to get started.

I'm so glad he did that. He's pretty sick and can't read much but it's THERE when he can. And from knowing what he reads and likes and a few PMs I could give him that.

So:

Never had so many friend requests as this week from all over the world.

Never seen so many book giveaways and that won't stop.

You choose your adventure. Even if you just want to enter the giveaways. Because the e-book giveaway sites like netgalley will be affected (new books delayed, very less books to give away) soon too. Tha's one thing Amazon can do easily for everybody.

Choose your own adventure. Some days I just read book reviews, I love reading twenty different people's very different (longer than here) takes on say Eight Perfect Murders. Because I have a short attention span now.

Choose your own adventure and if you're new to GR because of this THING please do post about your experience.

best, Lori

Catty2 · ‎09-06-2014

Thanks for that information. Over the weekend I found a website called Thrift Books. I am an avid reader and am almost done with the books I checked out of my library before they closed. This website has tons of books (large prnt and regular) in various conditions for as little as $4.00 with free shipping. I placed my first order a few days ago and it has shipped already.

Laura14 · ‎06-09-2014

@LoriLori Thank you. I think I may head over and sign up. I could use some book friends. Working through my library stash now.

CANDLEQUEEN · ‎03-09-2010

@Catty2 wrote:
Thanks for that information. Over the weekend I found a website called Thrift Books. I am an avid reader and am almost done with the books I checked out of my library before they closed. This website has tons of books (large prnt and regular) in various conditions for as little as $4.00 with free shipping. I placed my first order a few days ago and it has shipped already.

@Catty2 . I purchase a lot from Thrift Books as well.! Very quick shipping and books are very reasonably priced.

GingerPeach · ‎03-12-2010

I had no idea about the social aspect of GoodReads since I only look at it for a review now and then. I will want to dig a bit deeper now thanks to your info, @LoriLori

[was Homegirl] Love to be home . . . thus the screen name. Joined 2003.

LoriLori · ‎03-12-2010

@GingerPeach wrote:
I had no idea about the social aspect of GoodReads since I only look at it for a review now and then. I will want to dig a bit deeper now thanks to your info, @LoriLori

Another night when I couldn't sleep. Just spent about four hours reading friends' reviews. Laughing one minute, fascinated the next, every so often adding a book. Love it! Go there and if you want clues I can tell you how to find me

And a tip: When you're first starting out don't send people dorky messages like I did that say "According to GR we have 275 books in common and our taste is 87.9% similar." I just went right to Frederik Backman and started friending everyone whose reviews I liked -- but that message was not a successful one and the people who did respond were the ones I ended up ditching LOL..."Hi, I want to be your friend because I liked your review of..." or "You seem interesting" or nothing, just hitting the friiend button works fine. I'm an idiot 🤣

I bless that site every day for something or other. In the middle of the night I wrote a review and getting "love" back in the form of likes and comments doesn't hurt either.

And to @Laura14 hope you find a new world there and if either of you or anyone has questions can post them here.

I don't know about anyone else but our mayor, who is the only one leveling with us in this whole freaking state, said in his most recent update yesterday to plan on another month. That's after three weeks of this.

GR is literally my happy place!