BookArmy is a new social networking site for books

I just joined bookarmy. From what I can tell, what sets bookarmy apart from the other book sites (GoodReads, Librarything, etc.) is that it is set up specifically as a social networking site for books. Before they can lure me away from GoodReads, though, they need to get those apps/widgets created so I can flow my current reading list to this blog.

What is bookarmy?
Bookarmy is a social networking website for every sort of reader. Whether you’re a bookaholic or someone who picks up a book only once a year while relaxing on holiday, bookarmy is the place to discuss and review books, build reading lists, get the best book recommendations, and where you and your friends, family or classmates can read books together.

What makes bookarmy different from other book sites is that here you can make direct contact with authors; see what star rating they have given books, browse their reading lists, ask them questions about their own writing, and recommend titles to them.

Why did we create bookarmy?
Quite simply because we love books and we wanted to design an easy and reliable way for people to talk to other readers and decide what to read next.

For more information, you can also check out their blog.

(via BoingBoing)

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BookTour

BookTour: Where Authors and Audiences Meet

This site (still in beta) helps you find and follow authors: you can browse by genre as well as name, and updates are available vie email or RSS. One particularly cool feature is the ability to link with your Amazon account so that you automatically receive updates on authors whose books you bought through Amazon. I hope that they expand this function to include other sites like GoodReads and LibraryThing.

A new website for A Novel Idea

A Novel Idea is one of my favorite bookstores (owned by my good pal Cinnamon). They recently launched a new website. Go check it out and tell them Jana sent you.

If I was an author I would be so addicted to Booklert

screenshot from "my books" on Booklert

Booklert lets you keep track of the Amazon rank of your (or anyone else's) books. You get an email or a tweet of the latest ranks at regular intervals. And you choose how often - anything from every hour, to once a week.

Why Publishers Should Blog

Joe Wikert pointed me to Booksquare's Why Publishers Should Blog.

Just as authors need to better market themselves and their books, so do publishers. While the audience for a publisher website is diverse—authors, booksellers, journalists, agents, readers, and more—talking about books on your website the same way you talk about books in your catalog simply isn’t cutting it. In printed material, you have various constraints. On the web, you have the ability to do something special: tell the world what excites you, the publisher, about a particular book.

I was partially joking when I titled this post, but realize that while blogging isn’t a necessity, the type of writing that makes good blogs so enticing is exactly the type of writing publishers can use to convey excitement and information about their books to potential customers. If “blogging” can help you throw off the corporate chains and lead to a more natural, casual, exciting discussion about your books, then call it blogging.

I'd add that what can make a publisher's blog (or any organization's blog) interesting, is to let the folks not in the industry have a peek behind the curtain—see or hear about things that are only usually seen and heard by insiders.