Bye Bye TuesdayThinger

Life can be unpredictable... the last few months I have tried my best to keep up with the weekly TuesdayThinger post but there have been many times I have not been very successful at doing so. Who would of thought posting only weekly would get so difficult!! I'm the time of person who keeps her promises and its been frustrating for me that my TuesdayThinger post keeps on getting later and later in the week. With that said, after close to a year and 43 TuesdayThinger posts later I am retiring from the group.

I love LibraryThing and highly recommend buying a lifetime membership (only $25). If you are new to LibraryThing I suggest subscribing to Wendi's Book Corner and following the TuesdayThinger posts. You can discover a lot about LibraryThings' features and learn educational helpful hints and tricks.

I'm thinking of some big life changes next year and I've been very involved in researching possibilities. I'm not going to get into specifics now but I hope next year to make an announcement about exactly what I am up to!

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Have you explored the Series feature of your Statistics? Were you surprised by how many series you have/haven't read? Were your series mostly complete, or did you find that you had only read one book from a lot of different series? What was the largest number of books in a series? Feel free to answer a few or all of these questions.

Well I'm back from a two week hiatus being vacationing in the fabulous Okanagan in British Columbia, Canada. I managed to read four books and review two with another review on the way.

Let me just say that I think this week's TuesdayThinger question is great and ties in to my vacation reading, as one of the books I read was part of a series. I think I have only visited the LibraryThing Statistics page a couple times and never have I looked at the Series feature but its I think its very cool. I guess I love to read series because I own books from 110 of them. I'm totally blown away... although now that I think about it I also love to collect books by my favourite authors so it makes some sense.

What I did realize was that I actually own a lot of books that I have not added to my library yet so its hard for me to tell whether I have many completed series but I do like to own the complete the series by favourite authors. I was also shocked by certain series where I realized there were much books in the series than I had thought (i.e. J.D. Robb In Death series). If I actually added to my library all the books I own I think my largest number of series would be the Bridgertons by Julia Quinn at 14.

Tuesday Thingers, Vacationing

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Have you recently browsed any of the groups? Are you actively participating in any groups? Do you have any favorites?

I recently browsed the Early Reviewer's group and I think I am a member but not sure. This would be my favourite group. Its a good reference place to see if others have received their books yet. I find it difficult to juggle my blog with my work and I have found that I am not able to read as much as I used to, which is making me unhappy and depressed. So joining groups takes away from the reading I can do because I end up spending more time on the computer. I do have groups on ChaptersIndigo Community that I keep up with...like 50 books in 2009... but I find myself posting less. I do not want to sacrifice reading time to be on the computer so some things have to get cut.

Hello Sunshine

I am way late this week posting my TuesdayThinger answer and I may miss next week...because I will be on vacation. Whoo hoo!! We have not had any other vacation this year so I am really looking forward to it. Wine tours, golf, sun, sand...what could be better!!

So I am trying to plan what books to bring with me on vacation. I was having trouble for awhile there reading anything overlong, so I decided to read something lighter, hence Beauty by Robin McKinley. I just started reading Sepulchre by Kate Mosse, a weighty book at over 700 pages, since I promised myself my next read after Beauty would be longer and require dedication. Liking it so far. I have decided to to bring The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley and the first three books in C.L. Wilson's Tauren Soul series. I'd like to bring an additional historical fiction or mystery option. So, out of the list below what do you think would be perfect to read on my summer vacation?

Grand Sophy or Arabella, Georgette Heyer

A Fatal Waltz, Tasha Alexander

The Last Queen, C.W. Gortner

Grave Goods, Ariana Franklin

The Meaning of Night Michael Cox

Sacrifice, S.J. Bolton

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Did you use the Help button? Did you get some good information on the page you were on? Did you use the edit feature to add/edit any of the information on the page? I don't think I have used Help but I may have when I was first starting out using LibraryThing. What I think is cool though is that the Help pages are created by contributors and members, not just LT staff. I like that Help is intuitive...whatever LT page you are on when you press Help it will give you Help for all the features in that page. I would be very nervous about editing anything. I think I'll just leave that unless I see a very glaring error is a book's record. I never knew what Conversations exactly entailed so the Help page for HelpThing: Work was very useful in describing what the feature is. I will be using this feature going forward to see what is being discussed about a book. One of the links to the left is Your WikiThing page and I do not really understand what this is supposed to be...mine is empty. OK...I want to mention an Improvement I think the Author's page needs...I think it would be GREAT if you could sort the Author's works by Title and rating. Currently I think they are listed in popularity by number of copies.

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Have you had an opportunity to check out the new Amazon Vine program? Have you signed up? Is this program something that interests you? How do you feel about the reviews posted on Amazon in general (not counting the ones that have made the news)?

I have not checked out the Amazon Vine program or signed up, although I have heard of it and seen the icon by reviewers names on the website. Unfortunately I have a hard enough time reading and reviewing the books I already do own and that I win from LibraryThing's EarlyReviewers and elsewhere. I love to win books and it would be great to win more but additionally I am picky about what what I read and like to choose the specific books I could win.

I went to the Amazon Vine page and it indicates that it is an invitation only program...not a fan of this. EarlyReviewers seems much more fair with any permanent member able to join and "Request" to win.
I wonder at times about the Amazon reviews...I think the reviewers could be influenced. I have heard in the past about writers having their friends post positive reviews on their books, although I think this was a predecessor program to Vine. Amazon Vine members definitely provide longer reviews and I like that and I think on average the reviews are fair.

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: When you click on the Local tab, do you see any information? Do you find the information you see useful? Have you added any information? If you don't already use the Local tab, is it something you would use more often if there were more events listed?

I suggested this LibraryThing feature for this week's Tuesday Thinger as I had wondered if anyone else found it useful. Thanks to Wendi for posing the questions. When I first became a LibraryThinger I tried to change my location in my profile a couple of times but the system seemed finicky and would not accept a new city so I had Boston as my location for a long time. Now my city is correct and I see multiple events.

I have not added any information but if I was a Librarian or hosted a Book Club I would definitely post in LibraryThing Local. I do find the information useful... especially when book sales are posted! Also, it lists where all the public libraries and/or bookstores are in the city so I can see which are closest to my home and work locations. Of course the book stores are pretty much exclusively independents...and some of them I did not know about before so this is very useful.

For events it would be nice if events had expiry dates...or were divided into current and historical, as I do not find it useful to view events that are in the past.

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Have you checked out your ER list? Is it accurate? Did you need to mark any books as not received? Any suggestions for upcoming topics? I have checked out my ER list. In the latest State of the Thing newsletter they announced this new feature and I checked it out immediately. It is accurate although I have received "Woman of a Thousand Secrets" and I should change its status on the page.

As for suggestions for other topics I would like to know whether LibraryThingers find the "Local" page useful.

To see your books click on "Books you've won" in the light blue banner on the EarlyReviewers page. Most recently I can remember requesting The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruis Zafon and The Charlemange Pursuit by Steve Berry but did not win them...I usually "Request" on average one book each round...I'm pretty picky.

I have won:

	Woman of a Thousand Secrets by Barbara Wood You haven't received this book yet, as of Jul 1, 2009.
	The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen You reviewed this book on Oct 21, 2008.
	The Wednesday Sisters by Meg Waite Clayton You reviewed this book on Oct 21, 2008.
	How Do I Love Thee? by Nancy Moser You reviewed this book on May 7, 2009.
	Any Given Doomsday by Lori Handeland You reviewed this book on Nov 26, 2008.
	Bitten by Kelley Armstrong You reviewed this book on Nov 26, 2008.

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Do you tag? If so, do you tag for your own purposes (make lists, sort, clouds, etc)? Do you tag to help classify a book (historical fiction, self-help, sci-fi, mystery, etc)? What is the most helpful thing for you about tagging?

I tag! Hmm...I tag mostly for clouds. I try to tag the same on my blog as I do LibraryThing. Its important to me that I tag similar to the books current tag clouds. I have to admit it usually never occurs to me to make lists or sort using my tags. But of course I have looked at my wish list and to be read tag lists. I definitely tag to define a book's classification. That is more important to me on my blog than on LibraryThing and I try really hard to be consistent with the tagging of the books I read and review. I also do not go tag crazy. I have a set of defined tags and always try to tag a book into those categories rather than creating new categories. The most frequent tag I have on my blog besides TuesdayThingers is Historical Fiction and then Europe on my blog and on LibraryThing in order of frequency Fiction, Historical Fiction and To Read are my top 3 tags.
The most helpful thing about tagging is that it creates clouds and I think helps determine LibraryThing Recommendations and I always look at the LT recommendations to get ideas for further reading. Maybe I am not correct about this but I try to be consistent anyways.

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: How do you feel about social networking sites? Do you have any you like more than others? Are there any you don't like? Do you have any that you don't associate with your blogs and/or book reviewing? If you could only belong to one of these sites, which one would it be and why? Well as I have said in the past I mostly stay away from social networking sites but I do like book-related networking sites. I am on Facebook about once a week. I find Facebook a great way to stay in touch and connect me with my relatives and friends. I also use Facebook to track book groups such as Blood On The Page and HarperCollins Canada.

I have never really looked into MySpace or Twitter so I feel I cannot provide an opinion on these sites but I do have profiles for LibraryThing and GoodReads. I love love love LibraryThing for keeping track of my books, reading reviews and the EarlyReviewers program among a few features. I post reviews on GoodReads and I have a couple "friends" I chat with and authors that I follow (Lisa See, James Rollins) on this site.

I use networking sites that have book-related features. MySpace does not interest me because I already have a blog and it would be too similar. Twitter would be the least attractive site to me because when I am communicating with others I like more depth than just 140 characters! I connect my blog, GoodReads and LibraryThing together by always linking back to my blog in my reviews. I keep ChaptersIndigo Community and Facebook very separate from blog/LibraryThing/GoodReads...not sure exactly why but I suppose I like the anonymity of these sites whereas I provide a more public face on ChaptersIndigo and Facebook.

Hmm...only one site?? I guess LibraryThing. I only started keeping in touch with relatives on Facebook so it would be easy to revert back but I must have a place to talk about books and I believe LibraryThing is the most comprehensive site.

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Have you gotten Glue yet? If so, how do you like it? Do you follow Glue Genie on Twitter? Won anything in their quizzes? I try do do my best keeping up with posting to my blog...but I have a very demanding job so I think I do pretty well at posting regularly. That demanding job though does not allow me time enough to investigate all the new social tools available on the Internet. I did take a look at the Glue plugin and it sounds very interesting and fun but I am reluctant to add it to my browser...I like the idea of staying anonymous in my Internet browsing. I do not subscribe to Twitter and I have no plans to at this time...so I will not be following Glue Genie or participating in their quizzes.

I know it may seem contradictory to be posting to a blog and not want to be more sociable on the Internet but my blog is a place for my ideas and opinions and firstly for myself and then for anyone else who wants to stop by. Its a place I can organize all my reviews and show appreciation for things I find appealing or worthwhile. So I'm going to keep the status quo for now and not join Twitter or plug into Glue.

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: What areas of Library Thing do you find confusing or frustrating? The team at LT seem to be continually updating things at the site. Is there anything in particular that you would like to see updated or changed? Hmm...I think the new Collections feature is frustrating because I cannot change the collections of multiple books at once. I hope LT updates this new tool to allow this and if anyone figures out how to do it let me know please! I like the idea of Collections though...because now you can make collections of DVDs and AudioBooks, etc., which was a previous pet peeve of mine...not being able to distinguish between them. But the tab on the menu should now be changed to "Your library" instead of "Your books" to better reflect the added functionality.

I'm not fond of the AddBooks page...and then having to choose book, wait for the update and then edit book...I'd much rather search for a book and add then edit the book from the book's main page. I like to look at the tags on the book's main page before I add my own tags so the quick edit tags field is useless to me.

I'm a bit confused about Groups. I have not used Groups much yet...I have used this feature for the EarlyReviewers program and 50 Book Challenge but I'm not sure how you get updates and emails from groups or if you need to officially "join" a group in some way to get emails from group posts (as per GoodReads). Its a whole can of worms I do not want to open and time, brain power I'm not yet ready to expend.

I wish I could see my whole review when I edit a book rather than having to scroll through the box...sometimes I delete text I did not mean to...I preferred it the way it was. That's all my gripes!!! But I love the look of the site now and I always look forward to reading the State of the Thing Newsletter.

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Have you explored the new Collections feature? Do you plan to use the new Collections? Are you going to add any special collections? If so, what are they? I have not explored the new collections feature but I am going to right now! Ok this is a cool tool and probably long past due since I know in GoodReads you can already assign different collections/tags this way but there are a couple features that bug me. It is hard to tell that you have assigned the book to a collection...there is a cursor that flashes a couple times and then I guess the book is then added to the collection you have chosen in the menu (menu pops up by clicking on briefcase). It would be nice to mass change books...since I have 359 books its going to take more effort and time than I would like to use to change over my books to their related collections. There is an Edit Collections choice in the main All Collections menu (drop down menu 'All Collections' top-left of your library) but there is not the funtionality to mass edit collections. They need to create check boxes by the books that you can tick off and then add to collection. Since I already have 60 books in my To read collection I think they are pulling permutations of to read or tbr from Tags. I will be using this feature but will not be rushing into changing books already added to my library...just too much work and not a valuable use of my time...hoping they add multiple book changes in the future. Doubt I will add any special collections...thinking you could add collections Music and Video and add these products to your library though.

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: How often do you find yourself struggling through a book (if you HAD to estimate)? How far will you read before you stop and consider it a DNF (Did not finish)? Will you skim ahead and see if it gets any better? Once you put it down, do you still write a quick review? What do you do with the book when you are done?

I struggle through a book about one out of fifty times. I'm really careful in the first place which books I read because I'm one of those picky people...and I usually cycle between romance, historical fiction and action/adventure or thriller. I do get bored easily and sometimes even with books. If I have to put the book down multiple times or its taking me too long to finish I often just leave it until I become interested again and then will finish it. I also go through periods where I need to take a break.  Sometimes its hard to fit reading into everything else going on in life...but I always have a book in my bag for the ride home on the bus after work.

I'll read four or five longish chapters  but under half the book before I decide not to finish.  If the book is terrible and I do not want to continue on I will skim through the rest of the book.  I will often search out reviews of the book on Chapters, Amazon, LibaryThing and blogs to see if it was a DNF by others to justify my decision. So far I have one glaring DNF on LibraryThing and that was an EarlyReviewers ARC of Lori Handeland's Any Given Doomsday. I did do a quick review and then I traded in the book at a used bookstore. Besides this one I cannot remember my last DNF.

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Questions from Wendi's Book Corner: Do you Tweet? If so, what do you like best about Twitter? What do you like the least? Do you have any Twitter applications or extras that you use frequently (TweetDeck, TwitterFeed, etc)? Do you belong to any of the Twitter groups on LT? Who hasn't heard of Twitter now...I know its popular but I refuse to Tweat. I barely manage to post to my blog on a regular basis, keep up with friends on Facebook and look at all my feeds in Google Reader. I think Twitter is a great tool for a business, celebrity, news organization, or interesting, succinct, witty person. I'm not talented with the quip so I will leave it happily to those who are. I have no news I would want to broadcast in this way and when I do have something to say it ususally take more than 100 characters. I have only joined a couple groups on LibraryThing so far, so I do not imagine I would join the Twitter group.

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Question from Wendi's Book Corner: Is there anything you would like to see added to the Library Thing site? Is there something you like on another bookshelf style site that LT doesn't have? Ok I'm being picky but I would like to see the ISBN (s) on the book Main page as required and not only on the Details page. Why? When I am browsing books and reviews and/or I have added a book to my library I like every book to have an ISBN...because I use the ISBN to also look the book up on Amazon, Chapters, B&N, etc. and when adding to Bookpedia. So its a bit of a hassle to always flip to the Details page. Currently ISBNs are only visible on the Main page when a book has a Book Description, which can be found at the bottom of the book Main page.

When you add a book review on GoodReads I like that you are given the HTML code for your review that you can post on your blog to link back to GR. I do prefer LibraryThing over GoodReads though.

It might be time for LibraryThing to add Your Music/Your Audio/Your Video/Your ebooks, etc.  as Library's are not just for books anymore.  Or change "Your books" to "Your library" What do you think?

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Question from Wendi's Book Corner: Were you aware that LT had a mobile version of the site? Do you ever visit sites via a mobile device? Can you think of anything this would help you with?

How great is this question!!  So I was a cellphone virgin until January of this year...I held out a long time but then finally gave in and bought a Blackberry 8900 (Javelin).  I love it but I still avoid using the phone whenever I can. Best of all I convinced my boyfriend to get a Blackberry too and now we can pin (Blackberry Instant Message) each other with emoticons.  I had no idea LibraryThing has a mobile version. I am going to add it to my Blackberry right now!!!

Ok there does not seem to be much functionality but I can at least check recommendations and whether I own a book already or not... conveniently when I created my library on LT I decided to include only those books that I own (no wish lists), so this will be a great future reference when I am in the bookstore and am racking my brain about whether I had already read and/or purchased a specific book.

I do have my Google Feeder Mobile bookmarked and my work mobile pages , as well as MSN Entertainment.  I have also downloaded Google Mobile, Facebook, and Weather Network apps. I replaced the boring blue background on the menu system with an image of my favourite painting, Girl Reading, the painting I use for my blog. So much nicer to look at every day.

Tuesday Thingers

Tuesday's Question from Wendi's Book Corner: Do you add your reviews to the books you add to your library? If so, do you put your full review on there, or a quick review (one - two paragraphs)? Do you find other people's reviews helpful? Do you know of any other ways to enter your reviews (Other than Edit Book, or Quick Edit)?

Since last year around when I first started this blog, I would say 90% of the books I add to my LibraryThing I also post a review for. The reviews I post are always full reviews...because I also post them on my blog, Good Reads and ChaptersIndigo. Most of the time I include the book summary from the jacket and try to write more than a couple paragraphs. I find the reviews of other members very helpful. When I add books I use the Quick Edit for adding tags first then I navigate to the book and add my rating and review. On the "Your books" tab I have a couple styles I use. For one style I have added the review field and I am able to click inside and edit as needed. Adding the review field to your layout is also great because you can sort your books by Entry date and browse your recent to oldest reviews.

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Question from Wendi's Book Corner: Have you looked at your LT Clouds? Were you surprised at any of the larger tags within the Tag Mirror? Any thoughts on the clouds in general?

I look at my LibraryThing clouds only once in awhile.  My Tag Cloud interests me the most for my profile. I like to see what type of genres that have interested me and the larger tags are very reflective for what I usually read.

I took a look at the Common Knowledge Clouds for All LibraryThing (far right link on your clouds menu bar) and what struck me was the largest tag for Top 200 Most Populated Series was Harlequin Superromance. This tag must be popular because of all the libraries that use LibraryThing. Star Trek was another tag that stood out.

Here are some more facts about the All LibraryThing Common Knowledge Clouds. London and New York are the most often mentioned cities in books and where most authors live. Most Authors are buried in the Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. "The Doctor" is the most popular character name tag.  Most Authors were educated at either Columbia, Harvard, Oxford or Yale.  Most Authors on LibraryThing are American in nationality. World Wars I and II are the top mentioned events in works.

Tuesday Thingers

Today's Question from Wendi's Book Corner: Do you have any missing covers (they show as a plain gray book)? Did you have a favorite view (title, author, date entered)? Do you have any favorite covers? If so, is there anything they have in common?

First of all I really really wanted to put the book covers of my entire LT library in this post but it would take up way too much space, so I have only included those sections where I have missing book covers.

My missing book covers are The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff, the first below, and People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks.  I have now fixed them.  

Being an organizational sort of person I like to sort and view by date entered rather than by author or title.  Then I can see what I may have read/reviewed recently or a long time ago. Sorting this way the first book I ever added was The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory and the most recent addition was...none other than The Other Queen by Philippa Gregory.  What are the odds!

My favourite book covers are below, with The Thirteenth Tale probably being my most favourite.  I guess I like the colors red and green the most, I like pretty, striking or interesting covers.   Can I just say that I really dislike when the cover art cuts off a person's face...what is the point of this? On the left sidebar toward the bottom of my blog I have a Picasa album of Eye Catching Book Covers...take a look.