Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Cleaning up my GoodReads

I was on a bit of a blogging hiatus when the whole hullabaloo over GoodReads was at it's peak and if I'm perfectly honest, I've pretty much been ignoring the whole thing. I know there are problems and issues and things were not done in the way they should. I know there's some sketchy stuff going on in the background and I admit I have a love-hate relationship with Amazon as a company. I don't like everything Amazon does, but I still shop there. Not all the time, but I do. And let's be honest, if GoodReads wasn't the best site of it's kind, Amazon wouldn't have bought it. So if it's still the best book site (up for debate of course, but I think so), I just don't want to give it up darn it! If you're boycotting GoodReads that's fine by me, truly it is. If you don't want to read on, I will not be offended in the least. But truthfully, the rest of this post could apply to any of the various book sites out there...

Have you ever logged into your GoodReads (LibraryThing, BookLikes, Shelfari, etc., etc.) and wondered how exactly SO MANY books jumped onto your To-Read shelf? I made a separate Own-To-Read shelf to distinguish the books I actually have in my possession (a truly frightening number) from my "wish-list" To-Read shelf that (in theory) I use to keep track of interesting books I come across from reviews/recommendations/etc. that I might want to track down in the future. It's supposed to be a place to list books I don't want to forget about, but what it had actually become was a freakin' hot mess! Part of the problem was entering a lot of FirstReads giveaways and automatically adding the books to my To-Read shelf. What I was forgetting was just because a book looked interesting enough to throw my name in the hat for a possible free copy, doesn't mean that if I didn't win, it was a book I was really and truly interested in seeking out to buy (or borrow from the library).

About a week ago, I was trying to make a list of authors to look for at my local used bookstore (yea, I know, like I really needed more books...) and I was getting very frustrated with myself that I was sifting through so much clutter trying to find the books I was really  interested in. So what did I do this past Saturday afternoon? I culled that list down from almost 600 to 300 -- that is a LOT of books I felt meh about that just had to go -- and 300 is still a lot of books! And truth be told, I removed even more books than first meets the eye, because I also added a whole bunch that do belong on the list while I was at it. This little project didn't exactly fit in with my desire to spend less time on the computer, but it felt so necessary for my bookish organization and sanity. (And hopefully it will never get so out of control again!)

So going forward, I'm getting off "auto-add" mode and making sure I am more discerning in what I add to my shelf. I do sometimes add a random book by a particular author because I've heard good things about him/her and am not exactly sure which if his/her books I may actually want to read. I also sometimes look up authors I've read in the past and kind of "forgotten" about to see if they've written anything new and I'll add what I find as a reminder to explore further, but I'm OK with those scenarios. At least when I look at the shelf later on, the author's name will remind me why I put the book there in the first place!

So I'm curious, has this ever happened to any of you? How do you use book sites to keep track of an ever-expanding TBR list? I would love to know!

10 comments:

  1. I need to create a wishlist, and like you said an own tbr pile. Wonderful idea, and I have no issues with Goodreads.

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    1. Now that I've tamed my lists, I find it really helps!

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  2. I'm like you! My goodreads to-read shelf was getting insane and unmanageable and just too much. So I made a "maybe to read" shelf not long ago and started using that as well. I would still like to go through and fix up my lists even more. :) Good luck! It looks like you tamed it pretty well.

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    1. That's a great idea Kay! Then you can browse that separate list later on and decide if a book goes on the "real" list of gets deleted. Will have to keep that in mind if I encounter books I'm on the fence about!

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  3. I JUST did a post on this a couple weeks ago. (http://wp.me/p2ZSql-oT) When I started with Goodreads I just used their TBR shelf, but when it started getting out of control, I moved to using Excel to stay organized. It's easier for me that way to keep track of what books I definitely want to read, which ones just look kind of interesting... not to mention help me remember where I heard about it in the first place (really useful if I go to weed through my list and come across books that don't pique my interest at all and I wonder why I added it in the first place... I can be, "Oh, so-and-so said THIS in her review and that's what made it sound interesting.")

    Congrats on cutting it down. It's so easy for it to get overwhelming.

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    1. Thanks Charleen! I saved that post in my feedly and have been meaning to stop by to read more about your organizational system...will stop by soon, I promise!

      I guess none of us would have this problem if they didn't keep publishing so many great books, but none of us really wants that!

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    2. Honestly, the publishing world could shut down for five years and I still probably wouldn't be caught up. Because even just reading the books that are already on my list will lead me to even more authors whose backlists I have to get to...

      (Not that I'm saying that should happen... I'm just saying it COULD and it probably wouldn't affect my reading in any detrimental way.)

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    3. The publishing world could probably shut down for a decade and I'd still not be caught up! But you're right, that definitely shouldn't happen (nor do I really want it to!)

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  4. I still have general TBR shelf on Goodreads, but I've also toyed with the idea to make separate ones for books I physically own and books I just want to read. But since I'm not very eager in marking the books I want to read, the list is not that long yet. But I'm a huge fan of occasionally cleaning up things - whether it be Goodreads or friends lists or mailbox... I like throwing useless things away :)

    I took a look at the Goodreads drama and to be honest, if I had ever written a review there, I would have probably considered leaving the site, but I since I use Goodreads 95% only to keep track of my books and reading, I just didn't find it necessary.

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    1. I love getting rid of useless things too! It can be easy to ignore digital clutter until it gets really out of control, but then Big Black Garbage Bag syndrome kicks in!

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I'd love to hear what you think :)