I signed up for Goodreads, what do I do now?

Alessandra Kelley · Sep 8, 2011

Between my habits as a voracious reader and my interest in books and maybe writing some reviews, I finally signed up on Goodreads under my own name.

But I have to admit, I'm a little lost. At the moment on the site I have a list of books-I-have-read. Can anyone see that? How would they find it? How may I find other people's lists? What is this "friends" of which they speak? (I'm not on Facebook or Twitter or any other social network, so I don't know the protocols.)

I'm currently working my way through their "help" section on the rtfm principle. But can I ask people here how they use the site, things that might not be obvious to a newbie, that sort of thing? Thank you.

MacAllister · Sep 8, 2011

Post a link to your profile, silly, so we can find you.

Alessandra Kelley · Sep 8, 2011

Oh! Heh -- of course.

Would that be this?

http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/6243132-alessandra-kelley?ref=header

PorterStarrByrd · Sep 8, 2011

unsubscribe

MacAllister · Sep 8, 2011

That works just fine.

Sage · Sep 8, 2011

Goodreads looks through your e-mail account--or twitter or facebook, I think too--and suggests people that are also using it and are your contacts to friend.

Note... if you're using the same account you're querying with, you get a lot of agents on Goodreads, and if you say, "Sure, friend me," I believe it actually does send a message to them before you follow their Goodreads stuff. Not knowing this, I chose to follow a couple (agents of friends, mostly) and it turned out I sent a message requesting them to be my friend, oops.

Alessandra Kelley · Sep 8, 2011

Eh, I don't query. I'm not a writer, actually.

Deleted member 42 · Sep 8, 2011

Alessandra Kelley said:
Oh! Heh -- of course.

Would that be this?

http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/6243132-alessandra-kelley?ref=header

I just friended you.

They have a nifty app for iPad and iPhone that lets you check your books, look for books to read, and with a iPad 2 or an iPhone, take a picture of a barcode on a book and add it to your library with all the bibliographic data.

auntybug · Sep 8, 2011

I like keeping up with my reading list there & at shelfari. Mainly it's another place for me to leave a review for the AW & Champagne books I read. People seem to be on a 'friending' frenzy today, but I don't do much interacting there. All my 'peeps' there are on facebook as well. Since you aren't there - you'll probably get more use out of the mailbox & such.

MysteryRiter · Sep 8, 2011

Alessandra and Medievalist, I am on Goodreads too! I'll friend you both.

areteus · Sep 9, 2011

You can find me on there under: http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/1248752-david-lascelles

Though I rarely use it for anything much at the moment.

Grrarrgh · Sep 9, 2011

I'm there, too, under the same name. I mostly use it to keep track of what books I've read. I have a few there that are TBR, but not many. I don't do a lot of interacting there, but I use it a lot to find books to read or get general reviews on a book. Sometimes if I'm in the middle of a book and I'm beginning to feel ambivalent about it, I'll go to Goodreads and see what the overall feeling is. I don't read spoilers or specifics, I just sort glance over them to get a general feeling for whether it's worth continuing. I really like it, though, especially now that they've updated their app to include IPads, not just Iphones.

PorterStarrByrd · Sep 9, 2011

Grrarrgh said:
I'm there, too, under the same name. I mostly use it to keep track of what books I've read. I have a few there that are TBR, but not many. I don't do a lot of interacting there, but I use it a lot to find books to read or get general reviews on a book. Sometimes if I'm in the middle of a book and I'm beginning to feel ambivalent about it, I'll go to Goodreads and see what the overall feeling is. I don't read spoilers or specifics, I just sort glance over them to get a general feeling for whether it's worth continuing. I really like it, though, especially now that they've updated their app to include IPads, not just Iphones.

YUK !!

let me count the ways this is just so ... wrong :evil

Alessandra Kelley · Sep 9, 2011

Okay. I had a little trouble, because it turned out my email was bouncing (I did wonder why I hadn't been notified of my last Visitor Message here), and my password was also problematic. It took a while to straighten things out, since normally one uses the password to fix the email address or the email address to verify the password, argh. But now it's (hopefully) fixed.

Thanks to the Magic of Cookies I could add more books to my page, but more sophisticated profile stuff wasn't doable til now.

I've been putting up books I've read with star ratings. Is that right? I've seen some people's books listed as simply "read."

PorterStarrByrd, what are your objections? Seriously.

CACTUSWENDY · Sep 9, 2011

Worked for me.

Man....lol.

All that heavy reading with a Ben and Jerrys' Ice cream book in the mix? You sure have a wide span of reading.

bearilou · Sep 11, 2011

I'm boingboing there and I just friended you.

Don't expect much out of me, I go there for the reviews and that's about it.

Deleted member 42 · Sep 11, 2011

Alessandra Kelley said:
I've been putting up books I've read with star ratings. Is that right? I've seen some people's books listed as simply "read."

Whatever works for you is right.

Some people lurk and read reviews but don't post. Some spend most of their time in the Groups/discussion areas.

Some people have lengthy reviews complete with spoiler warnings. Some just make notes for their own use.

Don't stress over it; you're not being graded.

firedrake · Sep 11, 2011

I've been a member of Goodreads for a few years but have done sod all until my book was released.
Now I haunt it obsessively. As I'm a newbie author I don't have reviewers tripping over themselves to review my book and I'm not one of those who can tweet endless requests for reviews so I look at reader feedback in my pathetic search for some validation.

Having said that, there's so much on there it's impossible to get a grip of the place. So my recommendation is to take what you want from it and enjoy the resources.

Alessandra Kelley · Sep 11, 2011

CACTUSWENDY said:
Worked for me.

Man....lol.

All that heavy reading with a Ben and Jerrys' Ice cream book in the mix? You sure have a wide span of reading.

Heavy reading? Uh, thanks. Never seemed that way. Um. Blush.

Diana_Rajchel · Sep 11, 2011

I'm on there, too, just opened my author account.
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5119308.Diana_Rajchel
Hopefully I can figure it out!

rosepetal720 · Sep 16, 2011

Your questions might have been answered, but I actually wrote a blog article on using Goodreads that might help: http://teralynpilgrim.blogspot.com/2011/08/how-to-use-goodreads.html

Shadow_Ferret · Sep 16, 2011

Medievalist said:
I just friended you.

They have a nifty app for iPad and iPhone that lets you check your books, look for books to read, and with a iPad 2 or an iPhone, take a picture of a barcode on a book and add it to your library with all the bibliographic data.

They have one for Android, too.

readitnweep · Apr 21, 2012

I just friended you, too, as I saw we had some books in common. I like Goodreads to track what I've read and what I thought of it. I often can't recall stories and characters a few months after reading, so this has helped me retain the info quite a bit. And, I like getting ideas on good books to read from others. I see you're a history buff - cool.

Deleted member 42 · Apr 25, 2012

Archerbird said:
Hello, registered on goodreads. Friend me.

goodreads.com/lcstensby

My, how terribly flattering an invitation.

mccardey · Apr 25, 2012

I joined once, but I felt bad listing any books I didn't want to give lots of stars to. And then that seemed terribly sookish, so I deleted myself.

I think I may have missed the point ... I'm on librarything though. I'm quite harsh there. I think it's something to do with being able to give half-stars

I signed up for Goodreads, what do I do now?

Sophipygian

'Twas but a dream of thee

Sophipygian

nutruring tomorrows criminals today

'Twas but a dream of thee

Supreme Guessinator

Sophipygian

Deleted member 42

teh other evil broad

Murder isn't so bad...

Not so new, not so much a kid

nutruring tomorrows criminals today

Sophipygian

An old, sappy, and happy one.

DenturePunk writer

Deleted member 42

practical experience, FTW

Sophipygian

Writing from my Seaside Palace

Let the wild rumpus start!

Court Jester

Deleted member 42