Shelfari

Do you ever struggle with keeping track of what books you've read when? Or who you lent them out to? Or even just reminding yourself what you want to read in the future? Well, thanks to my dear friend, Sarah, I've got the perfect solution! It's called Shelfari, and it just might change your life.

This multifaceted site is half search engine and half organizing tool, with a little social networking thrown in for good measure. The idea is that you become a member (for free!), and then create your own "shelf," where you can store information about as many books as you choose. Seriously, how great is this? The interweb comes to the rescue again!

Give reviews to help out other Shelfari members, make notes to yourself about who gifted you a certain book, assign "tags" as a way of organizing your titles, and so much more. Once you've created your own virtual library, you can also reach out to other members, joining in book discussions, posing questions about certain books, and tracking what like-minded friends are reading to get new ideas (hint, hint). As if that wasn't enough, Shelfari also has a fairly interesting blog with fresh conversations about various titles and authors. Also, they allow you to synch your library up with your blog...which I have just attempted! That's right, look to the right of this posting and you should see a link to my very own Shelfari Shelf! Apparently there's a way to actually show your shelf, but I cannot get that to work...yet. Stay posted because I plan on makin' it happen, captain!

FYI-Figuring out how much to add to my shelf has been a bit of a challenge. I haven't invested the hours it would take to add everything I've ever read to this bookshelf; instead, my goal is to start tracking from now on (as of July 1, 2010) and perhaps on a rainy day in the future I'll go through and add some more favorites. Of course, when I do come across a title I've read (for example, once I entered Little Bee on my shelf, Shelfari suggested Kite Runner, which I had already read a few years ago) I've gone ahead and clicked "yes" to add those to my shelf, too. As far as user-friendly interfaces goes, this site definitely rocks. You'll have no problem signing up and getting your shelf going; I hope you'll sign up so we can share shelves (I'm looking at you, Lorin!).