Goodreads Librarians Group discussion

Please bear with me, this may take awhile to explain.

I have a set of 6 books in the 'Poetry for Young People' series. While trying to add them to my 'to-read' shelf, I noticed that two of the 6 books were not on Goodreads--at least not the specific editions I have. I searched by ISBN and didn't find them, so I added them. My first question is did I add these properly (this was done before being granted librarian status), in regards to title formatting and such? These are the two books:

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/63...

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/63...

Do I need to add Poe's and Frost's names in the Author line along with the 'Edited by' person?

The remaining four books I own I found an exact ISBN match for, but some of the information is incorrect--the books illustrator as listed as the author in one of them. Plus, I have better book cover images for a couple of them. It's ok to go in and correct the necessary information, right?

I didn't want to jump into doing anything without getting some additional guidance. I've already read through the Librarian Manual as well as a great number of posts in this group.

The additions look fine, except for two things:

1) adding the original author's name - For books of a specific author's works, compiled by an editor, I've seen those with the original author's name listed in the author field, in the second position (the editor first). This makes sure it does not get combined with the wrong books, but gives credit to the original author. (You can see this most in the William Shakespeare section.) **For bonus points, add the illustrator's name as well - use the Add Author field and use the descriptor Illustrator.**

2) some kind of book description - if you have the book in-hand and can type in the blurb from the flyleaf or back cover, that would be best.

I would say if you have the actual book in your hand, that you have the authoritative version and go ahead and correct the cover, authors, etc. to match that. Be aware that the download from Amazon often has inaccuracies like that, so go ahead and correct it if you find it. I often fix an author or editor's name by looking at the cover image (large) to see who is listed on there. = )

Good job otherwise! = )

Thanks, Carolyn.

And thank you for reminding me about the book description. I'd started to add the text from the back of one of the books, but wanted to make sure that was ok too.


ETA: Do I need to add a notation that the book description was taken from the back of the book? Or is it ok just to add the text without the notation?

I would cover my backside and say it was taken from the back of the book. It won't hurt anything.

Thanks, JG. I'll edit it into the books I added a description to.