Play Book Tag discussion

How do you keep track of the books you read, the books you want to read, the books you wish you had and the ones which you are interested in?

Do you have a method to your book madness?

Barely is my answer. Since 2016, every book I read is documented on GR. That is my only accurate tracking. I have overflowing bookcases and piles of books everywhere in my apartment. Some are read, some unread, and they are everything from dictionaries to latest book that caught my eye in the bookstore. There is no tracking.

I have all kinds of shelves on GR, so there is some organization of some books.

What I do have every year on GR is tracking of certain challenges - Popsugar, PBT and any others - showing what I read for them.

I am not a reading planner. I do have a shelf for monthly reads where I park books to read for one reason or another in the next month.

Mostly I rely on memory.

Exactly the same as Theresa. If it’s not logged on GR (either as read or want to read) then there is no log. I’m entirely a mood reader rather than a planner so I just have a shelf or pile for the ones I think are a priority at the moment.

The only exception is that, in a most unusual fit of efficiency, I recently did a spreadsheet of all the books I have on my phone that I haven’t read yet (eg freebies that I have picked up from various places over the years). Had almost lost the will to live by the time I finished! And it will be really interesting to see if I ever refer to the list again or whether that was a complete waste of time, never to be repeated…

I did start to catalogue my print books once, but then I go and buy more and the catalogue is immediately out of date! I do need to get them back into alphabetical order though. Drives me nuts when I can’t find something that I know I own.

Since about 2000, I have been writing down the title and author of books I finish in a small notebook, but there isn't any easy way to go back and find things. When I joined GR about 10 years ago, over time I transferred in all my "Read" books, as well as my "Owned" books - those I have in paper, ebook or audio, and which platform so I can find them.(over 300!) So GR is my best reference. PBT is the first time I have done regular reviews of books. I never post reviews on GR, just stars. I also have "Want to Read" for books I don't own but think I might be interested in someday (I think that is over 400).

At one point I had a lot of my physical books in alphabetical order by author, for fiction, and by general subject for nonfiction, but that didn't last long. Now it's wherever I can cram them in (And I have gotten rid of literally hundreds of books in the last couple of years.)
It's definitely happened that I know I have a book but I can't find it when I want to actually read it.

Of course, anything read goes here and on LibraryThing. I also use a Word document to type everything out before I copy/paste my reviews here and there.

The tbr is on LibraryThing because I can tag them with my initials, and combine those initials with other tags to find what will fit tags/themes/challenges, whatever. I have some from the tbr here on GR.

I know I have books here and there around the house that are not officially on the tbr to come up via a search, but the majority of my books are. If I buy an ebook, I try to add to my LT tbr as soon as I buy them.

I do have an email folder with books on the tbr, as well. Most have not been added to my LT tbr. These are often what I choose from to create a couple of "Trim" lists for myself. Well, I use it exclusively for one of them, anyway. The other list (our unofficial one here), may be in part from those emails and in part from books that have been on the tbr the longest.

Oh, the ones around the house I haven't yet read are not on shelves. They are in large bags.

You probably won't be surprised that I track everything I read.

I have a spreadsheet that lists all books I have read since joining GR, and my personal scoring for each book in ranked order. I do this by individual year and a combined list for the past almost 7 years.

I keep a separate tab to track all challenges and status of completion.

On another tab, I list all books I own (but have not read) in alphabetical order by author, along with the format (ebook, audio, hardcover, papaerback).

My background is in mathematics, science, and consulting so I analyze statistics on my reading:

Authors - male/female/non-binary

Genre - literary fiction, contemporary fiction, non-fiction, historical fiction, science fiction, fantasy

Books by % pages - under 200, 201-400, 401-600, 601-800, & over 800

# (and %) Books by star rating

I have also started keeping track of the countries each book is set in, with a goal of reading (eventually) a book set in every country of the world.

I do this because I enjoy it. Yes, I am officially a nerd.

Once upon a time in the now distant past, all my print books were organized on shelves by genre and alphabetically by author. Then I moved 3 times in 3 years with the books stored for much of that time. When I moved into my current apartment, I left for Europe the day after I moved, and when I returned, I needed to arrange for work in the apt. Oh, and order new bookcases to replace the cheap ones I had thrown out. I lived here 6 months before I could unpack the boxes of books stacked everywhere. I had no room to sort, just needed them on shelves. And that is how it stands. It can be like panning for gold to find books I know I have. Some like my hardcover set of Proust remain in hiding. Most usually surface.

Right now I am looking for both The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle - at least I believe I own them in hardcover?

The only record I have of my reading is here on Goodreads. I am sure there are some books here on the blanket chest,( and on the floor and under the bed) that I have not yet entered onto my TBR. I have started a habit of putting new books I bring home (books I have just picked up at sales, or found browsing the library) in a pile next to my desk and getting them entered onto Goodreads, before they get thrown in the physical TBR hoard. The tags on my shelves are pretty normal tags, however I finally started an "own" shelf so that I can go to those books quickly if I need something for a challenge right away. Trying to downsize everything in the house, so unless a books has special meaning or is one that I loved and cannot part it, all my read books are passed on to someone else or donated to the library. It is not very often that I re-read a book.

I record everything on Goodreads. I have a spreasheet saved that has my old reviews from when I was on Shelfari (sigh). For books I want to read now, I put them on my '22 books list, everything else goes into my TBR list. My TBR list is currently 2,458 books long and like my email inbox, I struggle to purge regularly. So many books, so little time. Looking forward to when I retire and hoping to read more then (and as much as I can in the meantime). I once heard of a retired person that read 1 book a day, at that pace, it would take me 6.7 years to read my TBR list as of now (not that I could ever read most of my TBR books in 1 day nor am I sure I would want to).

My only record of books I have read is here on Goodreads.

I keep track of everything on goodreads. It's simpler that way. My tbr is terribly bloated and I have way too many shelves, but I don't mind because I can always find something to fit a new interest, tag, or challenge.

Sometimes I wish I kept better track of the books I read when I was younger. Any lists I made probably got tossed during the years when I had no time to read.

Oh I don’t even have to repeat myself. Yes like everyone else Goodreads is my tracker of past books. But everyone knows by now how much fun I have with my secret phone TBR! Can hardly wait for the next chance to plan! It’s probably the reason I love trim so much. Because all of a sudden you’re gonna get the chance to get to something you might not have otherwise picked up. And the joy of what that does to my ever evolving list is glorious!

I admire those of you who have your TBR categorized in some way, so that if you want a particular genre/location/character, you can search that way. That might be a useful project and save me a lot of time searching through hundreds of books.

I read a lot but sometimes I wonder how much more I could read if I didn't spend so much time on GR in group threads or looking through and planning my books!

I keep track of my TBR on GoodReads. I make no effort to cull books from it, although I scan for duplicates frequently since Goodreads adds a book any time that you enter a give away.

I don't keep track of the DTB that I own until I read the book. When I post a review on GR, I use the private notes box to indicate where I got the book ( audible, overdrive, scribd, etc) and /or if I own a copy. I don't bother with listing book condition, purchase place or isbn. ( I don't really know why I do this. I never look at or need the information after the review is posted. But, somehow, I still enjoy doing it.)

I do try to tag books on my GoodReads TBR with 'Kindle' when I purchase
an ebook. It helps me help find those owned titles when there's a challenge. At this point, I can usually remember the titles of physical books that I already own. I have far more random ebooks on my kindle that are easier to forget.

I write and save a Books Read list on a google doc. for each year. Just a list. I tried making a spread sheet one year, but I felt it was more trouble than it was worth. I started doing this about the same time that I began using Shelfari, around 2009. I lost a few years worth of lists and some reviews that were on word documents when an old PC crashed. So now I duplicate in several places, including at GR. I write my reviews in a google doc. ,save them, and post on Goodreads and Library Thing.

I do look back at and reread my own reviews which I write primarily for myself. Like Charlie said on another thread, I haven't read any book that wasn't thought provoking. I like to record the thoughts that were provoked, and then I like to think about them again. :)

My TBR constantly changes, so it’s hard to keep up on a spreadsheet or app. I’m still looking for a good system to prevent duplicate purchases or library loans. I’ll figure it out eventually!

I track what I’ve read on GR, Library Thing, and just started looking at Storygraph. I don’t have other lists on here, like TBR, etc, because I’d rather keep GR uncluttered.

And I write them down- when I moved my library from Shelfari to GR, it said I “read” several books I’ve never heard of- like a handful of erotica and sci-fi from long ago. 😶Lesson learned- plus I track diversity, 1001 books, etc in my little notebook.

The books I want to read but don’t have easy access to are listed in an Amazon wishlist that gets culled often. I don’t feel bad at all when I walk into an indie store and pull out my phone to look at the list.

My first effort at tracking books I have read was in a card catalogue. Most of them are now on Gr and i keep it updated.

When I was at Shelfari I moved all my physical books to the TBR shelf there and now have them on Goodreads.

For books, I'd like to read which I don't own, I've had a wishlist on Amazon forever. Last year I went through and cleared it to just include a few years and I'm trying to do that once a year.

I have a radar list that is just in my mind of books, I've been paying attention to.

I am pretty much a mood reader, but I've found that with that I am more susceptible to forgetting books I own and purchasing new books, so in the last couple of years, I've been doing monthly planning here on PBT and it has helped to clear TBR And of course our monthly Trim the TBR list has helped as well.

I kept a written book journal for years, then I joined Shelfari and slowly transferred all those books to that format. Shortly thereafter, I also joined GoodReads and did the same thing. When I started joining groups on Shelfari, especially PBT, I started expanding my reviews to more than just a couple of sentences. AND, I religiously kept both sites updated as I read. So, when Shelfari shut down I already had a duplicate record on GR and didn't have to worry about losing data. Now that duplicate record resides on Library Thing.

BUT ... I also have numerous excel spreadsheets for my TBR. I cull them once a year to get rid of titles that no longer hold any interest for me, or which are not readily available through the library. And each year I pick 100 random titles from those spreadsheets to put on my "Priority TBR" list. (The titles I added to the various Trim the TBR challenges always came from the Priority list.)

I never had my tbr on Shelfari, and resisted starting it on GR, but then GR added the rule that to enter a giveaway you had to have the book on your TBR and ... well ... That GR tbr list gets culled a couple of times a year.

As Robin P mentioned above ... I'd probably get more reading done if I spent less time cataloguing and updating spreadsheets.

Like Book Concierge, I kept a handwritten book journal for many years, then I tranistioned to GR. I have my TBR list in GR, which I do occasionally cull. I also have a "high priority" shelf, for books that I would really like to read sooner instead of later. It has been the backbone of the Trim challenge for the last 2 years.
When we packed to move to NC, I gave away about 70% of my books. I rely heavily on the library. I do buy books occasionally, but not that often. So I don't need to catalog books I own, because they are pretty much in a small confined space! The vast majority of books on our bookshelves are my husband's and I tease him that all the empty space on the bookshelves belongs to me.

and as Robin and Book Concierge said, I might read more if I spent less time reading through GR discussions, and thinking and planning what to read...... but it has definitley paid off when Jeopardy has a books/literature category!

Shelly wrote: "Like Book Concierge, I kept a handwritten book journal for many years, then I tranistioned to GR. I have my TBR list in GR, which I do occasionally cull. I also have a "high priority" shelf, for bo..."

Oh, I love when Jeopardy has a book category. There was a question the other day that nobody answered correctly and I did. I am overly excited when that happens.

Joy D wrote: "You probably won't be surprised that I track everything I read.

I have a spreadsheet that lists all books I have read since joining GR, and my personal scoring for each book in ranked order. I do ..."

Are you also on LibraryThing, Joy? They have a fairly new page with all kinds of stats like you keep track of. I love it!

LibraryCin wrote: "Are you also on LibraryThing, Joy? They have a fairly new page with all kinds of stats like you keep track of. I love it!"

I believe I signed up for it a few years ago, but I have not used it much. I was not keen on keeping 2 sites updated, but I will check it again based on your recommendation.

Booknblues wrote: "Shelly wrote: "Like Book Concierge, I kept a handwritten book journal for many years, then I tranistioned to GR. I have my TBR list in GR, which I do occasionally cull. I also have a "high priority..."

Me too! It makes me feel so smart!

I track my books in Goodreads also story graphs. In GoodReads, I can track the books I already read, my currently reading, and to read books. Also, in story graphs. I can track my books in there too. Also, I can do buddy reads.

Shelly wrote: "but it has definitley paid off when Jeopardy has a books/literature category!..."

Funny you should mention that ... just this past week Hubby commented, "If I sign you up will you take the test to get on Jeopardy? You always seem to know the answers!"

Goodreads is the best place to check want-to-read and tbr (owned books), but I do keep an excel spreadsheet for everything I read and it restarts every year. It tracks many demographics of the authors which I like to see too.

I tried to add books I own to the excel tracking or new books I buy, but I couldn't keep up with it. For now when I buy a book I immediately scan it into GR and put it on the tbr shelf.

I started a book review journal this year, but we'll see how long that sticks. It kinda feels redundant since I am posting reviews here.

Book Concierge wrote: "Shelly wrote: "but it has definitley paid off when Jeopardy has a books/literature category!..."

Funny you should mention that ... just this past week Hubby commented, "If I sign you up will you t..."

I don’t know if anyone could beat Amy Schneider right now- she is amazing!

Tracy wrote: "Book Concierge wrote: "Shelly wrote: "but it has definitley paid off when Jeopardy has a books/literature category!..."

Funny you should mention that ... just this past week Hubby commented, "If I..."

She is! I am so enjoying watching her.

A friend of mine actually was on Jeopardy some years ago. You need knowledge but that only takes you so far. You need to respond and be able to press the buzzer fast. Most of all you need to strategize quickly and make the right gamble in Final Jeopardy. My friend lost her second night because she did the math in Final Jeopardy wrong, or was overconfident.

She also said that she was very nervous the whole time it was being taped, she couldn't relax. She won $8,000.

Joy D wrote: "I believe I signed up for it a few years ago, but I have not used it much. I was not keen on keeping 2 sites updated, but I will check it again based on your recommendation...."

There is a LOT to the site, so if you want some help with it, let me know. :-)

I suppose the stats page (I think it's called Charts & Graphs) won't be as - what's the word - accurate if you haven't been keeping it up to date.

If you'd like to start keeping your tbr there, I can also help you with "tagmashes" to combine tags to see what's on your tbr that might fit a theme.