Science and Inquiry discussion

I've been stumbling across new-to-me functionality of Goodreads and wanted a place to share discoveries. Many other groups offer a similar thread for members to post tips and tricks to finding, sorting and extracting useful information and fuctionality from Goodreads.

Please post your tips and tricks in this thread.

I didn't realize until today that I could get a list of those who are currently reading a given title.

From the specific book's main page, look over to the right side of the screen just above where "other editions" is found. If you click on "recent status updates" up pops a list of members who have included the book in their "currently reading" status.

How cool is that?

Here you can view how many books you read last year, and set a goal for yourself for this year.

Melissa, that's awesome! I totally didn't know that.

I have now learned that 200 people are on page <100 of War & Peace. Ha...

In another thread someone said they didn't know how to put the link to a book in their message. When you are in the window typing your message there are the words "add book/author" sitting on top of the window. Just stop typing where you want the link to appear and click on on "add book"; for example I'm now reading The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors so I click on "add book", type in "the scientists gribben" (gribben is the author) and it brings up a list of books containing those words. Then I click on "add" for the correct book and it inserts the link for the book as shown above.

Great tips! It's fun seeing who's reading what I'm reading and thanks for the 2011 Reading Challenge link, David.

I love the compare feature because I love judging people. Hey Bill, what are you thinking giving Treasure Island three stars? That book is awesome! Whee, judging!

Yeah, actually, that's the only book we disagree on. For what it's worth, I reread Treasure Island just last year and thought it was a blast; fun seeing all the tropes that are now cliches appear for the first time.

But that's off topic, sorry.

Wow, the Compare Books feature IS cool! I see I have zero books in common with you Bill, but 18 with Alex. Alex, I wasn't surprised by all the science books in common but Anna Karenina and Fountainhead were somewhat of a surprise. Madame Bovary was a frustrating slog for me. Be interested to know what you think if you do eventually read it.

And why did I give Fountainhead three stars? Your rating is better. Maybe I was being relativist, since it is at least better than Atlas Shrugged.

I actually read a ton of classics. You have good taste in books, Steve.

Should get to Madame Bovary this year. It's a new translation by Lydia Davis that got great reviews; and I've always been interested in Bovary because the title makes me picture a cow in a slutty dress.

If Madame B was about a cow in a slutty dress, I probably would have given it a much higher rating.

Alex wrote: "Yeah, actually, that's the only book we disagree on. For what it's worth, I reread Treasure Island just last year and thought it was a blast; fun seeing all the tropes that are now cliches appear ..."
I listened to Treasure Island this year, I don't think I had ever read it, and I absolutely loved it. I too couldn't believe all the stereotypical pirate cliches that originated in that book.

I read Madame Bovary in high school. I think it'd be interesting to re-read it now that I'm older...or maybe not.

Alex-it's mostly about a woman in a slutty dress. Or at least I picture her to be like that.

Kirsten, I see you are a Twins fan. You should check out Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game. It gives hope to all of us without budgets like the Yankees, Mets and Redsox. I thoroughly enjoyed it even though Billy Beane's A's are always causing problems for my Mariners.

Moneyball is awesome.

And ahem Steve, please note that although my Red Sox do have an embarrassing budget, we were also one of the first and most effective moneyball adopters, as demonstrated by a certain third first third baseman you may have heard of.

Also, Adrian Gonzalez.

I am a Twins fan! I'll definitely look into that book. I'm currently looking for some lighter reading at the moment.

Why the heck couldn't Beltre hit like that when he was in Seattle? Only for the Dodgers and the Red Sox? We need to test our water. Beltre's a class act. We loved him.

It's the Anti-Curse of Sox third basemen, aka the Bill Mueller Effect: everyone who plays third for us has a career year. I miss Beltre already. I loved watching him play.

Kirsten, Moneyball is one of those "satisfaction guaranteed" books. Impossible to dislike.

Unfortunately we're going to see a lot more of Mr. Beltre since he signed with Texas. Six years!!!

Third base...yeah. We haven't had a third baseman who was any good since I was in Jr. High school.

A Mariners fan, eh? I went to school out west and know lots of them. I felt badly for them a lot.

Last year was just plain ugly for the M's. All we had was pitching. At least we came away with the Cy Young award.

Yeah, and didn't make the playoffs only to self-destruct for the rest of the season and then hand the Yankees easy victories.

At least we have Joe Mauer.

Cleverly sequeing back to science, aren't there some good books about the science of baseball?

I got a book for Christmas called Understanding Sabermetrics: An Introduction to the Science of Baseball Statistics. I haven't read it yet, but I think Matt is trying to kill baseball for me. Granted, he has a degree in statistics, but still. I keep you posted if I actually read it.

All, I would really like to see this thread back on topic, please? If you would like to discuss books, please create a new thread . . . .

Thank you.

Your picky co-mod Melissa

I get many of the books I read from our local public library. One of the neatest features on Goodreads allows you to permanently add a link to your library, from every book page. In that way, whenever you find a book you like, you can click on a link to your library--one click is all it takes, to check if the book is on the library shelves!

To do this, go to your "my account" page, and click on the "book links" tab at the top. On the right side of the page is a list of all the pre-existing links that you can choose from. The list is very long, so to find a particular one, you can alphabetize it. After you add the link, you can bring it up to the top of your individual list of links (even above the Amazon link), to make it easy to access in the future.

I did not find my library on the list, so I had to add it to the list, using the "add a new link". That brings you to a page with instructions for adding a link to your public library. The instructions are not simple--it took me some trial and error to get it right.

Just tried that, David - too confusing for me.

I also added my local libary to my "buy the book" link a while back and it is a real timesaver.

I just realized that if book links are included in a comments then I can click on the link and add that title to by to-read list.

I just got around to noticing the apps for this site. I'm not sure how many of them work, but I tried the twitter one. When I leave a review on a book, it automatically leaves a link in twitter back to my review here on Goodreads.

I haven't tried the facebook or blogger ones yet.

I'm also completely addicted to the giveaways page. It gives me an idea of what is new that I can put on my to-read list. It is just a bonus that I can try to get the books for free too. =)

Grace wrote: "... I'm also completely addicted to the giveaways page. It gives me an idea of what is new that I can put on my to-read list. It is just a bonus that I can try to get the books for free too. =) "

I agree, Grace. So far, I've received three giveaways books. The first one was a dud. The second one was Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories, an excellent collection of short stories. I'm currently reading my third one, The 21-Day Kickstart, and it is great!

David wrote: "Grace wrote: "... I'm also completely addicted to the giveaways page. It gives me an idea of what is new that I can put on my to-read list. It is just a bonus that I can try to get the books for fr..."

Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories, is now available as a free download from Baen books free library.

Free books! Man, I love free books. I'll head over to Baen later today to grab that free download too.

I wanted to write also that the app to add your review to blogger doesn't seem to work. I can't figure out how to make it go.

Grace wrote: "I wanted to write also that the app to add your review to blogger doesn't seem to work. I can't figure out how to make it go."

Grace, questions like that can be addressed in the Goodreads Feedback group. You can join that group, and then ask questions. You will get answers to your problems very quickly.

Eh, when it becomes important I'll look into that. But, it is good to know that there is a group to cover it. Yet another way we can use Goodreads.