Online Book Communities
Goodreads, LibraryThing, Shelfari, Booklikes, Biblionasium

In this blog, I'll be discussing different Online Book Communities.  What is an online book community? It's simply a place for book lovers to communicate online with other book lovers and members, anywhere in the world.  Online Book Communities are also a great way to keep books organized.  Members of the sites allow most to organize books by creating your own personal book shelves, based on books you've read, books you want to read, and books you're currently reading..  You really don't have to be a book lover to join an online book community, but once you join a community, it's bound to happen.

Goodreads
This is a great website for readers, those looking for books, and those looking for book recommendations.  I've always been a fan of Goodreads, I joined a few years ago for another course I was taking and have regularly visited.  I found Goodreads  pleasing to the eye, and easy to use.  I like that creating a bookshelf is so incredibly easy! I also like their community reveiews.



Library Thing
Was not pleasing to the eye, the site looked very plain, boring.  I didn't like that I had to type in the title of a book, author's name, or ISBN to pull up a book list. Once you're in, you can easily catalog your books and join different interest groups. I did like the way the books (my choices) were displayed on the screen afterwards. 

Shelfari
Pleasing to the eye, initially seemed user friendly, I liked that the empty book shelf is the next thing you see, it was time to search.  I didn't like the process on how you had to search for books, either I was tired at this point because it just became a little frustrating for me.

Booklikes
The main page was set up nicely, very eye catching, a  it was a video, it wasn't confusing, more geared towards blogging about books.  I did like that there was a long list of book genres to choose books from and then it walked you through the steps of setting up a blog.

Biblionasium
Colorful and bright, kid friendly-centered, also for parents and educators.  I liked the site a lot, I like that it allows kids to actively participate and create bookshelves for themselves.  As an educator I like that there were several options for me to create shelves for students using Lexile, DRA, Reading Counts etc.  I couldn't find anything that I didn't like about this site.

Final Comments: If I had to choose one of the following sites that I like the best, it's Goodreads.  I will continue to use Goodreads because I find that it suits my needs when I'm looking for book recommendations and reviews.  I like  knowing that other librarians and educators go there and I can find good recommendations.  I would recommend Biblionasium  for students and teachers.  The reason I chose this site was because it was very kid oriented and there were so many things students, as well as teachers could do, like make book trailers and blogs.  I would encourage all to join an online book community.