5/1

I have been keeping an eye on a few of the sites in the sidebar. Mostly I've been looking at Goodreads and NPR, but the other get cursory glances fairly frequently.

An interesting thing has popped up during this blog: I've been reading the collection blog on BCPL's intranet more often. There are new things every week that are always interesting to read. New books, sometime there are announcements about book being delayed or dropped from publication. I find this quite fun to read.

One of the better fantasy books about dragons, one about the science of dragons, called The Natural History of Dragons, was discovered using the collection blog. It is a fantastic read set in a parallel world. There are nations like ours that have languages the same as ours, but with different names on a different map. And all the while, the main character, the future Lady Trent, is working to learn the secrets of dragons.

What does a site like Goodreads tell me about this book, I wonder.

It tells me that one of my friends has read it and another has the book on their to-read list.
It tells me that there are four books in the series. (Four? Oh. Huh. I guess I should probably read the third one before I buy the forth one, right?)
Goodreads tells me that, based on 6,940 ratings, this book has a score of 3.78/5. That's not bad. The majority, 40% of the ratings, have been four-star.
There are 1,164 reviews for this book on Goodreads, but none of them are mine.
I should probably write one. Hmmmm.

All in all, there is a lot of information about the book on Goodreads ranging from the objective data such as page count and ISBN number to the subjective like the 160 people who gave the book a single star rating. I love this site.