Pick-a-Shelf discussion

Hello. I'm a librarian in Illinois. We will be doing a travel theme for our adult summer reading group. I'm creating a list of locations based on adult fiction titles. We are going to create a map marking locations they can "travel to" to read a book or series of books. For instance we will mark Bisbee, Arizona on the map and that will tag them to the J.A. Jance books about Joanna Brady. I'm looking for location ideas. I have several, but would like to add more. Thank you!

this is a cool idea. unfortunately I live in Canada and one I would say is Edmonton, Alberta or Toronto, Ontario. A few in the states could be Austin, TX, Los Angeles, NYC, or another good place New Orleans. if that helps

maybe you could have your patrons nominate places they would like to visit and then you can find books that fit - it would get them involved

Are you looking for places off the beaten track, or are you looking for well-known books over a geographically diverse area?

You might browse the Goodreads Places tags (which can be found under the "setting" label of each book's details). I don't think they're searchable, so you sort of have to guess your way to the page of alphabetical results for a specific location. The books for each Place are sorted by the number of ratings they have, so the most well-known books appear first. For example:

Seattle, Washington
Denver, Colorado
Tucson, Arizona

These are not exhaustive lists, as many books don't have a setting indicated at all, but they're a good place to start.

If you're looking for foreign locations, I suggest

The Shetland Islands - Ann Cleeves
Venice, Italy - Donna Leon
Reykjavik, Iceland - Arnaldur Indridason
Ireland, Patrick Taylor
Quebec, Canada - Louise Penny

There are so many! Or are you looking in the US only?