SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

So as an offshoot from the 2014 Challenge thread where there was a beginning discussion about shelving I thought I'd open a separate thread just for it.

Do you have a lot of shelves? I'm notorious for creating lists and I'm no exception on here. I have shelves for many different genres, for year/decade/century the book was written in (the older it gets the larger the time I put together, don't want to so granular I have shelves for every year out of the past 3 centuries), gender of author, various awards, different book clubs, some regional shelves, and have just started working on a new shelf - books that were adapted into film.

Do you like to get down and dirty with data? Or do you prefer minimal - read, currently reading, to-read?

Minimal. Can't be bothered to turn managing the tracking more extensively, it would seem like another chore.

I try to limit my lists, but I also like exploring by categories. (I'm in the camp who find it more of an "entertainment" than a "chore") My problem with Goodreads is that it only lets me select the intersection of three shelves at a time. So if I have shelves for authors-of-color, female-authors, fantasy, and favorites, I can't get a list of my favorite fantasy books by women of color by selecting them all. I have to create a new list. Bah!

I guess my point is that Goodreads offers a fun way to tag things, but it's not really up to database functionality, which is a limitation for us data geeks. Even if you export it to Excel, you get a long string for the "shelves" column, instead of a column for every shelf.

I do wish the exporting worked a little better. I've used it a few times but it is clunky.

I seem to be adding mite and more shelves as I go along. When I just had 2-300 books it wasn't a problem. Now that I'm over 800 I'd go crazy without them. I think I have 10-15 right now and in sure more will be coming.

I don't want too many shelves, I'm happy sorting using the database fields. However, it would be great to have some user definable fields to fine tune sorting, similar to iTunes.

I like the shelving system on this site. It really helps me keep everything organized. I have shelves for different genres, different types of books, for books that I own, books read during childhood. I also have more specific shelves for Star Trek and Doctor Who books.

I tried a few times to have fancy shelves set up. I always forget to shelve books in the right places and it soon turns into a total mess. My photography is like that too, I always get myself tangled up with complicated organising systems. It's just making work for myself I have decided.

Yeah I try to just have basic "Science-Fiction" and "Fantasy" shelves, etc. Although I have gotten a bit crazier lately.

I like to keep things simple, although I do have a few shelves. I have 15 shelves in addition to the default shelves. This is my basic shelving scheme:
* The default read, to read, and currently reading shelves.
* Basic genre shelves – fantasy, science fiction, mystery, etc. I don’t bother with subgenres.
* An anthology shelf and an omnibus shelf.
* A standalone shelf which represents books that are not part of a series.
* A completed series shelf which represents books that are (as of the last time I checked) part of a completed series. (I prefer to read series books all at once.)

But I suppose I display my obsessiveness in different ways. I keep all of my books in an Access database which I designed a few years ago when I decided to start keeping track of my books. The shelves I have on Goodreads mimic the tags I use in my database but, when it comes to querying my books, I prefer to use my database. Additionally, I think it’s better to drive my data through an offline method rather than relying on a third party to keep my data safe and accessible. If I didn’t know how to use Access, I would probably use an already-built offline program such as Calibre instead. The first place I add or update data is in my database; updating my shelves on Goodreads is secondary. I have hundreds of to-be-read books in my database that I’ve never bothered to add to Goodreads. I’ll add them when I read them, or when I know I’m getting close to reading them.

I like having the power to store the data I want in the format I want and be able to manipulate it however I want. My database isn’t super fancy, and there are a lot of things that I’d like to add to it if I could ever find the time, but I have the power to prioritize for myself what features are necessary and what I can live without for the foreseeable future.

Michael wrote: "I guess my point is that Goodreads offers a fun way to tag things, but it's not really up to database functionality, which is a limitation for us data geeks. Even if you export it to Excel, you get a long string for the "shelves" column, instead of a column for every shelf."

I agree that Goodreads’ shelving functionality is quite limited, and that a relational database is much preferred. And it has to be normalized, so that it’s easy to write queries! No silly stuff like multiple columns for the same type of data or multiple entries being stuffed into the same field.

However, Excel’s filtering tool is pretty powerful and very easy to use -- I have many colleagues who barely even know how to add two numbers together in Excel, but they can still filter data to their hearts' content in any manner they can imagine. Having all of the shelves in a single column is much better in order to utilize that. You can easily filter on the intersection of multiple tags in Excel if you have the tags listed in a single column.

I'm also a bit obsessive about my library database, and use Calibre. It's got all of the features that I'm looking for- the ability to tag easily, search across multiple tags, build collections on my e-reader from those tags, quickly look at metadata or browse through my books without having to go to individual book pages on Goodreads etc.

There is a Goodreads plug-in that makes it easy to sync your Goodreads shelves to your Calibre tags, but since I use Goodreads more for book discussions/recommendations than for library management, I don't do that much any more.

YouKneeK wrote: "Having all of the shelves in a single column is much better in order to utilize that. You can easily filter on the intersection of multiple tags in Excel if you have the tags listed in a single column. "

How does that work? Do you have an easy example?

Michael wrote: "How does that work? Do you have an easy example?"

I’m not sure how to explain it coherently – it’s so much easier to show somebody in person. But I think, if I tell you how to turn filtering on, the rest will be pretty obvious.

Turning on Filtering
How to do this depends on what version of Excel you’re using, but the first thing you need to do is make sure you have a cell selected within the table of data you want to filter on. It doesn’t matter which column you’re in, as long as you’re in a cell with data. Older versions of Excel might require you to select the entire table – I can’t remember.

Then you want to look under the Data tab and look for a filter button. You don’t need advanced filter, just click the regular filter button. It may have an icon that looks like a funnel. As soon as you click the correct option, you should see little arrows show up on the right-hand side of your column headings.

If you can’t find this option on the menu, you should be able to use the old-style keyboard shortcuts which is what I always do myself out of habit. Type Alt+d, let go of both keys, then hit f twice.

Using the Filtering
From here, it’s probably self-explanatory. Click on the arrow for the column you want to filter and you’ll be presented with all sorts of options.

In this case, you’ll want to select Text Filters / Contains. You can add a couple of filters the first time you go there, but you’re not limited to two selections. After you add those filters, you can go back to the same spot (Text Filters / Contains) and add additional filters on top of the filters you’ve already added.

If you want to remove your filters, you can either click on the arrow in the column you filtered and select “Clear filters”, or you can just remove the filtering functionality altogether by going back to the Data tab and selecting the Filter button again.

I hope this makes sense! It’s a lot harder to type an explanation than it is to do it. I hit Alt+d, f, f, add a couple of filters, and voila, my filtering is done within seconds. There are probably more coherent help documents available with screen shots if you press F1 in Excel and search for "filter".

I don't shelve by pub. date (after all, that is a column given to us by GR) or year read (another column), or genre (too imprecise for my concerns, I'd have to have several tags/shelves for almost every single book).

I do have several shelves, emphasis on non-exclusive, that more resemble real-life physical sorts.

Library to read, for books that are available in my system but aren't high priority. Library wishlist, for books I really hope to get from the system soon (ie before last copy is culled). Wishlist, for ones I want badly enough to buy (if I ever get my existing irl shelves cleared). Etc.

Sometimes I'd like to have tagged, say, all classic SF that has strong females, but I figure there are Listopias and other ways to find stuff like that.

Cheryl wrote: " pub. date (after all, that is a column given to us by GR)"

My date shelves are for convenience. The column GR provides can be sorted but not filtered without exporting. Using the column if I wanted to know how many books from the 1950's I've read i'd have to sort the column, find where they are, and then count them manually. Using a shelf I just look at the number and I'm done. Or I can click on that shelf and look at only those books.

Wow Kim, you have some serious shelves there. I admit I had to go look.

Sarah wrote: "Wow Kim, you have some serious shelves there. I admit I had to go look."

I've had 4 years to work on them :P I still make adjustments and updates from time to time. I love data.

YouKneeK wrote: "Michael wrote: "How does that work? Do you have an easy example?"

I’m not sure how to explain it coherently – it’s so much easier to show somebody in person. But I think, if I tell you how to tur..."

Thanks for the tutorial! That's pretty cool. Is there a way to get a count of the filtered rows? It's just not intuitive since it is hiding certain rows and so the row numbers are no longer sequential. I guess I could select one column and get a count from the status bar at the bottom..

Kim wrote: "Cheryl wrote: " pub. date (after all, that is a column given to us by GR)"

My date shelves are for convenience. The column GR provides can be sorted but not filtered without exporting. Using the c..."

I've discovered that when you "select multiple" shelves you can't tell how many total books you have selected, unless you choose "infinite scroll"; then it will say at the bottom scroll section "x of y books loaded" where "y" is the number of books in intersection of selected shelves. Hope that helps someone, it took me a while to figure it out...

Michael wrote: "YouKneeK wrote: "Michael wrote: "Is there a way to get a count of the filtered rows? "

I’m glad you were able to figure out how to do it!

Actually, as soon as I change my filters, it shows me the # of records found in the very bottom left corner of the screen: “x of x records found”. So I’ve always just referenced that. However, I do seem to remember this disappearing periodically. I can’t remember what triggered it to disappear, and I’ve just now tried to recreate the disappearing act without success. I have a newer version of Excel here at home (Office 365), so perhaps this was a problem on older versions such as what I still use at work (2010).

But your suggestion of selecting one column to get the auto-count at the bottom is also a good idea if your filtered record count disappears. If you happen to like keyboard shortcuts, hitting Ctrl+Space will automatically select the entire column where your cursor is. (Shift+Space selects the row.)

Kim wrote: "Sarah wrote: "Wow Kim, you have some serious shelves there. I admit I had to go look."

I've had 4 years to work on them :P I still make adjustments and updates from time to time. I love data."

I have a very limited amount of shelves on gr. Where I keep my major database (just passed entering title #3000!) is on Collectorz.com. It has innumerable columns for all your data and can be sorted using anything as a filter. Once you have the basic plan, you just put in an ISBN or title and/or author and the book, along with all of its pub info, gets automatically downloaded to your database. Even a pic of the cover! I've been using this since 2003 and it is the best investment I've made to keep my books in order. No, they didn't pay me to say that! :)

$25/year? No thanks. I'd rather stick with GR or Calibre.

Out of curiosity, what do you guys do with the data? What's the purpose of tracking so closely?

Sarah wrote: "What's the purpose of tracking so closely?"

Curiosity :P

For me anyway. I just like to track various metrics for the sake of it. It also allows me to see odd trends like I've read more books written in the 1930's than in the 1940's, or that only 11% of the books I've read were written by female authors, something I want to work on changing.

I can see the appeal. I can tell I'm going to keep adding shelves as I go and then end up with a big mess. Genres would be especially useful.

Personally due to my laziness I'm a very minimal guy in terms of shelving. When I first joined GR I tried to create a military science fiction shelf. However, six books in, I decided I was too lazy to sort it all out. So anybody who looks at my profile will see just the basic shelves.

My shelves are just to help me know where I can find each book, Sarah. I get 'curiosity' and I kinda get 'wanting to see how I'm doing across different criteria & metrics' but I'm too lazy/ too busy reading to do all that. To each his own, for sure! :)

Kim wrote: "$25/year? No thanks. I'd rather stick with GR or Calibre."

Time is money. Collectorz has saved me hundreds of hours I would have spent entering all the information on a crappy Excel spreadsheet. That's well worth the small sum. I want detailed info on my books and the ability to sort it at will. I can get it all with one click! :)

I'm definitely not on Goodreads for the organizing aspects. I'm lucky if I remember to add books at all after I read them. I do keep my personal files on my computer fairly well organized by genre and author though.

In a burst of zeal I managed to make 2 extra shelves - 1 for SF&F favorites and 1 for other favorites. That exhausted my data stamina.

YouKneeK wrote: "Michael wrote: "YouKneeK wrote: "Michael wrote: "Is there a way to get a count of the filtered rows? "

I’m glad you were able to figure out how to do it!

Actually, as soon as I change my filter..."

Okay, I will look for that at the bottom. Thanks again for the help!

Sarah wrote: "Out of curiosity, what do you guys do with the data? What's the purpose of tracking so closely?"

What Kim said, plus some other things. For example, I have a shelf called "to-read-authors-and-series" that keeps track of series I want to finish and authors that I want to read everything by. It helps prevent authors or series from slipping under the rug; and I can catch up a bit at a time since I'm not very good at sticking to one thing for very long.

Stephanie wrote: "Kim wrote: "$25/year? No thanks. I'd rather stick with GR or Calibre."

Time is money. Collectorz has saved me hundreds of hours I would have spent entering all the information on a crappy Excel sp..."

Besides money, I also worry about being tied down to any particular service, although if you can export to Excel for all of these things then I guess it's not a problem as long as you remember to back things up. Excel isn't going anywhere (famous last words).

I like that authors and series idea.

I've been keeping mine simple, mostly with the defaults and one addition for "reviews".

I'm a stickler for organization and if I start labeling and creating a million bookshelves I'll spend way too much time sorting.

Pretty simple. Genre shelves and awards shelves. That's it.

I don't have shelves with labels like "these_are_books_i_read_in_2012_that_were_too_long" etc. LOL

I don't see a need for any type of favorites. I can sort each shelf based in rating. That tells me my favs right there.

I have a couple shelves I added in for my own benefit: to re-read, ongoing (for things like books of short stories I dip in and out of), favorites, books I own and e-books I own.

I also added one for this year specifically, which is books I acquired in 2015. I want to track how many books I'm given or purchasing because I have officially reached bookshelf capacity in my tiny apartment and I'm curious to see how many books I actually acquire in a year's time.

I track all the specifics on an Excel spreadsheet I started in high school and have since put into whatever they call the excel function of Google drive.

Jes wrote: "I have a couple shelves I added in for my own benefit: to re-read, ongoing (for things like books of short stories I dip in and out of), favorites, books I own and e-books I own.

I also added one..."

Sweet! For the shelves, maybe you'll need a donated/lent shelf to see outgoing numbers...

Michael wrote: "Jes wrote: "I have a couple shelves I added in for my own benefit: to re-read, ongoing (for things like books of short stories I dip in and out of), favorites, books I own and e-books I own.

I al..."

That's actually a really good idea I had never considered before! Thanks! :D

I just have genres (with subgenres for ya), few years (2013, 2014, 2015), favorites, classics depending some areas (am, br, fr, other), reread, fr (since I try to keep a tab of how many books written in french I read) and challenges. It seems too much a pain to get more.

I have a decent amount of shelves, but not for anything intellectual or useful really. I tend to get bored and with a tv show on one screen, use my second monitor to mess around on Goodreads half the time.

I do like to break it down into genre as that matters to me. I also have a few ewxclusive shelves: Read, To be read, Currently Reading, Wishlist-eventually, and Wishlist-soon. Then I have the stickied shelves like owned book form.

I used to have shelves for different sub genres (urban fantasy, dystopian, etc.), but I removed them, because many novels are just too hard to classify in that way and I'm just not that concerned about it personally. Now I just have shelves genres, medium (audio, ebook), whether I own the book, and few misc categories like favorites.

I don't rely on the shelves that much anyways other than read and to-read, but I do meticulously order my to-read shelf to help decide what I'm going to read next. Boy, that can be a struggle.

I don't shelve or sort my books at all except alphabetically by author. There's no point since I select my next book by what I feel like reading at that moment. Pre selecting doesn't help at all since I know I won't follow it. At any rate, it's more organic that way.

V.W. wrote: "I don't shelve or sort my books at all except alphabetically by author. There's no point since I select my next book by what I feel like reading at that moment. Pre selecting doesn't help at all si..."

This is an interesting conversation. There's clearly no 'best way' since we're all so different in so many ways. Apparently people choose what to read by mood differently even.

The reason I do by genre at home (and here) is I get in the mood for a genre to read, and then pick that way. It's interesting how we all differ and compare.

I originally joined Goodreads so that I could figure out what I had read. Sometimes I go through a binge and devour book after book. Then a few months later I'm wondering if I ever read the sequel of the one with the snarky unicorn, or what about the one that had carpenter elves...

Alice wrote: "I originally joined Goodreads so that I could figure out what I had read. Sometimes I go through a binge and devour book after book. Then a few months later I'm wondering if I ever read the sequel ..."

Fictfact.com works well for me to track series—I love seeing all my "next in series" and new release calendars showing just new for my series .

Goodreads doesn't seem interested in the continually-over-years suggestion to track series and next in series features (not even in adding a column for "series" in My Books). Other book sites have made noises about but so far haven't implemented.

Sounds like something I should look into. Thanks for the tip!

Oddly, my kindle paperwhite just said it updated and now has a next in series feature. Maybe that might make goodreads reconsider.

I guess I shelve my life. There's stuff I do for work, stuff I do for church, and stuff I do for fun. My bookshelves correspond with that. SF and fantasy books are for fun. Professional books and YA books are for work (I teach 8th and 9th grade English). And I have group of religious texts and bible studies too. I also keep a shelf for my nieces and nephews, because kids need books.

I worked at Barnes and Noble for four years so shelving by genre (at least on goodreads) is kind of ingrained in me! And then alphabetical by author. But I'm okay with that.