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I do not claim that these lists are exhaustive; they only contain items that I happen to be aware of. If you know of other items that should appear here, please e-mail me the site's URL and I'll consider adding it.
I have no financial interest in any of the retail sites listed here.
Large online bookstore. A particularly interesting feature is the reader reviews of individual books. You can read what others say about any book and submit your own reviews.
Barnes and Noble
http://barnesandnoble.com
Large online bookstore. A particularly interesting feature is the large archive of interviews with authors.
Books.com (Book Stacks Unlimited)
http://www.books.com
Large online bookstore. A particularly interesting feature here is the presentation of book-related news in RealAudio format.
Books on Tape
http://www.booksontape.com
Unabridged audio versions of thousands of books—both classics and current bestsellers—for sale or rent.
Borders
http://borders.com
Large online bookstore features a special section on children's books.
Elliott Bay Book Company
http://www.elliottbaybook.com/ebbco/
Large independent bookstore in downtown Seattle's Pioneer Square area. Click on "For the True Bibliomaniac" for links, including a list of Northwest authors.
Powell's Books
http://www.powells.com/
Large bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that sells both new and used books; also buys books. Check out "The Catacombs" (warehouse) for books available only online.
If you want to know when your favorite author will be in your town to sign books, the first place to check is the publisher's Web site. This is also the place to find out how to contact an author, either by e-mail or U.S. mail. If you want to contact an author but can't find an address, write to the author in care of the publisher.
Avon Books
http://AvonBooks.com/
Features mainly science fiction, mystery, and romance. Aspiring writers might want to click on "How to Submit a Manuscript" near the bottom of the home page. Authors represented include the following:
Bantam Doubleday Dell
http://www.bdd.com
Presents these daily features: puzzle, horoscope, word of the day. Major authors featured here include the following:
HarperCollins
http://harpercollins.com/
Among the authors featured here are:
Penguin Putnam Inc. Online
http://www.penguinputnam.com
Features "author of the day" and "first fiction." Authors represented include the following:
Random House: Books @ Random
http://www.randomhouse.com/
The Web site says that it includes the imprints Ballantine, Crown, Del Rey, Knopf, and Random House, but with the most recent publishing megamerger the Random House site now also links to Bantam Doubleday Dell. Here you'll find teachers' guides, information on the Modern Library line, and reading group guides, especially for the Vintage imprint, a major producer of trade paperback editions of literary fiction. Major authors featured here include the following:
Simon & Schuster
http://www.simonsays.com/
Major authors featured here include the following:
Here, collected in one spot, you’ll find reports of news and reviews
from major publications from all over the world. Updated daily, this is
a rich source of information.
Atlantic Unbound (The Atlantic
Monthly)
http://www.theatlantic.com/
The self-proclaimed magazine of "politics, society, the arts, and culture." The section "Post & Riposte: A Reader Forum" features message-board discussions on related topics.
Bold Type: An Online Literary
Magazine
http://www.boldtype.com/
Sponsored by the Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, this magazine "brings together some of today's most talented new writers."
Book: The Magazine for the
Reading Life
http://www.bookmagazine.com
In a Letter to Readers in the premier issue (October/November 1998) of this magazine, the editor and publisher state that this publication will be "about people and places and ideas that are important to people who care deeply about books."
Bookpage
http://www.bookpage.com
This self-described "monthly general interest book review" contains author interviews, features and 40-50 reviews of new books each month.
The Boston Book
Review
http://www.bookwire.com/bbr/bbr-home.html
Here you'll find reviews and features about books you're not likely to read about in the popular press, particularly books published by small presses and university presses.
Los
Angeles Times Books
http://www.calendaralive.com/LA_Times/Arts_and_Entertainment/Books_Talks/
Much of the information here is a listing of book-related events in the Los Angeles area, but you'll also find reviews, first chapters from current books, and reading group guides.
Midwest Book Review
http://www.execpc.com/~mbr/bookwatch/
In addition to book reviews in several categories, Midwest Book Review features reviews of Web sites related to books, literature, and publishing.
The New York Times: Books
http://www.nytimes.com/books/
All book reviews published in The New York Times since 1980 are now available at this searchable Web site. Access requires registration, which is free.
Salon
http://www.salon.com/
This literary magazine includes commentary on books, music, television, politics, and other areas of popular culture and society. Features book reviews and author interviews. The section "Table Talk" offers message boards for discussion of a variety of topics.
This classic literary reference is available online through Columbia University's Project Bartleby (see below).
Bibliomania: The Network Library
http://www.bibliomania.com/
Large collection of online texts including classic novels, biographical and academic works, poetry, and ancient texts.
Biography
http://www.biography.com
The companion to the A&E series Biography, this site offers message boards, a daily biography, and a searchable database of "over 20,000 personalities."
BookBrowser: The Guide for
Avid Readers
http://www.bookbrowser.com/
This is the place to look if you want to find out the order of books in a series by a particular author. Here you'll find all kinds of fiction reading lists arranged by genre, location, author, etc.
Recently the folks at BookBrowser have tried to beef up their site with the addition of book reviews. However, a quick glance at the reviews under "general fiction" and "detective/mystery" convinced me that the lists available at this site are much more valuable than the reviews. The review section could have been more useful if the site owners had been more discriminating in their choice of reviewer.
Booklist
http://www.ala.org/booklist/index.html
This site presents "the digital counterpart of the American Library Association's Booklist magazine." Here you'll find indexed thousands of reviews of both books and electronic media.
The Book Group List
http://books.rpmdp.com/
This is the home page for a reading group that meets via e-mail.
The group reads two books a month and discusses them through listserv mailings.
The site contains the current reading schedule, instructions on how to
join the group, a listing of the group’s past selections, and a huge list
of recommended reading.
Book Lovers: Fine Books
and Literature
http://www.xs4all.nl/~pwessel/
Not much original content, but all kinds of links to book-related sites.
The Book Reporter
http://www.bookreporter.com/brc/index.asp
The Book Reporter is a large site containing feature articles, book
reviews, and author profiles. You can sign up to receive the e-mail newsletter.
Book Web
http://www.bookweb.org/
Official site of the American Booksellers Association. Includes a bookstore directory. If you want to know about the lawsuit against Barnes & Noble and Borders/Walden, this is the place to check.
Book Wire: Inside the Book Business
http://www.bookwire.com/
Just about anything you might want to know about books and the book business, including lists of publishers, booksellers, book awards, literary e-mail lists, and authors' Web sites. Also includes reviews from School Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, Boston Book Review, and Hungry Mind Review.
Britannica Internet Guide
http://www.ebig.com/
With anyone in the world now able to throw a page up onto the World Wide Web, how do you know which pages are reliable and worthy of your time? To help solve this problem, the people who bring you the Encyclopedia Britannica have created this free service that ranks Web sites. Simply being included on the list means that a site has at least minimal usefulness and authority. You can research topics by means of a Yahoo-like hierarchy.
Children's
Literature Web Guide
http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/index.html
Contains features, discussion boards, and lots of links.
ClueLass Home Page: A Mystery
Lover's Notebook
http://www.cluelass.com/
A MUST site for mystery fans. Especially helpful is the Bloodstained Bookshelf, a listing of new mystery releases scheduled for the upcoming months.
Digital BookWorld
http://www.digitalbookworld.com/
This book site, with a decidedly Canadian flavor, features a monthly author profile, publishing industry news, and lists of authors and their works.
Ed's Internet Book Review
http://www.clark.net/~bell/eibr
Hundreds of reviews of books in every category, both fiction and nonfiction. Often you'll find multiple reviews of a particular title offering different viewpoints. EIBR solicits reviews, and you can find the guidelines for writing and submitting your own reviews at the site.
A note of caution here: because anyone can submit reviews, the quality of the material varies greatly. I'd suggest that you start by looking at some reviews of books you've already read to find reviewers whose sensibilities and critical judgement match your own.
The Great Books Foundation is a nonprofit educational organization
that oversees the formation of literary discussion groups, trains group
leaders, and collects and publishes readings for its groups. Great Books
offers groups for both adults and children. At their Web site you can learn
how to start a Great Books group or look for an existing group in your
area.
The Internet Classics Archive
http://classics.mit.edu/
English translations of classical works, mostly Greco-Roman but some Chinese and Persian as well.
The Internet Movie Database
http://us.imdb.com/
OK, so it's not strictly a literary site. But if you want to find out about film versions of a book, start your search here.
The Internet Public Library
http://www.ipl.org/
Features several sections, including the following:
Literary
Calendar
http://litcal.yasuda-u.ac.jp/LitCalendar.shtml
Find out what noteworthy literary events occurred on any date. You can also subscribe to have the calendar e-mailed to you daily.
Literature
and Medicine
http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/lit-med/lit-med-db/literature.html
Part of a project at New York University, this list annotates works—both fiction and nonfiction—by physicians or about medical topics. You can search the database by author, title, genre, or keyword. (A list of physician authors curiously includes neither Robin Cook nor Michael Palmer.)
Murder, Mystery,
and Mayhem
http://www.doitnow.com/~cerci/mystref.htm
A listing of mystery-related links.
Mysteries.com
http://www.Mysteries.com
From A&E. Here you can check TV listings, purchase videos, and subscribe to a monthly e-mail notification service of upcoming Mystery! shows.
The Mystery
Chat Channel Title Page
http://www2.ari.net/saunderf/mystery/mystery.html
The Mystery Chat Channel is an IRC (Internet Relay Chat) channel. Here you'll find out how, where, and when to participate.
MysteryNet.com: The Online Mystery
Network
http://www.mysterynet.com/
Areas here include The Case (mini-mysteries), Mystery TV & Movies, Authors & Books, and The History of the Mystery.
The New York Public Library
http://www.nypl.org/
The On-Line Books Page
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/books.html
A listing of books available online prepared at Carnegie Mellon University. Includes Banned Books On-Line, with lists of books that have been attacked, discussions of censorship, and links to other sites dealing with censorship.
Prime Crime's
Cyber Times
http://members.aol.com/bcsherlock/index.html
The monthly newsletter of Prime Crime, a mystery lovers' group that meets weekly on America Online.
Project Bartleby
http://www.columbia.edu/acis/bartleby/
Sponsored by Columbia University in New York City, this site features online versions of classic works such as poetry (e.g., Wordsworth, Yeats) and reference books (e.g., Strunk's The Elements of Style).
Project Gutenburg
http://www.promo.net/pg/
An impressive collection of e-texts of classic works of literature that are no longer under copyright.
Reader’s Club
http://www.readersclub.org/
Produced by the public library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County,
Charlotte, NC, this site offers features such as “American History” and
“What Is Literary Fiction?” It also contains reviews of films based on
books along with sections such as new fiction, mysteries, nonfiction, and
treasures (staff picks). The calendar of book group meetings at the library’s
various locations is impressive.
Shakespeare: The
Complete Works of William Shakespeare
http://the-tech.mit.edu/Shakespeare/works.html
Troutworks Mystery Guide
http://www.troutworks.com/
Reviews of mysteries. When you choose a favorite book, the system will suggest the 5 most similar books from the database.
Click here to go to the Glossary of Literary Terms.
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