I also wanted to share this gift idea (yeah ok, it is book related… not overly shocking). I use Goodreads to track what I read. I am of an age and have read enough books that I will pick on up and say “oh this sounds good” and read 4 chapters and thing “this sounds familiar” and then look at it again and say, “I’ve read this”. The world has too many books to read ones that are just meh a second time. (ones I love, I read many times). About two years ago, I started recording the books I read (and the books I tried and said nope).

During this time, a few of my friends have joined and it has been interesting to see where our tastes merge and where they don’t. It is fun way to find new author.

I have a friend who is closing in on 150 books for the year. She is always looking for new authors. I made a list of her top 15 authors (books she starred with a 4 or above). As a librarian you are often asked “I like Author, but I have read all their books, any ideas?” I call these Like authors.

There were two sites I used the most for this:

https://www.literature-map.com/

https://www.meetnewbooks.com/

I took the list of authors and then found three like authors for each of her authors. With a big sheet of paper, I then took the original authors, made a cloud and then put the new authors around them in the same color. Once the sheet was filled, I went ahead and made some doodles. Rolled it up and put a ribbon around it.

Fun, useful gift that I enjoyed creating!