a book service I wish existed.

I don’t know about you, but when I discover a new favorite author, I try to buy or read all her or his other titles–which is made much, much easier by used/out-of-print online sites that bring together millions of book sellers in one search like abebooks.com.

I just received a package of six books today by my new favorite (yet really old favorite) author Gillian Bradshaw that I bought through abebooks.com. That’s great. Exciting, even. It totally made my day.

But you know what I’m missing? You know where the gap still is? Finding out about all the new books that come out by the authors or illustrators that I love. I want some online service (preferably a free service) to send me an email notification each time a new book by one of my favorite authors comes out. Maybe that exists, and I just haven’t found it yet. But that’s what I want.

I know you can go to various publishers’ sites, and sign up for email notifications–but that’s a hassle. First, you’d have to visit a lot of different sites if you have a lot of favorite authors (and geez, do I ever.) Second, they don’t all have notifications. And third, even when they do, they might not publish that author’s next book. I want one notification place where I can input my long list….

It sounds simple to me. Like something an online bookstore could do, or some service attached to Google. But I don’t know of one. Does anyone else? And if not, why hasn’t anyone created it? I hope someone does. That’s my current dream book service that I want. Oh, yeah–and the first five pages of each book attached, so I can see if I want to buy the book right away, or wait.

Maybe some technologically inclined book geek will create such a service. I’ll bet they could get advertising dollars from publishers; it would be a boon for them. I hope someone will snatch up my idea and run with it. Book notifications, here we come!

August 15th, 2007