Intelligence Report: Goodreads

You guys know my main mission with the pen… win the war in the trenches!  But that’s not the end all and be all of James Beamon.  I’m like a role playing game hero.  I got side quests!

I haven’t talked much about my side quests.  The war in the trenches gets gritty enough without distraction.  But here are two of them.

1) My own Wikipedia entry

2) Exclusively me on the first page of search hits when I google myself

I figure if I handle my war in the trench with gusto, these side quests will take care of themselves.  And while having my own Wikipedia article is a ways off and kinda epic, the whole first page of google is attainable.  You should see some of the folks running around with my name.

Helping me finish out my side quest to take over Google Page One is Goodreads.  That’s how I discovered these people… when I was knee deep in the dirty pleasure of a self google.

Alright, so these people came seemingly out of nowhere with info on me, so naturally I had to check them out. As the name suggests, it’s a site dedicated to readers for readers about all the books they may or may not want to check out.

Goodreads has two of my first ever printed anthologies in their database. They both did well, giving me some pretty choice stats. Signing up with them officially got me access to the James Beamon Author Dashboard.

It’s not as comprehesive as Amazon’s Author Central. It’s not as author friendly either, as trying to add Triangulation: Last Contact to my book list proved an impossible task. I gave up with Last Contact added as a book I’ve read versus a book I helped write. In the words of Vector, “Curse you tiny toilet!”

Despite its interface shortcomings, I think Goodreads will be a pretty good site to use when it comes time to sell my book. They have all sorts of features for the writer trying to get his work noticed, like Q & A sessions with the author, giveaways, and ways to advertise. Since Goodreads is a site for book readers, it’s one of those few places that is already extensively dedicated to your target audience. In this respect, they’re actually better than Amazon. Wolf shirt anyone?

So, if you’re looking for a way to network with readers and see what’s hot on the shelves, take a look at Goodreads. Let me know when you’re there. I have like zero friends on that site and trying to add some seems harder than actually going out into the world and making new friends.

I have a good rating but no homies to share it with.