Given that thousands of books are published each and ever year, it may be overwhelming for the discerning reader to separate the wheat from the chaff. Stepping into the fray (since 1997) is BookBrowse.com, started in 1997 by Davina Morgan-Witts and her husband Paul. As the site notes, "Bookbrowse carefully selects from the most interesting current books and provides you with multiple reviews and a...

The Booknotes Web site is dedicated to providing information about the long-running Booknotes television show, and as such, will be of great interest to those with a passion for reading nonfiction. On the site, users can sign up to talk about the books featured on the show, as well as creating a personal video collection of their favorite Booknotes moments. The main highlight of the site is the...

Many sites provide book reviews, but Complete Review may be one of the better ones available to the Web-browsing public. Currently, the site includes 1,443 book reviews, and visitors can browse through them at their leisure. Visitors can also view the reviews by genre, such as drama, film, philosophy, or poetry. Each review contains a bit of brief information (such as the date of publication and...

The folly of downsizing book reviews http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-op-connelly29apr29,1,3962449.story?coll=la-news-comment Battle of the book reviews http://www.calendarlive.com/books/cl-ca-bloggers13may13,0,4948424.story CRITICAL MASS: The blog of the national book critics circle board of directors http://bookcriticscircle.blogspot.com/ Salman Rushdie and Stephen...

Goodreads is not only a fine place to find your next "good read," but also a great way to keep track of books you've enjoyed. Visitors can log in to create their own lists of books, along with annotations, comments, and ratings. Additionally, visitors can search and browse other readers' profiles, take literary quizzes, and look over hundreds of book lists. Author pages collect writers'...

Jen Bigheart in the Public Relations director for Westbank Community Libraries of Austin, Texas who is also involved in the Texas Teen Book Festival and a co-founder of the group Literary Lonestars. On her blog I Read Banned Books, Bigheart reviews a number of Young Adult and middle grade fiction titles with an eye toward intellectual freedom. Books are tagged by title, author, and topics for easy...

Literary Disco is a podcast hosted by book lovers Julia Pistell, Tod Goldberg, and Rider Strong. As the trio note on this website, "We're writers, but we've always been readers first and foremost." In keeping with this sentiment, Literary Disco is dedicated to discussing and reviewing books of all genres, including popular fiction, young adult literature, non-fiction, memories, genre fiction, and...

Avid readers and those interested in literary criticism may enjoy this crowdsourced book rating resource from Literary Hub (featured in the 3-09-2017 Scout Report), which collects and weighs book reviews from multiple literary journals, news outlets, and "alternative litblogs." The aim is to create a cumulative rating that helps users select their next favorite book, providing pull quotes from the...

Similar in both its outlook and content to the New York Review of Books here in the US, the London Review of Books is a place that serves as the nerve center for a great deal of discussion about literature and authors. This online edition of the London Review of Books will be a great place to browse for those who love to read, and particularly for those persons looking for trenchant reviews of...

"Look Out Honey, 'Cause I'm Using Technology," is a line in a 1973 song by Iggy Pop and the Stooges. It's also the title of a delightful blog by Jenny Arch, a public librarian who has worked in both adult services and youth services. Arch's blog will appeal to two audiences. First, fellow librarians will enjoy her thoughtful reflections about her work, which includes a recent post about providing...