I've got just the thing for you - LibraryThing

"Library what?" my husband asked, thinking I'd forgotten the complete title.

"Thing. LibraryThing. That's actually what it's called," I said, trying to explain that I wasn't substituting "thing" for the real word that I'd forgotten.

I know I didn't have to, but I couldn't resist signing up for an account. Not that I needed yet another place to keep track of the books I read. I already use at least two other social networking sites centered around books, and I still haven't been able to relinquish my hand written Book Lovers Journal that I keep on the shelf by my bed.

And there's the rub. The question isn't whether or not such sites are useful - the answer to that is obvious to any bibliophile! The question is which site or method for cataloguing my literary conquests is best - most complete, easy to use, fun.

I use the Visual Bookshelf application to display the books I read on Facebook, although as FB has modified over time, I've become increasingly disillusioned with it. I was forced to turn off the "publish" feature because whenever I finished reading a book, about 4 notices to that effect would be posted to my friends news feeds. Now I know my friends are all incredibly interested in my literary life, but I felt that was slight overkill!

A few weeks ago I created an account using GoodReads. And of course, a few days ago, I jumped into LibraryThing. Honestly, I haven't used either of them long enough to compare and contrast their various features. I'm open to being wooed by either, but I think I'd be most likely to commit to the one that most of my friends use, or the one that has the best Facebook application. Which means I could go either way at this point, as I know one person who uses LibraryThing devotedly, and two people who use GoodReads infrequently. And while GoodReads already has a Facebook app that I downloaded, I can't get it to work properly. LibraryThing on the other hand, is only in the beginning stages of interfacing with Facebook, meaning you can only publish your book reviews there and nothing else.

So, until I overcome my fear of commitment, I'm compelled to quell my obsessive compulsive tendencies by keeping all three sites up to date. And there's just something about flipping through the pages of my journal, counting up the titles I've read so far this year...

Oh! Did you all notice? In the column on the right? I managed to embed a LibraryThing widget on my blog! You can see what I'm currently reading and click on the link to visit my profile on LibraryThing. How technologically advanced is that, eh? I might have to change the title of my blog from Techno-Peasant to...hmmm...what's the next rung up from peasant...