THE LITERARY WEB

Books

"The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them."
Mark Twain

Book Clubs, Forums, and Groups
Book Reviews
Books Online
For Book Lovers Only
Awards
Publishers

Book Clubs, Forums, and Groups

Those who read often enjoy sharing their perceptions and insights with others. The following selection of sites includes Book Groups listings both off- and on-line.

The BookWire Reading Room: This site has a selection of electronic texts as well as author information, literary mailing lists, an index of book-related newsgroups, and a book award index.
Yahoo Literature Usenet: An annotated list of book related newsgroups.
Vintage Reading Group Guide List: Vintage Books has designed Reading Group Guides to enhance a group's reading and discussion of a book. They include a description of each book, questions, discussion topics, author biography, and sometimes a note from the author to assist the group in having a stimulating and interesting discussion. Teacher's Guides are also available on selected titles. This site also contains links to more on-line reading groups.
The Great Books Foundation: "The Great Books Foundation offers people of all ages an exciting way to read and discuss outstanding works of literature." They publish a reading series for children and adults, and offer training for discussion leaders. The site includes a list of Great Book Councils by state and a Great Books Discussion List.

There are a variety of sites relating to book reviews on the Web. Some sites are simply electronic versions of traditional print reviews in newspapers, journals, and magazines. Other sites were developed strictly as Internet resources and contain Web enhancements, reader reviews, and discussion groups.

ACQEB'S Directory of Book Reviews on the Web.: This site is a gathering place for librarians and other professionals interested in acquisitions and collection development.
Amazon.Com: Search their catalog of 2.5 million titles for reviews by media as well as readers.
Atlantic Unbound: Here is the Atlantic Monthly in electronic form, with the contents of the current print issue enhanced for the Web. This is a great resource for anyone who loves books and words. It contains a monthly column on Digital Culture with emphasis on arts and letters in the electronic realm. In its pages one can find book reviews and articles, interviews, and commentaries.
Barnes and Noble: This online bookstore offers reviews of many current titles. The reviews are from places like Kirkus and Publisher's Weekly. Click on search and type in the title you are looking for.
The Book Buffet: Reviews of books that may, at times, be overlooked due to lack of marketing, odd subjects, unknown authors or saturation of the market.
Book Links: The Overbooked Website: Book Links is a volunteer project site constructed by members of the staff of the Chesterfield County Public Library in Chesterfield, VA. It contains a collection of links to sites of interest to the book lover including an extensive section devoted to reviews and reading lists.
Book Recommendations of Real Folks: For those readers wanting to know what "real people" think about the books they are reading, this is the page to visit. The page was constructed with the hope that readers would share their recommendations of books about which they feel strongly and find others with similar book interests. The online browser can link to the forty newest book lists or peruse randomly selected lists.
Booklist: This Web page is the digital counterpart to the American Library Association's magazine, Booklist. For over 90 years Booklist has been the librarian's source for reviews of the latest books. The Web site allows the online visitor to examine current selections of reviews, feature articles, author interviews, and book-related essays beyond the limited review selections available in newspapers and magazines.
BookPage: BookPage is a national review publication with an interest in helping people select their books and learn more about the authors writing them. Information found here is unique to the site or an enhancement of the print publication. It includes reviews and interviews, the opportunity to post one's own reviews, and a readers' guide to what's new.
Books We Have Read and Loved: This site is a place for readers and book discussion groups looking for something beyond the bestseller lists to help guide their reading selections. The site was developed by a group of women who love to read and have been in a book club for many years. They believe in the power of good literature. The group aims are to encourage reading books not lengthy reviews, to find relatively unknown but great books, and to offer membership in the growing community of serious readers.
BookWire Reviews: Bookwire Reviews offers a search feature in which reviews from a variety of sources can be found. Search by title, author, or publisher. BookWire is an immense, authoritative site with something for every book lover. It contains a vast list of links to various review sources and a discussion area for literate conversation about books.
The Boston Globe Book Reviews
Boston Review: The Boston Review "combines commitments to public reason and literary imagination." This is the electronic version of the magazine, containing prose and poetry reviews with an emphasis on political, cultural, and literary ideas.
Good Reading: This Net site is devoted to good reading. From the home page, the online browser can link to reviews and previews of new novels. Sample extracts and author interviews are included as well. The page also links to an "Electronic Slushpile" where works from novels in progress are showcased.
Hungry Mind Review: Hungry Mind Review is a quarterly book review magazine distributed free in bookstores around the country. The print edition is built around a particular theme with reviews and essays supporting that theme. The online version contains features included in the print magazine as well as selections exclusive to the Web version. The page contains discussion sites and an HMR archive.
Midwest Book Review: This is a valuable and abundant site for any book lover! The MBR site contains a number of literary resources as well as information and reviews of specific books. Links to Internet and children's book watch information can be found here as well.
Miami Herald
The New York Review of Books
Providence Phoenix
The Quarterly Black Review: This online edition of the QBR contains the most recent views and reviews from the print edition. Included in this page are nonfiction, fiction, poetry, and children's literature reviews. Links to a Black Classics Guide, the QBR Blacklist, and a Black Booksellers Directory are also contained here.
Salon: Book features archive. Reviews, articles, searchable.
San Francisco Chronicle Book Review: Current and archived reviews.
Washington Post Book World: This site contains the electronic version of the Sunday section of the Washington Post Book World. From this site the visitor can read the first chapters of books mentioned in the reviews. This Web site also supports online discussion groups on books, reading, and writing.
New York Times on the Web Books: Click above to go to the front page of The New York Times; click on "books," then register. There is currently no subscription fee. The New York Times on the Web Books site has a complete archive of New York Times book reviews since 1980--more than 50,000 in all, searchable by author or title. The site also includes book reviews and book-related news from every day's New York Times. Also, Only-on-the-Web features first chapters from a selection of recently reviewed books and bestsellers. You can also listen to RealAudio presentations of authors reading their own works.
Nancy's Really Good Reads: Nancy works in the acquisitions department of the O'Keefe Library at St. Ambrose University

Books Online

Electronic Literature Foundation: Advanced, free electronic texts from world literature in several formats and languages. All of the ELF texts include internal search engines and numerous illustrations. Current works online include "The Rubaiyat" of Omar Khayyam, Dante's "Divine Comedy", Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales", the novels of Jane Austen and Thomas Hardy, and more.
The Great Books: Online links to books and author's biography. The site also has links to booksellers, publishers, reviews, reference, online resources, and books online.
Project Gutenburg: The Project Gutenberg Philosophy is to make information, books and other materials available to the general public in forms a vast majority of the computers, programs and people can easily read, use, quote, and search. There are three portions of the Project Gutenberg Library, basically be described as: Light Literature; such as Alice in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass, Peter Pan, Aesop's Fables, etc. Heavy Literature; such as the Bible or other religious documents, Shakespeare, Moby Dick, Paradise Lost, etc. References; such as Roget's Thesaurus, almanacs, and a set of encyclopedia, dictionaries, etc.

For Book Lovers Only

While it's not as easy to curl up with the computer as it is with a good book, there are many diverse and exciting Web sites available to those who share a common interest, that is, the bibliophile! Here is an attempt to provide links to some of the varied resources available to dedicated book lovers. This section contains links to lists of what people are reading, what people should be reading, where you can buy it, and some of its history. Warning! Once you start down this path of fascinating and hyperlinked pages, it will be hard to escape!

Amazon.com Books: Amazon claims to be the Web's largest bookstore. Almost anything in print can be ordered online from them. Their page includes staff and reader reviews, author interviews, and titles in the news (Oprah's booklist, NPR book reviews, etc.). This site also contains an automated search agent to notify the reader if a favorite author releases a new title.
Book Browser: BookBrowser is a collection of fiction reading lists. BookBrowser was made to help avid fiction readers find books and authors. The list is arranged by genre, location, and series. Readers may submit their own author and genre selections to be added to the site.
Book Lovers: This site is a good general reference to fine arts and literature. Piet Wesselman offers a selection of useful sites of interest to those who enjoy reading and writing. He includes links to rare book sites and book arts and fine printing as well as a multitude of literary links.
Book Web: This is the site of the American Booksellers Association home page. The contents of the page include current book news and events, a reading room, links to searchable databases, and other book-related sites.
Books A to Z: This site is intended to be a tool to enable the book lover to produce, distribute, or find books. There are a large number of links to book and library resources. The links from this page have been reviewed by the page designers and are offered because of their merits.
Books in Chains: Books in Chains is a complete and appealing literature resource. Information is maintained in three broad categories: resources, authors, and ezines. This is a large page with many interesting and varied links.
BookWire: Bookwire is listed in multiple sections of this page because of its exhaustive content concerning everything to do with books. This site contains thousands of annotated and intelligently organized links to book-related sites. A must visit for the bibliophile.
The Center For The Book: The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress was established by law in 1977 to stimulate public interest in books, reading, libraries and literacy. It serves as a catalyst and a source of ideas -- both nationally and internationally -- through an expanding network of affiliated centers in more than 30 states, a reading promotion partnership program that includes more than 50 national civic and educational organizations, and a broad network of "community of the book" organizations.
A Celebration of Women Writers: This page includes extensive links to information about and writings by women writers. The site is edited and maintained by Mary Mark Ockerbloom at Carnegie Mellon University. From here interested readers can sign up for the Book People mailing list, a forum for announcing and discussing electronic books freely read on the Net. Its intent is to aid and inspire a culture of volunteers and projects providing literary works on the Internet.
Christian Classics Ethereal Library: This Web page contains classic Christian texts in electronic format and is maintained by Wheaton College. "There is enough good reading material here to last a lifetime, if you give each work the time it deserves."
Digital Librarian: Digital Librarian is maintained by Margaret Vail Anderson, a librarian in Cortland, N.Y. This is an annotated list of web sites on books and reading. "A librarian's choice of the best of the web."
Great Books: The goal of Great Books programs is devoted to the idea that everyone can read and understand great literature, literature that has the capacity to engage the intellect as well as the imagination. The Great Books Foundation sponsors reading lists, conferences, and seminars for adult and juvenile readers. Information about their reading lists and programs can be accessed here.
Great Books Index: This page is a personal interest project and not affiliated with the Encyclopedia Britannica "Great Books of the Western World" publications; it does, however, include a list of the works that appeared in that project. Some of the criteria for selecting works contained in this page are contemporary significance, inexhaustibility (book can be read again and again), and relevance to great ideas and issues of the last 25 centuries.
Half.com: Half.com is an innovative marketplace that connects book buyers and sellers. Half.com is not an auction. There is no bidding. Everything is available for immediate purchase and is discounted more than 50%.
The Internet Book Information Center: IBIC was the first book-related "megasite" to appear on the Web. It is a publication intended to serve the global community of book lovers. The IBIC mission is to provide the online browser with useful, interesting, and important information about books.
the list: The list contains a compilation of the great books of human history. The page's author has defined great books to be those that have influenced human thought. The list is divided into six categories containing historical dates interspersed with titles of books written within the corresponding time period.
Literary Resources on the Net: Literary Resources is a well-named site containing links to online pages of interest. Links are listed by genre and time period. The collection of sites included are concerned mainly with English and American literature and would be useful to academics.
Real Fiction: This is a page for readers and authors of small press and self-published novels. Works here are unusual, difficult to categorize, and often provocative.
SHARP Web: SHARP is the Society for the History of Authorship, Reading & Publishing. "Book historians study the social, cultural, and economic history of authorship; the history of the book trade, copyright, censorship, and underground publishing; the publishing histories of particular literary works; authors and editors; the spread of literacy and book distribution; canon formation and politics of literary criticism; libraries, reading habits and reader response." This is an ambitious site with a number of interesting literary links.
The Western Canon: This Web site is very similar in intent to the list. The Western Canon is dedicated to providing a location where the Internet community can link to the most important written works of Western civilization. The importance of communication, printed or electronic, is the power of the ideas it expresses.
Wordsworth: An independent bookstore located in Harvard Square,Cambridge MA. The site inlcudes links to book awards, author interviews, a weekly first lines contest, an area just for kids, and an Independant bestseller list. Their online database has almost every book that is in print and a number of books that are no longer in print.

Awards

Bookwire: The Bookwire Index of Book Awards is an extensive list of sites for literary awards.
PEN American Center Literary Awards: PEN American Center administers a number of literary prizes to honor excellence among American authors--emerging and established--of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, and to recognize the translation of fo reign works into English.
The Booker McConnell Prize: Referred to colloquially as the "Booker", this literary prize is sponsored by Booker McConnell Ltd and administered by the National Book League in the United Kingdom. It is awarded to the best full-length novel written in English by a citizen of the UK, the Commonwealth, Eire, Pakistan or South Africa.
The Orange Prize for Fiction: UK's largest annual literary award for a single novel. The aim of the Orange Prize for Fiction is not only to celebrate novels of excellence, originality and accessibility but also to promote women writers to as wide a range of male and female readers as possible.
The Pulitzer Prizes: This Web site lists the names of the winners and finalists, citations, pictures, cartoons, jurors and other information.
Literary Prizes: Links to some of the major prizes in Literary Fiction.
The Nobel Prize Internet Archive: Nobel Prize Literature Winners 1996-1901. Each name is hyperlinked to pages about the author.
PEN/Faulkner Award: Named for William Faulkner, who used his Nobel Prize funds to create an award for young writers, and affiliated with PEN (Poets, Playwrights, Editors, Essayists and Novelists), the international writers' organization, the PEN/Faulkner Award was founded by writers in 1980 to honor their peers, and is now the largest juried award for fiction in the United States.
Virtual Words Worth: A list of literary awards, includes children, fiction, and non fiction.
Yahoo Literature Awards: Yahoo's list of litertature and humanities awards.

Publishers

Bantam Doubleday Dell: The Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. is one of the largest publishers of general interest consumer books in North America. Its core businesses are adult and young readers fiction and nonfiction hardcovers, paperbacks, and audio books.
Graywolf Press: The site includes, Pick of the litter - featured books; Making Tracks - Resources for educators, readers, writers; Books to Sink Your Teeth Into - Catalog/Ordering. Graywolf currently publishes sixteen books a year, including poetry, novels, essays, literary criticism, and memoir. They have claimed their piece of the literary landscape by introducing and promoting the most exciting and creative writers of our times.
Howell Press, Inc.
University Press of Virginia: The UPVa editorial program focuses primarily on the humanities and social sciences with special concentrations in American history, African American studies, gender studies, southern studies, literature, and regional books.
Yahoo! Literary Small Press: A long list of links.

Updated June 4, 2000
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