To everybody on all find my book sites everywhere:

[conuly]

If you have no idea what book it is, don't post!

"Here's a book I hope you can find, it's about cute little bunnies going on a picnic."

"It's not The Hunger Games, is it?"

"No, I think we can safely say that it is not."

"How about Catch-22? The Giver? Ender's Game? Sounds a little like Watership Down! Cause rabbits!"

"Okay, new book. It is a collection of short sci-fi stories. It must have This Specific Title, That Specific Title, and Another Specific Title. I am certain this book was written for adults, as there is quite a lot of graphic sex and violence in it."

"How about this book of realistic short stories for kids?"

"How about next time you visit Wikipedia to see if any of my specific stories are mentioned instead of making me do it?"

Like, it's okay to take a guess, but if you're not sure, google the title you're about to suggest first to see if it pops up as "No way, Jose, can't be that book".

And then people say I'm being mean when I respond to 15 comments of "It sounds a little like this book!!!!" with "OP, don't bother, it sounds nothing like that book."

Comments

[tozka]

Ha! Love it.

My own frustration is when people post search requests with like, two bits of information. "It had a blue cover and was about a ghost. I was a child when I read it." Eesh.

[rhoda_rants]

Oh man--see, at the library I have answered that EXACT question more than once. And weirdly, I tend to get excited about it now? Like I know this is a fake question, but I'm already thinking, "Okay, going by your age now, it was probably William Sleator, Mary Downing Han, or Lois Duncan. Let's find some blue covers and narrow this down!"

BUT I'm a nerd, and I work in a library, so that's literally my job, lol.

[movingfinger]

Public libraries sure would save a lot of time if they would just put their old card catalogues online, perhaps by decade, so people could flip through them! (Ha, ha. Nobody would use them.)

[conuly]

It's always a Sleator book. ALWAYS.

[conuly]

That's at least a solvable problem - though I wish people would get it through their damn heads that "seventh grade" is meaningless when we have *no idea how old you are*.

[rhoda_rants]

Hahaha--yeah, anytime there's a question like, "Hey, what's that weird, creepy, out-of-print book I read as a kid?" chances are he wrote it.

[peristaltor]

Oh, goodie! I was hoping DW had one of these communities!

That said, I've only been able to identify exactly one book ever in the years I read the LJ version.

[conuly]

DW does, and it's the same as the LJ one (which shut down after fully porting over here), but I'm bitching right now about stuff going on in the reddit sub, which is much more active and thus has many more people being ridiculous.

[fred_mouse]

Apologies for being too tired to brain, but what is the reddit sub titled?

and then I realised that google is a thing and I have found one. See previous too tired to brain.

[conuly]

However, I will link it for the benefit of anybody else: https://old.reddit.com/r/whatsthatbook/new/

(I prefer old style reddit pages.)

[conuly]

You will note, of course, that I am a VIP over there, because I've identified so damn many books. *preen*

(I give myself imaginary internet points for every book I solve.)

discerning books from minimal info

[bibliofile]

Yeah, bookstores get that too. I was so happy to see that art installation where a bunch of people organized an entire bookstore's inventory by color of cover. (Temporarily, for ART!) (We were never paid enough, and besides we had way too many books.)

[fred_mouse]

oooh, that is a much better layout. Thank you.

[fred_mouse]

Well done! I've noticed that you are also a useful contributor at the DW community. I also give you internet points for each book your solve :)

[tozka]

(I'm also a librarian! :D)

Weirdly enough, when it's in PERSON I don't mind doing a reference interview and find it really fun. When it's online, I get annoyed. lol.

If I had a nickel...

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

...for every time I either saw or posted a detailed description of a book to one of those what-was-that-book places and had The Secret Garden suggested, I'd be richer than Neil Young and Willie Nelson. At one otherwise excellent place, I started putting "It's not The Secret Garden" in my description.

Bluejay

[rhoda_rants]

Yeah, there is something about answering questions like that in person--although I find I enjoy it online too. I just go into research mode or something. It's fun!

HOWEVER, both those things *are* a bit different than people who clearly don't have a clue chiming in with something totally unlike whatever the asker is looking for.

[chez_jae]

I dunno--cute bunnies going on a picnic sounds like 'hunger games' to me.

:D

[conuly]

Right! And sometimes people forget, or misremember, or combine details from two or more books - but that doesn't mean that you can just slot in any old book anywhere.

[rhoda_rants]

The number of times I've had to say, "No NOT like frickin HARRY POTTER" every single time someone mentions "magic" or just "fantasy." *shakes head*

Re: If I had a nickel...

[conuly]

There's really only one book that sounds like The Secret Garden. I mean....

[conuly]

Only if you have a sick and depraved mind.

[conuly]

Some people would.

[conuly]

And it's probably The Boxes.