Online book recommendations

In compiling my collection of 10 books I would like to read, I decided to pick a theme that would guide my search. I recently picked up the book “Holy Blood, Holy Grail” from the library to read after class was over. I enjoy history and this sounded like a good combination of research and speculation about the holy grail and the knights templar.
I started my the process using WorldCat, the online catalog maintained by OCLC. I have used WorldCat before, but only to find materials for customers that CML does not own. I began by entering a basic search for knights templar which returned about 600 results. WorldCat’s lay out is nice, with the results occupying most of the page and linked terms for refining the search on the left side. My favorite part is looking to see what libraries own the item. One the page for a selected item, this is located below the information about the basic information about the book. One thing that stood out about WorldCat is the lack of reviews. Most of the review for books are from sites like Amazon or Goodreads. I agree with Professor Roland that as librarians we should be working to change that. To evaluate the books, I read a few of the reviews. I tend to ignore the “star” ratings, because people are very subjective with them, praising a book while giving it 3-stars. I find the review more useful. After wading through a few pages of titles, I changed my search, using the advanced search options to knights templar grail and further limited the search to only non-fiction books. WorldCat has an easy list feature, just click the link at the top. I added three books to the list “Things to Check Out.” Also, the ability to cite the book in APA with just a click is very convenient.

Next, I tried Goodreads. I’ve used this site before, but not much. I decided to try starting at the last book I added on WorldCat, Rossyln by Tim Wallace-Murphy. I was hoping that Goodreads would be able to suggest titles that were similar to this one. However, after checking the Popular and People Who Viewed shelves, I did not find this to be the case. I searched for knights templar grail and started looking. I was disappointed to find that many of the books I looked at were not reviewed, and the ones that were had only a brief explanation of the readers like or dislike. Most people who had added the book had only given it a star rating.
I left Goodreads to try Google books. I've used Google books before, but mainly to find previews of books I am interested in. This is the first time I have used the My Library feature. Again, I began my search with knights templar grail and began browsing. Google allows users to rate and review books, however, nearly all of the reviews were from Amazon. In fact, the experience was very similar to Amazon, except for the preview feature. I have mixed feeling about the mix preview. At times it is a good way to see if you like the authors writing style or if a book has the content you want. Other times, the previews are too limited to determine anything from. In this case, one of the books I looked at allowed me to read several pages and I added it and another book by the same author because I like his writing style and description of the book.

Lastly, I looked in LibraryThing (LT). I’ve used this site many times and really enjoy the creative ways that LT gives meaning to user data with things like Recommendations, Unsuggestions, and Members with your books. The blog is also very interesting, check out the most recent ost on the Melvil Decimal System. I began my search with a book that I read in college, The Hiram Key by Christopher Knight. I clicked on Recommendations and LT generated several lists of recommendations based on their data. These included: LibraryThing combinded recommendations, Member recommendations, Special recommendations, Books with Similar Tags, People with this Book also have, Books with similar library subjects and classifications. With one search, I was looking at an long list of recommendations, with different different associations to the book I had started with.

The main thing I learned from this exercise is that Amazon has the best reviews. I hope that more librarians will begin using WorldCat because I like its layout and it has the potential to be a good non-commercial source for this type of information.


Baigent, Michael, & Leigh, Richard. (1991). The Temple and the lodge. Arcade Pub.
Bradley, Michael. (1998). Grail knights of North America. Hounslow Press.
Churton, Tobias. (2006). The Magus of freemasonry. Inner Traditions International.
Griffin, Justin. (2001). The Holy grail. McFarland & Co Inc Pub.
Griffin, Justin. (2004). The Grail procession. McFarland & Co Inc Pub.
Hancock, Graham. (1993). The Sign and the seal. Touchstone.
Matthews, John. (2007). The Grail tarot. St Martins Press.
Nicholson, H. J. (2001). The Knights Templar: A new history. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton Pub.
Robinson, J. J. (1991). Dungeon, fire, and sword: The Knights Templar in the crusades. New York: M. Evans & Co.
Wallace-Murphy, T., & Hopkins, M. (2002). Rosslyn: Guardian of the secrets of the Holy Grail. London: Thorsons.