Thank you, Goodreads

I am reluctant user of most social media. I look at Facebook primarily to keep up with family and a few close friends. Twitter I use to let people know that I've created a blog post. Same with LinkedIn. I've never used Instagram or any of the other tools that seem to be more popular with younger demographics.

But I do like Goodreads very much. And for a variety of reasons...

1. It's an easy way of tracking the books you have read. More importantly, it's a convenient way to keep track of the books you might want to read. Paper lists don't do it for me. 
2. It gives me suggestions of new reading materials. Yes, you do get blasted with promotions for "a new book by an author you have read" but primarily I enjoy seeing what my friends are reading and recommending. Although some have horrible tastes in reading materials (and I am sure they think the same of me), it's fun to see how their ratings and reviews compare to my own. I do wish more people wrote reviews - even if only a sentence or two. Some must have had a bad experience writing book reports as a child.
3. I enjoy the book challenge, "Year in Books" summary, and my reading statistics that chart how much I've read over the years. (I read more than twice the number of books in 2020 than I did in 2016. Hmmmm, I wonder why.) The "Year in Books" lists some interesting factoids - longest and shortest books, most popular and least popular books, and your average review score. I am not a believer in extrinsic motivation for encouraging reading, but somehow this is rewarding.
4. Finally, Goodreads keeps me quite humble. Most of my Goodread friends are educators - librarians, teachers, and professors. (I heard once that an administrator read a book but I don't have a reliable source for that claim.) Anyway, many of these folks tear through so many books, it makes me feel I am still in kindergarten. And most do not enjoy the luxury of spare time afforded by retirement. Are they just fast readers or have they stopped doing things like cooking, bathing, and exercising to make more time?

 Anyway, even if you are not a big social media fan, give Goodreads a try. An added bonus is that it seems pretty free of nut-job political rants. But then, maybe I've just been really good at choosing my friends.