With summers taking its toll on all of us, the most rejuvenating and satisfying activity to beat the heat is reading a good book while lazing around in your favorite beach or on your cozy couch.

But the hardest part is, choosing the perfect book, they say that "sometimes its the book that chooses you", but there are times when you are in the mood to read a book of a particular genre, or from a particular author, but don't know how to find it .

Therefore, we decided to compile a list of websites that help you in picking the right book, these sites are not just search engines for books, in fact they take inputs from you and recommend something that will suit your requirements or current mood.




What Should I Read Next?

Simply type the name of the author or book that you've recently read or liked, whatshouldireadnext.com will provide you a list of books that you may like. Their data of books is based on registered user's reading list or favorites. Once you type in a name, they assume that you already know about that book or have already read it, therefore they display similar books that you may like. "WSRIN represents mass opinion about books. Over time the recommendation should get better and better as the database grows" explains the site.

LibraryThing

LibraryThing is like a social networking site for books, it is an online application that allows you to catalog your books, you can even visit your catalog via mobile phone. Since everyone catalogs their books on the same system it makes it easier to bring together people who share similar interests and allows everyone to swap reading suggestions. "LibraryThing is a full-powered cataloging application, searching the Library of Congress, all five national Amazon sites, and more than 80 world libraries." claims the site. It also allows authors to have their own pages, therefore a good site for authors, publishers and readers.


Whichbook.net
















This site allows you to discover books based on your mood. You could be happy, sad, serious, funny, violent, optimistic, bleak, larger than life or unusual, whatever your mood may be. It also allows you to search a book based on character, plot and settings. It also provides a link 'borrow' which links you to the library system in the UK according to your location. A unique way of discovering books which allows it users to try various permutations and experience a personalized book searching service.

The Book Seer
















The Book Seer is a simple application that integrates recommendations from Amazon and LibraryThing. On the homepage, you will see a gentleman with a speech bubble, where you need to type the name of the latest book that you read along with the author's name. On the next page the site will display two different lists, one for Amazon and other for Library Things, one you click on any of the link, it will take you to the respective page of either if the service.

Your Next Read















This is another fun book recommendation site that not only suggests you the next book that you should read but also lets you stock up your reading list. Once you type in the name of the latest book that you read, it will take you to a page where it will display eight recommendations along with expert reviews on the right hand side of the page, you can view amazon ratings as well. It also provides you with thumbs up/down button allowing you to either like or dislike the recommendations provided by the site.

Good Reads














This is one of my favorite site when it comes to browsing good books along with interacting with casual and avid readers. Members recommend books, compare what they are reading, review it, can keep track of their past reads and make a wishlist for future reads. According to the site "Goodreads' mission is to get people excited about reading.". You can add friends, connect with other social networking sites, explore various genres or authors and best of all, you also join a book club through this site.  Members can create trivia about books, post their own writing and form groups apart from book clubs.

So go ahead and create a virtual book shelf for yourself. Do remember to share your views or feedbacks with us.