Show HN: Crunching 1,200 Authors' Favorite Reads of 2023

Hi all, creator here :)

I launched Shepherd.com on a Show HN in April 2021 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26871660), and it has come a long way.

My goal with Shepherd is to create an experience that feels like wandering your local bookstore, along with little notes from authors & experts sharing why each book is one of their all-time favorites.

For 2023, I surveyed 1,200+ authors to get their three favorite reads of the year. Then I crunched that data and broke it by genre, age range, and when it was published. Publisher data is a nightmare, so some of the genres are not perfect; I am working on improving that and some of the NLP/ML that drives this.

Check out their top sci-fi reads: https://shepherd.com/bboy/2023/science-fiction

Or, their top nonfiction reads: https://shepherd.com/bboy/2023/nonfiction

You can also zoom in on each author’s favorite 3 reads.

Louise Carey - https://shepherd.com/bboy/2023/f/louise-carey

Kevin Klehr - https://shepherd.com/bboy/2023/f/kevin-klehr

Alice C. Hill - https://shepherd.com/bboy/2023/f/alice-c-hill

Sara Ackerman - https://shepherd.com/bboy/2023/f/sara-ackerman

My email is [email protected] if you want to share ideas or suggestions for 2024.

Thanks, Ben

P.S. I have a newsletter for readers here where I share what I am building, new features, my fav book lists: https://forauthors.shepherd.com/newsletter-for-readers

149 points bwb 2 years ago 76 comments

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