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Ask HN: APIs for getting books and author data

1 pointsby andheralmost 4 years ago
Hey ya&#x27;ll, I wanted to build a personal project for better tracking the books I read. I was wondering if:<p>1. There are any good apis for getting book data and author information (including demographic information). Paid is fine as well, if it&#x27;s not too much I could consider that.<p>2. Anyones built something similar which collates this data from different places. Would be interested in hearing the how of that.<p>Cheers

1 comment

dredmorbiusalmost 4 years ago
I&#x27;d suggest looking at OCLC (Worldcat) or the Library of Congress.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.loc.gov&#x2F;apis&#x2F;json-and-yaml&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.loc.gov&#x2F;apis&#x2F;json-and-yaml&#x2F;</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.oclc.org&#x2F;developer&#x2F;develop&#x2F;web-services&#x2F;worldcat-search-api.en.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.oclc.org&#x2F;developer&#x2F;develop&#x2F;web-services&#x2F;worldcat...</a><p>Cataloging information is pretty straightforward to find. Author demographics may be trickier, though if you can sort how to query Wikipedia, you might be able to work with something there.<p>Wikipedia&#x27;s BookSource page(s) might also be of value. It&#x27;s indexed by ISBN, so you&#x27;ll need to provide that or acquire it elsewhere.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Special:BookSources&#x2F;0571345751" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Special:BookSources&#x2F;0571345751</a><p>There&#x27;s ISBN Search: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;isbnsearch.org&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;isbnsearch.org&#x2F;</a>