Forgotten Titles and How to Find Them
Growing up, I spent a fair amount of every summer on the north shore of Big Spirit Lake at a small cabin my grandpa built. One aspect of those summers I adored was hanging out with my friend Sarah whose grandparents owned a cabin just to the west of ours. Sarah and I would spend all day together, either in the water or crouched in the bog nearby looking for toads or fishing with string tied to a random stick. But my absolute favorite activity was curling up in the hammock strung between two trees next to the beach and reading a specific book called…something book of monsters? The Book of Monsters from Around the World? Just the Book of Monsters? No, no, those aren’t right.
Oh no.
This is one of the absolute worst feelings in the world, when there’s a book you can remember but the title, the author, the cover are just barely out of reach in your brain. And this book haunted me. It was such an integral part of my childhood, and a few summers after Sarah and I had “outgrown” this book, in the way teenagers often feel like they must stop liking all the things they liked in their childhood, I asked her about it and she couldn’t remember the title either. But that’s okay, she would send me the title when they went back to Illinois at the end of the summer, or send the book itself to me–she didn’t need it anymore, and I liked it way more than she did. But the summer passed and I didn’t get the title, and Sarah told me she didn’t know what happened to the book. It was like it had just slipped through a crack in reality.
For years I thought about this book and sometimes I would enter some search terms to find it, but all of my searching was fruitless. Until one day I resolved that I would scroll every page of google if I had to if only to find this damn book. I went forward with what I could remember–it was a kid’s book, but not a picture book. It had a very specific illustrative style that I don’t know the nameof, it talked about monsters from around the world and had danger ratings for each of them, and one monster it specifically talked about was the hidebehind. That’s all I had to go on. And lo and behold! After years of searching and hours of scrolling using marginally different search criteria, I found it.
The Gruesome Guide to World Monsters
It was like every warm sunshine day of summer had been laid at my feet. I found it, and I could purchase it, and I did and it brings me such joy.
I want you to have that kind of joy, too, dear readers. But you don’t have to go it alone like I did. Now, there are all sorts of different tools to help you find books barely remembered and also real-people resources on hand. Here is what to do if this ever happens to you:
First, in the words of our dear Event Coordinator Emily: “It’ll return to you. Open your arms to the universe.”
Okay, I love Emily with my whole heart and soul, but, uh…not super helpful.
Actually first, there is a really common instance where people hear about a book somewhere and they will come into the store and ask us about a book they heard about from a podcast or the radio or TV. We are always happy to help you! But if you’d like to do some sleuthing of your own, first:
Check the notes of the podcast episode or on the radio show’s website. They almost always list the books they talk about in there
If it’s on TV, google the day you watched the show plus the word “book” and there’s usually a web page where it will be listed.
Same goes for newspapers—search the title of the newspaper where you think you saw it, the day you think you read it, and the word “book”. Hopefully the article you read pops up.
If this is not your situation or none of these strategies work, we move to the next step. Wrack your brain for whatever details about the book you can remember.
What did the cover look like? What color was it? Do you remember specific design details? Was the author’s name written in large font or was the title?
Do you remember any plot elements? The genre? Even random innocuous details can be really helpful in finding a book
Is there a specific line or phrase you remember? Other people probably noted it too and put it on the internet. Google Books even has a search feature designed specifically for this!
A display made for people who only remember the cover
Throwing any or all of these elements into a plain ol’ google search can turn up results, but if it doesn’t, here are some other advanced search functions you can try:
This is a good option because you can search by specific ratings or categories. If you know a book was a children’s book, then you can filter out all adult books, for example.
If you really want to get down into the nitty-gritty search wise, this, the biggest online library in the whole world, has all sorts of different search features. They also have a feature called “Ask a Librarian” where you can send an email to their talented staff of librarians and they’ll try and help you find it.
This is for all of you who remember the cover very well but not much else—their cover search tool might just be right for you.
Recently unveiled, this AI search functionality allows you to throw in random plot points or what you think the title might be and its powerful AI can spit out some ideas of what the book might be.
If you’re still coming up empty, it might be helpful to tap ✨The Power of Book Lovers✨. Here are some of the resources in that arena:
The book social media juggernaut Goodreads has a group “What’s the Name of that Book???” can help you ferret out a book or you can go through its archives to see if someone has wondered about the same thing.
If Library Thing’s AI search didn’t do it for you, then maybe their community of book lovers can help you in their forum—just follow the rules and give them all the details you can remember
Reddit’s “What’s that Book Called” subreddit—especially good for sci-fi/fantasy books, this near-endless thread of voracious readers can help find obscure books and have a list of frequently requested titles.
Stump the Bookseller Blog—based in a small indie in Ohio, this website has a long searchable backlist that’s great for children’s titles and will have their extensive group of book-lovers provide personal help for a small fee.
And of course, the booksellers here at Dog-Eared are always happy to help dig through your memories to successfully excavate a beloved book you can’t quite remember. Though we don’t have the full knowledge of the internet on our side, we do have a passionate group of booksellers with diverse reading tastes who have googled a thing or two.
Is there a book you’ve successfully found after having forgotten? What was it and how did you rediscover it? Let us know in the comments below!
