Book lovers bound for the Chennai Book Fair 2015, inaugurated on Friday, may find it easier to locate specific titles, this year.
Bookconnect, a city-based start-up engaged in book distribution and data aggregation, has catalogued more than 8,000 books, mostly regional titles, for the annual book fair, at bookscape.in.
M.R.K. Murthy Raju, co-founder of Bookconnect, said the cataloguing initiative, done free of cost, is just a beginning.
It is proposed to carry out indexing of books in the coming years for book fairs to be held across the country. He said: “Though there are more than 350 exhibitors, comprising publishers and sellers, at the Chennai book fair, we concentrated on enrolling publishers in regional languages, particularly Tamil.”
The website showcases books by displaying the cover photo (if available), with details of the title, author and publisher, along with the stall number, for easy identification. The only missing feature on the website is the ‘add to cart’ instead of which they have ‘add to shopping list’ tab.
Rajeev Gopinath, director of Bookconnect, said, “We want to get more people to visit the venue to have a feel of the book fair,” he said.
The website also has a user-friendly map for visitors to locate the various exhibitors.
Rave Max Pro IT Solutions too has created a website, >http://www.chennaibookfair2015.com , where books can be ordered online. Bulk purchasers can avail of this facility. The site will be online till February 9.
A city-based start-up has catalogued more than 8,000 books for the annual book fair, at bookscape.in
