Barnesnoble for Bookworms

Barnes & Noble, Inc. is the largest specialty retailer in the United States and is has its headquarters in New York. The website Barnes & Noble.com is one of the premier destinations of the web for books, music, DVD, video games and other related products and services. The site with its exhaustive collection of over 1 million titles has been described as the internet's largest book store.

The homepage done in shades of green has two rows. The first one lists the various products available besides the books. The second row includes the books related options- browse books, new releases, bestsellers etc.

The browse books option helps you to hit upon the book you want from among the exhaustive collection available. If you know the name/author of the book you need, you can directly access it by typing the key word in the search bar. Otherwise, you can leisurely browse through the collection which is categorized broadly into ‘Fiction and Literature,' ‘Children' and the Spanish sections. There is a non-fiction section as well here. Each of these sections is divided further, for example, horror, poetry, romance etc. under ‘fiction and literature' and ‘Photography' ‘Biography' ‘History' ‘Humor' etc. under non-fiction.

Clicking on any of these sections, for example, ‘biography', will take you to an exclusive page where all possible categories within ‘biography' will be listed. A few featured new releases as well as around 10 titles of the section will be displayed in this page. These will have a short 2-3 lines write-up about each of these.

If you hit upon the book of your choice, you can look up more details and add it to your cart. You have to be a member of the site in order to avail of any special discounts. Registering brings certain other benefits as well- you will be able to shop and check out faster, check your order status online and also receive updates on special offers and events.

The site also promises shipping within 24 hours. There is also an option to buy the book ‘used' if available.

There is a bit more that you can do with this page. You yourself can write a review of the book or email a friend about it.

Other features of the site include ‘what America's reading', a list of bestsellers, ‘meet the writers' which has profiles as well as audio and video interviews of authors.

The DVD section of the site has some 40,000 titles. Out of the 10,000 odd previews available in the B&N screening room, you can take your pick and instantly order the movie of your choice.

The online music store has an exhaustive collection of classical, jazz and world music besides exclusive interviews, free downloads, sample audio clips, music reviews and biographies.

Asha Prakash

Hi-tech Editorial Division