The Hawaii Project is a personalized book discovery engine, kind of like a bookstore where every book in the store is picked just for you. When you first sign up for The Hawaii Project, you can pick from our “channels” to identify what kinds of books you are interested in (including traditional genres like “Historical Fiction” or “Romance”, and interesting “concept” Channels like “Noir” or “Exotic Places”. And you can identify authors you love. As you use the system, marking books you’ve Read or Want, we are learning what kinds of books you love, and this improves the quality of our recommendations. But, sometimes this can be time-consuming.

Today, I’m pleased to announce an easy way to jump start your interest profile, by importing your Goodreads library.

It’s quick and easy. Just sign in to Goodreads and go to this Goodreads page. Hit “Export Library”, which will create a “csv” file with your Goodreads Library in it. When it’s complete click on the “Your Export” link to download the file. Then head to the Hawaii Project’s Goodreads page. Pick “Choose File”, select the file you downloaded from Goodreads, and hit “Import Now” to import your library. Books on the “read” or “currently reading” shelf on Goodreads will go on your Read list; books on the “to read” shelf will go on your Want list on The Hawaii Project.

Loading your Goodreads library will give you a head start on tracking what books you’ve Read or Want, and quickly jumpstart your recommendations to take into account the books you’ve read (so we don’t show you those again, but DO show you books in a similar vein). By analyzing the metadata associated with those books, as well as the text, keywords, and books that are often mentioned along side those books, we produce a unique set of personalized, relevant book recommendations (and book news!) every day.

Enjoy!