GSU Library Research Guides: Christianity: Subject Guide: Find Books

Search the GSU Library Catalog

Search the GSU Library GIL-Find Catalog
Note: Using this feature will take you away from this subject guide.

Search Tips:

Use quotes to search for phrases:
- "divine law"
Adding an asterisk * to the stem of a word will search for various word endings.
- myst* will return mystic, mystics, mystical, and mysticism
Use AND and OR to narrow or broaden your search. Note: AND and OR must be ALL caps:
- faith AND belief - to retrieve results that includes all of your search terms (retrieves fewer results)
- faith OR belief - to retrieve results that contain any of your search terms (retrieves more results)

Not Finding an Ebook Version?

If you're not finding an ebook using the sources in the "Finding Electronic Books" box, you still have some options:

Contact your Subject Librarian to see if it's possible to order an ebook. (Find your Subject Librarian by locating your school/department here).
If you know that you only need a section of a book, you can place an Interlibrary Loan request for that section. You will need full citation information for the book and the page range that you are requesting. Start here to place an Interlibrary Loan request. (Don't know the page information? Check Google Books to see if you can see the book's table of contents. Amazon's "Look Inside" feature might also provide this information).

Catalog Relationships

GIL: Searches only items in the GSU Library

GIL Universal Catalog: Searches the contents of 35 academic libraries in Georgia

WorldCat: Searches 10,000 libraries worldwide.

How to Find ebooks in GILFind

You can search for eBooks from all GSU library ebook databases in the GSU Library's GilFind catalog just as you would search for traditional print books. After you search, tweak your results to show only "full access online" and the "books" format to see only eBooks.

(Are you teaching? See a full description for embedding ebooks for course content).

Help! I've found an ebook in the library's catalog and I'm not sure how to download it!

Different providers (i.e. ProQuest, EBSCO, etc.) have different requirements. Check out our Ebooks research guide for information about how to read/download ebooks.

Other Options for Finding Ebooks

Google Books
Most books published after 1924 will not be fully available in Google Books due to copyright protections. However, Google Books will often include a book's table of contents, and snippets or sections of text; sometimes an entire chapter will be included (and it might be the section you need!)

HathiTrust This link opens in a new window
HathiTrust makes accessible a vast collection of works from an international community of research libraries. The collection includes more than 16 million volumes, nearly 6 million of which are in the public domain.

Fulton County Library System
If you have a current library card from the Fulton County Library System, you are able to check out ebooks held in their collection. GSU affiliates are able to get an AFPLS card regardless of what county they live in. Check the Fulton County Library site for information about getting an online library card.(If you have a library card for another public library system, check with that system to see what your borrowing options are).
Project Gutenberg
Digital copies of books whose copyrights have expired.
Center for Research Libraries Digital Collections
Wide-ranging collection of digitized resources. Search the CRL's catalog, or browse the collection.
Internet Archive
Digital library, includes scanned books for checkout (select "Books" from the top menu) as well as moving images, live music, audio.

In a Pinch... Book Reviews

In a pinch, you can also search in our databases for book reviews to get a general sense of the book's argument, even if you can't access the book itself.

Our Book Reviews research guide gives information about general book reviews

Finding Book Reviews

Most of the library's article databases allow you to search for book reviews. Here are instructions on how to find book reviews in the most used databases appropriate for research in religious studies:

ATLA Religion Database
- Use the Advanced Search option. Then type the title of the book or issue for which you need reviews into the search box. Then choose "Review" from "Document Type" pull down menu near the bottom of the page and click Search.
Religion and Philosophy Collection
- Use the Advanced Search option. Then type the title of the book or issue for which you need reviews into the search box. Then choose "Book Review" from the "Document Type" pull down menu near the bottom of the page and click Search.
Academic Search Complete
- Academic Search Complete is a large, multidisciplinary database that abstracts and indexes over 9,000 journals. One of the publications available in this database is Reviews in Religion and Theology.
- Use the Advanced Search option. Then type the title of the book or issue for which you need reviews into the search box. Then choose "Book Review" from the list of "Document Types" near the bottom of the page and click Search.
JSTOR
- JSTOR is an interdiscplinary digital library of academic journals, books, and primary sources.
- Use the Advanced Search option. Then, type the title of the book or issue for which you need reviews into the search box and click on "Reviews" from the "Narrow By" list of options.

In databases that do not have a "Book Review" limiting option, you can simply type the words "book review" (in quotes) into one of the Advanced Search option search boxes and then either the title of a specific book or a topic.