A CLI-based skill for AI agents to search and retrieve comprehensive book and author data using the Open Library API.
Install & Download
1. ClawHub CLI
The fastest way to install a skill directly from the registry.
npx clawhub@latest install books
2. Manual Installation
Copy the skill folder to one of these locations
~/.openclaw/skills/ <project>/skills/ Priority: Workspace > Local > Bundled
3. Prompt Installation
Copy this prompt to OpenClaw to install it automatically.
Help me install books using Clawhub. If Clawhub is not installed, install it first (npm i -g clawhub).
Prefer to download?
Get the raw skill files in a ZIP archive.
What is Book Lookup?
The Book Lookup skill enables AI agents to interact with the massive Open Library database directly from the command line. It is designed as part of the Openclaw Skills ecosystem to provide agents with the ability to identify literature, retrieve detailed bibliographies, and access author biographies without requiring API keys or complex authentication. By leveraging Openclaw Skills, developers can build more knowledgeable agents capable of discussing literary works, genres, and publication histories with high precision.
This skill serves as a bridge between an AI's conversational abilities and the structured data available in the public domain. Whether your agent needs to find a specific edition of a classic or explore a contemporary author's body of work, this implementation within the Openclaw Skills framework ensures fast and reliable data retrieval.
Book Lookup Use Cases
- Identifying books based on vague descriptions, titles, or plot summaries.
- Fetching detailed metadata for specific works using unique identifiers like Work IDs.
- Exploring an author's complete bibliography and biographical information for research.
- Researching literary subjects and genres to provide recommendations or context.
- Integrating book discovery features into AI-driven personal assistants and research agents.
How Book Lookup Works
- The AI agent receives a natural language query from a human regarding a book, author, or topic.
- The agent executes the books search command, passing the query to the Open Library API.
- Upon receiving a list of results, the agent identifies the relevant Work ID (e.g., OL27448W) or Author ID (e.g., OL23919A).
- The agent then calls the info or author commands to fetch deep metadata, including descriptions and publication years.
- The Openclaw Skills wrapper formats this data, allowing the agent to present a concise summary to the user.
Book Lookup Setup
To integrate this skill into your environment, ensure you have the required dependencies: bash, curl, and jq.
# Ensure the script is executable within your Openclaw Skills directory
chmod +x scripts/books
# Test the search functionality
./books search "the name of the wind"
No authentication or API keys are required for this skill, making it an ideal plug-and-play component for Openclaw Skills developers.
Book Lookup Data Schema & Taxonomy
The skill organizes its output based on Open Library's unique identification system. Data is structured to be easily parsed by AI agents.
| Data Type | ID Format | Metadata Fields |
|---|---|---|
| Work | OL...W | Title, First Published, Subjects, Description, Cover URL |
| Author | OL...A | Name, Birth Date, Biography, Bibliography |
| Search | Query String | Result List with Work IDs and Year |
All responses are optimized for text-based consumption, ensuring the agent can interpret the literature data accurately.
Book Lookup Advanced Features
- Advanced search prefixes allowing for filtered queries by author: name, title: name, or subject: topic.
- Dynamic cover image retrieval providing links to S, M, and L sized images from Open Library covers.
- Efficient bibliography fetching that allows agents to list an author's entire body of work in one command.
- Lightweight architecture that fits perfectly into the Openclaw Skills standard for CLI tools.
SKILL.md
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