My AI Librarian

Can't make it to a Library? Use our AI Librarian that gives personalized book recommendations, answers reading questions, and helps you find free resources—like a library, anytime, anywhere.

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Inspiration

Libraries have always represented access to knowledge, discovery, and support—especially for those who may not know where to start. In an age of AI, I wanted to create a digital librarian that feels just as welcoming and helpful. I imagined a tool that could help people find their next great read, answer questions about books and literacy, and point them to real-world library resources—all powered by free, ethical tools and open data.

What it does

My AI Librarian is a web-based app that allows users to:

  • Chat with a friendly AI Librarian to get book recommendations and answers to reading-related questions
  • View beautifully formatted book recommendation cards with cover images, authors, and summaries
  • Search for nearby public libraries based on location
  • Explore and build a personal reading list

It's a free, always-on assistant for anyone who loves books or wants to get into reading more.

How I built it

I used Bolt.new to create the entire app from a single AI prompt (One-Shot Competition). The site was deployed using Bolt's integration with Netlify (Deploy Challenge - team account slug: adamgede), and data is pulled from the Open Library API, which provides access to free book metadata, images, and summaries, as well as Google Places and Google Geocoding for location-based information.

The app includes:

  • A welcoming home page with subtle animations and a professional library-inspired theme
  • A chat interface where users can interact with the AI Librarian
  • API integration to fetch book data dynamically based on user input using Open Library API
  • A custom location or geolocation-based list of nearby libraries, using Google Places and Geocoding
  • A Reading List feature using localStorage

Challenges we ran into

  • Crafting a single, robust AI prompt to generate a working multi-page app without making further AI queries to make edits was a unique challenge that required careful planning and iteration. I used my years of website developer and software engineer experience to fill in the gaps that the initial AI generation didn't fill. It seemed like the gaps were more about the single prompt not being detailed enough to accomplish the desired tasks. Despite the gaps, the initial site generation was surprisingly accurate to what I had envisioned before putting in the prompt.
  • The AI generation for the book recommendations is not a Generative AI result. The single prompt caught the spirit of the idea, but not the letter of the law. In this case, I felt that it was close enough to give a great idea of the spirit of the idea, especially the idea of an algorithm-based approach to giving suggestions and interactions to a chat bot for a Librarian personality. If I were to start the prompt over, I would try to see if it could produce a Generative AI Librarian personality, but that will be left as a stretch goal for after the hackathon. In this case, I was hoping to showcase an approach that would cost no money, or as little money as possible to showcase how easy it could be to get started with bolt.new without breaking the bank.
  • Connecting to the Google Places and Geocoding API required some extra care and consideration, as it wasn't included in the original prompt and felt like it was a high value addition. Initially, I thought the code could run from the front-end, but eventually determined that it needed to be included in the Netlify serverless Functions area. This accomplished exactly what I was hoping to do.
  • Keeping everything within free-tier constraints (no paid SDKs or services) meant being extra creative with tooling and functionality. If the website really takes off, the Google Places and Geocoding API usage may cause charges to start happening. Considering that I do not have any monetization, this could set me back a lot of money, so I have to be careful with how I want to proceed.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

  • Creating a fully functional, polished web app from just one AI prompt
  • Building a real, useful tool that could help readers and learners of all backgrounds
  • Staying 100% within the bounds of hackathon rules

What I learned

  • How to write highly detailed, structured prompts that can guide AI generation tools effectively
  • That free and open tools like Open Library can power surprisingly robust apps
  • How to simplify and prioritize features to meet a single-prompt, zero-cost constraint

What's next for My AI Librarian

I’d love to expand My AI Librarian to:

  • Offer book suggestions in multiple languages
  • Add a way to monetize the website to help pay for itself, potentially adding actual voice or video Generative AI through a Generative AI service to give more interesting, robust, and personalized book recommendations and social interactions
  • Include reading programs and challenges for different age groups
  • Add support for real-time library event listings
  • Partner with local libraries to promote community programs

My hope is to make the AI Librarian a true gateway to lifelong learning—one conversation at a time.

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