How to get book cover from ISBN using Google Book API?

Question

Is there a simple way to get book cover in JSON format from ISBN using Google Book API?

Answer 1

You can use the isbn: query, like this:

https://www.googleapis.com/books/v1/volumes?q=isbn:0771595158

This will return a proper JSON response containing either the book information or an error description if the ISBN is not found.

Answer 2

If you are looking for an answer for a Ruby (Rails, Sinatra or Console) answer on how to get a conver image or for that matter any detail available through the Google Books API, I think GoogleBooks gem is a good place to start.

For example, for the same scenario:

Install the gem

gem install googlebooks

Use the gem

require 'googlebooks'
GoogleBooks.search('isbn:9781443411080').first.image_link

first because it returns a collection of books.