Literature Map - beware the rabbit hole!

[katie]

I came across this Literature Map on another forum, and thought y'all might appreciate it: https://www.literature-map.com/ Put in an author's name, and it gives you a map of similar authors. As far as I can tell, it's based on what readers like to read. So if a lot of people love Robin Hobb and Guy Gavriel Kay, they'll show up next to each other. I'm not sure where they get the data from, but when I searched Robin Hobb, I definitely saw a lot of authors that I've read near her name. Not sure if I'd consider some of them similar to her, and some I really don't enjoy, while I love Hobb.

Obviously it's all subjective anyway, but I'm curious how "accurate" it is for different genres and lesser known authors.

[Ben George]

I was reading a TOS novel so I put in James Blish.
I got Clancy and Ludlum as two of the results. I can definitely seeing the demographics line up, but I wouldn't count them as similar authors.
Plenty of classic SF authors I would expect to see though....