The book cover is designed to grab attention, but a catalog record requires a more authoritative source. Promotional taglines, abbreviated names, abbreviated subtitles, and series information may all be present on the cover yet still lack the specifics necessary to uniquely identify one edition among many. Thus, you should always open your book and go to the title page. It is often the best place to find information on the title, subtitle, main author, editor, translator, or corporate authorship.
Read the full title from the title page; check whether the line under it is actually a subtitle, series name, or just descriptive text. A subtitle usually explains or completes the main title, whereas a series title links the book to a larger publishing project, so it is easy to get them mixed up, and the result is a poor quality catalog record. You may edit the punctuation and capitalization to reflect the catalog style rules, but it is essential to understand first what the relationship of these elements are to one another.
Identify a correct statement of responsibility; this is the statement of the author, editor, illustrator, or translator (if the book is a collection of writings, you want to check whether the person prominently mentioned on the cover is the editor of the collection, while for an original work it should be the author). For a translated book, note which names (if any) are attributed to the translator as well. In general, a collection of writing will have a collection editor as its primary stated responsibility and a book translation may show a translation credit (if the book cover only shows the translation name, check for more information on the copyright page).
Title pages usually do not provide complete information, which makes the next step to locate the copyright page. Check the copyright page for information on the publisher, date of publication, edition and printing, and ISBN. Note if the edition is a second or revised edition, or other terminology to distinguish it from earlier versions (Note a later printing is not a different edition, as just because a book has a different printing date than another one does not necessarily mean the contents are different, so do not create a new catalog record until you are sure).
Try this activity: Place a book on an open table and create a worksheet for your notes and separate each area for the source information for each entry (title and statement of responsibility from the title page; information from the copyright page about the publication, edition statement and edition and printing history; note all title and responsibility information on the book cover and spine). Then you will have a clear example of why it is important to record information from various pages of the book and not just the front cover.
When you finish the sample record for each book, you can check the results for completeness and accuracy. Is it possible to separate out the title and subtitle? Are the names of the main author and editor accurately identified? Are the statements about the edition consistent with the information given on the publication and copyright page? Did you accidentally record the series title as part of the main title? You should perform a preliminary search for the author, title, and ISBN of the book in your catalog in case another catalog record has already been created for the same book. Do not fill in anything in your records that you do not understand; rather, note it for future review.
When you stop jumping from the cover to the data input form, you become much more attentive to your cataloging activity: you start reading the title page, checking the copyright page, and choosing the appropriate source for your record. This small improvement can help reduce duplicate records, missing edition information, and inconsistent author information. The next time two similar books are shelved next to each other, you will be inclined to check their title pages and edition statements to determine how they should be described in your catalog.