Google’s NotebookLM is revolutionizing how many people study, research, and brainstorm ideas with its AI-powered research and writing tools. With the help of Google Gemini, NotebookLM can consume large amounts of information from various sources like PDFs, Google Docs, websites, YouTube videos, and more, and break it down for you.

You can use NotebookLM to summarize key points from all your sources, create a detailed mind map, or even have it make a podcast where two AI-generated hosts discuss the material you’ve provided in a conversational way. Among all the AI apps available, NotebookLM is one of the most useful and educational, and now it’s becoming even more resourceful thanks to this new feature.

Google has announced a partnership with authors, researchers, publications, and non-profits to introduce a new feature called “Featured notebooks” to NotebookLM. This feature offers a curated collection of notebooks on various topics, including parenting, Shakespeare, lifestyle advice, and more. These notebooks are pre-filled with extensive information and sources, making it a handy way for users to explore NotebookLM’s capabilities without having to create and fill their own notebooks.

“For newcomers to NotebookLM, the notebooks are a preview of how useful the product can be when you’ve assembled a collection of sources for whatever project you’re working on,” explained Steven Johnson, NotebookLM’s editorial director on X (via The Verge). “But it’s also a preview of a potential future where there are thousands of expert-curated notebooks on all sorts of topics that you can add to your own collection, to have the knowledge you need on tap.”

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Topic breakdowns on top of topic breakdowns for easier reading.

There are eight featured notebooks to check out

Google plans to add even more featured notebooks in the future

If you want to check out NotebookLM’s new featured notebooks, you can do so now on its desktop site. You should be able to find it on NotebookLM’s homepage under “Featured notebooks” right next to “My notebooks” above your recent notebooks (as seen in the video above).

At launch, there are eight featured notebooks you can explore. A few of the highlights include William Shakespeare: The Complete Plays, which lets you learn about all of Shakespeare’s famous plays from the 16th and 17th century, Secrets of the Super Agers by Eric Opol, which offers health and longevity advice, and How To Build A Life, from The Atlantic, which provides insights into how to “lead a happier and more fulfilling life.”

As someone who’s always been interested in NotebookLM but is unsure what to research and doesn’t have access to a vast number of sources to input it into, I’ve found this new curated notebook tool excellent so far for exploring and testing NotebookLM’s capabilities. I checked out the Shakespeare featured notebook, as I’ve always been interested in the English poet and playwright, and it offers so many different insights and tools for studying and understanding Shakespeare’s extensive collection of works, including Hamlet (my personal favorite) and Romeo and Juliet. In particular, I find NotebookLM’s Audio Overview tool the most useful, as I can listen to it discuss the work wherever I am.

Google plans on releasing even more featured notebooks in the future, including more work from its partnership with The Economist and The Atlantic. In addition to featured notebooks, Google has also recently launched the ability for users to share their notebooks with a publicly shareable link. According to Google, over 140,000 public notebooks have been shared since it was released four weeks ago.

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