Books & Film MCP Server

A comprehensive Model Context Protocol (MCP) server for books, films, and scholarly publications with advanced search capabilities and user-friendly formatting.

Supported APIs: Open Library, Google Books, OpenAlex, Crossref, TMDb, OMDb, and LIBRIS (Xsearch & OAI-PMH).

Features

Core Capabilities

• 🔍 18+ search and retrieval tools across multiple databases

• 📚 Book data from Open Library, Google Books, and LIBRIS

• 🎬 Movie information from TMDb and OMDb

• 📄 Scholarly articles via OpenAlex and Crossref

• 🔗 8 URI-based resources for direct data access

Enhanced Search Experience

• 🎯 Smart Summary Mode - Scholarly results show only essential fields instead of 200+ line JSON responses

• 🔄 Cross-source deduplication - Removes duplicate books found across multiple databases

• 🌍 Advanced filtering - Language, publication year, and recent publication filters

• ⚡ Combined searches - Search multiple databases simultaneously

• 📋 Readable formatting - Optional text format for better CLI display

• 🛡️ Reliability - Automatic retry, caching, and rate limiting

Related MCP server: Academic Paper MCP HTTP/SSE Server

Installation

npm install

Development

npm run dev

Build & Run

npm run build
npm start  # stdio transport

Environment Variables

Copy .env.example to .env and configure:

Required:

• OMDB_API_KEY - OMDb API key

• TMDB_ACCESS_TOKEN or TMDB_API_KEY - TMDb authentication

Optional but recommended:

• GOOGLE_BOOKS_API_KEY - Higher API quotas

• CROSSREF_MAILTO - Polite pool access

• USER_AGENT_EXTRA - Custom user agent string

Available Tools

📚 Books

• books_openlibrary_search - Search Open Library works/editions

• books_openlibrary_get_work - Get work by OLID

• books_openlibrary_get_edition - Get edition by OLID

• books_google_search - Enhanced Google Books search with structured fields (intitle, inauthor, isbn, etc.)

• books_google_get_volume - Get volume by ID

📄 Scholarly Publications

• scholarly_openalex_search_works - Enhanced OpenAlex search with summary mode and advanced filters

• scholarly_openalex_get_work - Get work by ID/URI

• scholarly_crossref_search_works - Enhanced Crossref search with structured queries and summary mode

• scholarly_crossref_get_by_doi - Get work by DOI

🎬 Films

• film_tmdb_search_movie - Search TMDb movies

• film_tmdb_get_movie - Get movie details by ID

• film_omdb_search - Search OMDb by title

• film_omdb_get - Get by IMDb ID or title

🇸🇪 Swedish Libraries (LIBRIS)

• se_libris_xsearch - Enhanced search with structured fields and boolean queries

• se_libris_oai_list_records - OAI-PMH harvesting

⚡ Combined Multi-Source Search

• books_search_across_all - NEW Search Google Books, Open Library, and LIBRIS simultaneously with deduplication

• scholarly_search_across_all - NEW Search OpenAlex and Crossref simultaneously with summary mode

Key Search Parameters

Summary & Formatting

• summaryMode: true (default) - Returns essential fields only vs. full API responses

• formatAsText: true - Human-readable text format instead of JSON

• deduplicateResults: true (default) - Remove cross-source duplicates

Advanced Filtering

• recentYears: 5 - Publications from last N years

• language: "en" - Language filter (ISO 639-1 codes)

• isOpenAccess: true - Open access publications only

• publicationYear: 2023 - Specific year filter

Available Resources

Direct URI access to data:

• openlibrary://works/{olid} - Open Library work

• openlibrary://editions/{olid} - Open Library edition

• googlebooks://volumes/{id} - Google Books volume

• openalex://works/{id} - OpenAlex work

• crossref://works/{doi} - Crossref work

• tmdb://movie/{id} - TMDb movie

• omdb://id/{imdbId} - OMDb by IMDb ID

• libris://xsearch?q={query} - LIBRIS search

• libris://oai/listrecords?prefix={metadataPrefix}&from={from}&until={until}&set={set} - LIBRIS OAI-PMH

Usage with Claude Desktop

Option 1: Local Server

Add to your Claude Desktop configuration:

• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "books-film-mcp": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/absolute/path/to/books-film-mcp/dist/server.js"],
      "env": {
        "OMDB_API_KEY": "your-omdb-key",
        "TMDB_ACCESS_TOKEN": "your-tmdb-token"
      }
    }
  }
}

Option 2: MCP Bundle (MCPB)

Create an installable bundle:

npm i -g @anthropic-ai/mcpb
npm run build
mcpb init   # creates manifest.json
mcpb pack   # generates .mcpb file

Open the .mcpb file in Claude Desktop to install.

Search Examples

Enhanced Google Books Search

{
  "inauthor": "Astrid Lindgren",
  "language": "swe",
  "maxResults": 10
}

Scholarly Search with Summary Mode

{
  "query": "climate change",
  "recentYears": 3,
  "isOpenAccess": true,
  "summaryMode": true,
  "formatAsText": true
}

Combined Book Search with Deduplication

{
  "author": "Selma Lagerlöf",
  "deduplicateResults": true,
  "maxResultsPerSource": 5
}

Performance & Reliability

• Automatic retry logic with exponential backoff

• Memory caching (1-hour TTL) for frequently accessed data

• Rate limiting respects API limits (Crossref: 50/min, Google Books: 100/min, etc.)

• Smart error handling with graceful degradation

• Response optimization - Summary mode reduces scholarly results from 200+ lines to ~10 essential fields

API Documentation

Each service follows their respective API guidelines with enhanced MCP features:

• Open Library: Public API with optional pagination and field filtering

• Google Books: Enhanced with structured field searches (intitle, inauthor, isbn, etc.)

• OpenAlex: Advanced filters + summary mode for readable results

• Crossref: Structured queries + summary mode + date range filtering

• TMDb: Movie database with v3 (API key) or v4 (Bearer token) auth

• OMDb: IMDb data requiring API key registration

• LIBRIS: Enhanced with boolean queries and structured field searches

Contributing

1. Fork the repository

2. Create a feature branch

3. Make your changes

4. Add tests if applicable

5. Submit a pull request

License

MIT