You may have noticed Google’s doodle today in celebration of the 200th birthday of British author Charles Dickens consisting of classic characters from some of Dickens’ most famous works, including Pip from “Great Expectations” and Ebenezer Scrooge from “The Christmas Carol.” However, what you may have not realized is that today’s doodle is sending many people to a Google product rather than the typical web search.
In this case, clicking the Dickens doodle is directing many users to a Free Google eBooks search. Normally when clicking a doodle, Google directs users to a web search for a related word or phrase. Therefore, in the case of today’s doodle, clicking the image would normally have taken a user to a Google.com web search for “Charles Dickens.”
With that said, as you can see from the screenshots above, clicking the Dickens doodle leads to a Free Google eBooks search listing instead with various results for the query “dickens.” This action may be the first time Google has promoted, or linked to a product other than a web search, from a doodle.
The Dickens doodle only appears to be linking to Free Google eBooks searches for United States users, as Canadian users still report it linking to the typical web search for “Charles Dickens.” It also does not appear to be sending mobile users to the books search, but it does work when not signed in or using an incognito browser mode.
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