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I had a hunch that something went awry in my great-aunt's first marriage. When I asked about Charlie, her first husband, the response was, "He died."

Questions about the how, when, and where of his death were brushed off with a vague "don't remember."

Husbands, and wives for that matter, aren't easily disposed of in the genealogical world. There's almost always a paper trail to fill in the blanks of the suspicious "don't remember's."

Investigating Aunt Alice's long-missing first husband has been on my to-do list for a number of years. And, it's still on the to-do list; however, I stumbled across an interesting clue when I wasn't even looking, catapulting this mystery to a higher spot on the list.

I was browsing Google Book Search looking for any references to Alice's father. In the search box I entered the county where the family lived and the family's surname. The list of hits contained a tantalizing reference to both Aunt Alice and the elusive Uncle Charlie.

Apparently some of Charlie's kin have the genealogy bug, too, because back in 1972 someone wrote his family's history. The book clearly contains a reference to Alice and Charlie's 1901 marriage and his death in 1960, decades after the "he died" insinuation.

Because this book is still under copyright, I wasn't able to look any further into its contents online. But now I know the book exists and I have an idea where to find it.

This is the beauty of online books — a few keyword searches can steer you toward a genealogical windfall. Google Book Search is a regular pit stop in my genealogy journey.

Launched just a few years ago, the project reportedly scans 3,000 books a day; exact numbers of scanned books aren't public knowledge, but computer users, with just a few mouse clicks, have access to well over a million books on the site.

While Google Book Search has its critics, primarily those concerned with copyright issues, the ambitious digitization project can certainly benefit family history researchers.

I regularly searched for family names and locations where they lived. I've discovered dozens of books that mention my ancestors.

The books range from those offering a full view (the entire book) to those with no preview at all. I found Uncle Charlie in a book with a snippet view, meaning I could only view a few sentences around his name.

Even though we can't fully read online every book our search produces, we do receive all of the bibliographic information we need to track it down. A handy link beside each book on the results list takes you to WorldCat, the massive library database, enabling you to see which libraries hold the book.

A bonus feature of Google Book Search is the personalized library. Set up a free Google account, then you can save the books you find to your own online library.

You can add notes to the books in your library to remind you why you saved them in the first place, and you can add a label to each book. I label the books according to family surname, so I can quickly sort the books I've saved.

Searching books for our ancestors has always been part of the genealogical game plan, and having Google Book Search in the playbook is a winning strategy.