Shelf Space
Booksellers and Librarians talk about what's in their reading room and what's on the horizon.
 Thursday, March 05, 2009
ARCs: Just like the Hardcover, only Free! Part 2
Part Two: What's the big deal?

Last week, I wrote about what an ARC is: an advance version of a book, printed to create buzz, reviews, and sales.

Let's talk about what an ARC isn't: the final published version of the book.

Once again, I spoke with Brian Farrey, a Flux Acquisitions Editor; Andrew Karre, Editorial Director for Carolrhoda Books, a division of Lerner Publishing Group; Sheila Ruth, Publisher, Imaginator Press; and fantasy author Sarah Prineas.

Despite the language that appears on ARCs, some bookstores seem to think an ARC is the final book. Stories abound of people who order a book via an online bookstore, and discover that they've been sold an ARC.  

Some libraries, likewise, seem to think that an ARC is "good enough" for their patrons.

Keep in mind, I am not talking about informal galley groups with patrons and students. Sarah Prineas sees positives in sharing ARCs with young readers, as long it's not a formal sharing. "I think it's great when teachers and librarians share ARCs with their most enthusiastic kid readers, and with each other.  They're the ones who fall in love with books, and their excited comments after reading an ARC can, in turn, get others excited. That's what "buzz" is all about!"

I am talking about libraries that make ARCs part of their formal collection, complete with spine label.

Oh, some librarians I spoke to said "never!" But others told me of seeing ARCs in collections, or waiting to be processed, and educating both directors and technical staff of why ARCs shouldn't be on the shelf. Suzi Steffen of Oregon is an avid library user. She checked out a recent nonfiction book from her local public library. "I was shocked & pretty annoyed to see it's an ARC."

On a professional library listserv, a librarian justified adding ARCs to her permanent collection because low budgets meant fewer materials. I wonder—as budgets continue to fall, with other people adopt this "but I cannot afford the final book" attitude?

And really, what's the harm? It's just a few typos, right? Isn't putting books—even if they are ARCs—into the hands of  customers the most important thing?

Brian Farrey explains that "in theory, there aren't many substantial changes between ARC and final copy. Most changes are to correct typos, clarify text (eliminate confusing or inconsistent plot points/character traits)."

Andrew Karre says that while "ideally, very few changes are made—mostly proofreading and adding details like bios, art, design tweaks, dedications, etc. In practice, a lot can change. I've seen covers change, major plot points change, and even titles."

Publishing is a business; and like any business, many factors go into the process and a tight timeline exists. An ARC is needed at a certain time, ready or not. Andrew explains, "Book publishing can be a bit like that famous I Love Lucy episode in the candy factory. The conveyor belt generally does not stop for anything."

Typos do matter. Sheila Ruth agrees, saying "even such minor errors reflect badly on a book, because they make the book look unprofessional."
I've read ARCs with grammar and spelling errors, knowing that those things would be corrected in the published book. But to read them in what is the final version of the book can take the reader away from the story and creates the impression that the writer and publisher are sloppy.

One young adult author I spoke with experienced a mix-up with her publisher, when the wrong book file was sent to the printer. The author and publisher realized that some things just had to be fixed before sending out the ARCs. Italics had been left out that would have rendered the story confusing. The solution? Sitting down and underlining the necessary parts of the story in the ARCs—all 600 of them.

Sometimes, the changes are more significant than these "minor" typographical errors.

Sarah Prineas, the author of The Magic Thief fantasy series for readers ages 9 to 12, shares what happened with the second book in her series. "My situation with The Magic Thief: Lost was a little different than usual.  I'd originally turned in the LOST manuscript much earlier and my editor and I finished our edits on the book over the summer.  But then, sadly, my editor was laid off in June and I was assigned to a new editor, for whom I offered to do a new round of edits. I turned the book in again for her in September, and the ARC went out during the third week of October. That's a pretty quick turnaround, and as it happens, my new editor and I were not finished with our edits yet. Still, the ARC had to go out then because the book itself comes out in May, and the booksellers and librarians need that much lead time to place their pre-orders for the book."

Obviously, Sarah couldn't hand write in changes in the ARCs. "I've tried to offer caveats when I see that friends have gotten copies of the ARC—"beware, the final version of the book is very different!"  Also, my editor wrote a letter that was included with the copies of the ARC that went out to reviewers and booksellers. The letter basically said that the ARC and the final book would be more different than usual."

When I was discussing this with Carlie Webber, young adult services librarian for BCCLS, New Jersey, she handed me the ARC and book of Be More Chill by Ned Vizzini. The ARC has a chapter not found in the book.

Reviewers and those who understand what an ARC is—and isn't—know that when they read the ARC, they are not reading the final book.

These differences between ARC and final version should be enough to keep that ARC off of a library (or bookstore) shelf. The library that has one in its collection is not only giving its patrons inferior service, they are also misleading the patrons into thinking the ARC is the final book. As Sarah Prineas says, "adding the ARC to a permanent collection isn't a great idea …. The ARC just isn't as nice a book as the final version.  Most ARCs are going to fall apart after just a couple of reads, and this isn't a great way to promote love of books."

A bookstore or library customer who gets an ARC that they believe is the book is going to think less of a publisher who put out the "book." Imagine the student who does a report on Ned Vizzini's book and links an argument to the "missing" chapter. Or the reader of Sarah Prineas's second book, who think they know how it ends… but doesn't.  Is this really giving customers the best possible service?

In case quality service isn't enough, there is one more reason for not shelving that ARC. Simply put, it's stealing from the publisher.

Andrew talks bluntly about his concerns. "I hadn't heard of [adding ARCs to a library collection], and I'm a little shocked. It's not an exaggeration to say that shelving ARCs is an existential threat to the whole practice of distributing ARCs widely." Andrew later says, "there is almost nothing a librarian can do that's more damaging than shelving an ARC. Like I said, an ARC is expected to make a sale. If you shelve an ARC, then that ARC has the opposite effect. I think the relationship that's developing between publishers and libraries in YA trade publishing is very exciting, but misusing ARCs will kill it. I know budgets are tight, but shelving ARCs is stealing."

Are you thinking of adding that ARC to your collection? Don't. Pass it along to another librarian or a customer to create buzz and get input; but don't add it to your collection. Trust me—it's OK to throw it away. It's not throwing away a book.

Posted by: Elizabeth Burns

Libraries | Promotion

posted on Thursday, March 05, 2009 10:48:21 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)  #    Comments [9]
 Friday, February 13, 2009
How Do You Read That Book?

This past year, I read a lot of Young Adult books. How many? I lost count. Any number would be a bit meaningless, because I read many of those books multiple times.

This wasn't just any reading; I was on the 2009 Michael L. Printz Award Committee. The Printz Award is awarded annually by the American Library Association; it is for "a book that exemplifies literary excellence in young adult literature."

I read fabulous books and worked with brilliant librarians; and this past January, we met in Denver during the ALA Midwinter Conference and discussed books in person and ended up picking one Award Winner, Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta, and four Honor Books, The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves by M.T. Anderson; The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart; Nation by Terry Pratchett; and Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan. After the Awards were announced, I returned home, took a deep breath, and - didn't read a thing for two weeks.

Being on the Printz Committee was awesome. A dream come true. But it was reading unlike any reading I've ever done before. The first and most important thing, it wasn't about me and what I liked or didn't like. The Printz is about literary excellence, not "Liz's Favorite Books". Now, a year later, I have the award criteria memorized; but at first, I didn't. So in addition to printing out the criteria, I had post-it notes with short reminders of what to look for when I read the books. Now? I have those paragraphs memorized.

Second, the book mattered. Yes, upon occasion I read an Advance Reader's Copy. Sometimes I just couldn't resist and didn't want to wait months for the final book! ARCs are not the final books; spelling and grammar may be corrected, passages rewritten or changed. The copy that was read and reread, with marked pages and highlighted passages? That was the final copy, not the ARC.

Third, my time was not my own. There were hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of YA books published last year. Every time I wasn't reading one of these books, I felt guilty. I ignored the new Nora Roberts; my issues of Vanity Fair piled up, without even a glance at the photographs. "Do I dust, or read a book?" The answer was - read a book.

Fourth, rereading is important. Luckily, I've never been the type of reader where knowing the ending "spoils" the book for me. I've been known to read the first chapter of a book, and then the last, and then the rest of the book. On the other hand, I don't usually reread books. Oh, sometimes I'll revisit a childhood favorite to see if it holds up; or see if a book I read in high school or college is different from an older perspective. Other than that, I'm not one of those people who will read Pride & Prejudice every year. This past year, that all changed. I'd read once for me. I'd read again for the criteria. I'd read again, using fellow committee members' input. And again, and again.

Finally, all books and no breaks makes Liz a tired reader. Don't get me wrong; I love YA books. The first book I read after my two week break? YA. But, given how intense my reading was, I found that I needed something to give my mind a break so that I could jump into each book, fresh and ready to appreciate the new story and writer. So what did I use? TV. Not just any TV; reality TV. Watching a little America's Next Top Model or House Hunters was the perfect minivacation for my brain.

Now I'm back to reading for me. Not for a committee. Not for an Award. I can read whatever I want, including adult literature or books written 20 years ago. As I read my first book, I realized that my Printz reading habits were still with me. I noticed how the book met the Printz criteria, marked passages to share, wondered how a reread would be. I thought that being on the committee would end after a year; but instead, the deeper reading experience continues.

So how was being on the committee? Tiring. Exhausting. Time consuming. And awesome.

Posted by: Elizabeth Burns

Libraries | Reading | Young Adult Books

posted on Friday, February 13, 2009 10:10:48 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)  #    Comments [4]
 Friday, October 17, 2008
The Audacity of Bravery
You know you are in a literary city when the taxi driver starts waxing poetic as he drives past the public library. There aren't many cities where libraries inspire such passion, but Seattle is one of them.

I recently spent a weekend in Seattle, and when I visit the Emerald City, I always stay at the hotel right across the street from the new Central Library because there is something wonderful about looking out of my window at night, through the glass facade of the library building and into the quiet stacks of books.

Seattle's Central Library has its share of detractors, to be sure. A year ago, when I visited the library for the second time, they were replacing the flooring in one section because it had already worn out. (While the expense and hassle was probably a distraction for the staff, can you think of a more wonderful problem for a library to have? Too many visitors!)

If you aren't familiar with the Seattle Main Library, you should know that it is an architectural marvel--all glass on the outside and bright colors and big spaces on the inside. The books are shelved on a single continuous spiral, which allows a patron to walk through many floors of books without ever resorting a staircase or elevator. That's a grand idea, though I found constantly walking up and down the slope to be a bit tiresome when I spent an afternoon doing research.

Still, what I admire about the facility and Rem Koolhaas's design is that it attempts to reinvent every part of the library. The architect and the planning committee threw caution to the wind and aimed to build something extraordinary. If they didn't always succeed with the details, they did succeed in building a monument to books that is a real object of adoration in the community. I've sat on enough government committees to know that taking any risk at all is rare for an organization like a library or city government. At the Seattle Central Library, it's hard to find a single aspect of the facility that was a safe choice. I am amazed at the risks they took.

Like many book lovers, I worry about how book culture is going to remain strong in the face of so much digital competition. The Seattle Central Library shows us that we need the audacity of hope and that courage matters. When the taxicab driver is proud of his library, I feel reassured that books still have a place in our culture.

[With apologies to the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates for borrowing from the titles of their books.]

Photo credit: Seattle Public Library

Posted by: Scott Brown

Libraries

posted on Friday, October 17, 2008 4:49:08 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [1]
 Friday, October 03, 2008
We Were Robbed
As the founding editor of Fine Books & Collections magazine, a publication for book collectors, I’ve discovered that writing about book theft is the one sure way to get our readers riled up. In fact, one blogger—Travis McDade—writes exclusively on the subject and another, Philobiblos, covers cases and sentences most every week.

Most thieves strike libraries, purloining valuable books, slicing rare maps from atlases, and slipping signed letters and documents from large archives. E. Forbes Smiley, the high-end map dealer whose name sounded as Upper East Side as the address of the office he kept for a time on Madison Avenue near 75th Street in New York, is probably the most notorious recent thief. You may remember that Smiley was caught at Yale’s Beinecke Library when he dropped an X-acto blade on the floor, and he went to prison for stealing something like 100 rare maps from libraries.

I’ve always understood that libraries walk a fine line between access and security: The more access a library grants, the easier it is to steal from it. That point was hammered home this week when four antique logging photographs were stolen from the bookstore I own. I paid roughly $400 for the pictures, which for us is a significant loss.

I went next door to the jewelry store that is owned by a retired Navy Seal who has an extensive surveillance system that catches the front entrance of my shop. I watched his video of the thief walking in bookstore early in the afternoon and dashing out 24 minutes later. The thief arrived during the lunch hour, when our regular weekday employee was out, and I was covering the store alone. The thief struck me as odd, and I was trying to keep an eye on him. I turned my back at one point and immediately heard a rustling sound. I turned to see him walking out of the building. I crossed the floor to where he had been standing and realized what had happened. By the time I reached the door, he had vanished. The surveillance footage showed the shoplifter dashing outside and into a nearby store. No wonder I couldn’t see him when I went outside to look.

I felt awful for the rest of the day. Telling and retelling the story to the police and the owners of nearby antiques stores, didn’t help. I started to understand how so many merchants end up bitter and suspicious. One nearby shopkeeper told me he lost $15,000 in merchandise during one particularly bad year. Another said he budgeted 8 percent for theft. A third planned 10 percent.

I woke up at 5 a.m. the next morning with a clear head. I have never liked bookstores with locked “rare” book rooms or locked glass cases. They make me feel like I’m distrusted from the moment I walk in. But now I understand the logic behind them, but I don’t agree with it. Something like 10,000 people have walked into my store this year, and only one has stolen anything of note. Does it make sense to spend all my effort deterring the one in 10,000 or serving the 9,999 honest customers?

Libraries face the same question. Like many shopkeepers, a lot of librarians feel under pressure to improve security. But I think we have to be cognizant that many efforts to deter theft also deter legitimate visitors. The safest store or library is one that allows no one inside.

I resolved to stay focused on the honest folks, while keeping in mind that there are people who will steal me blind if given the chance. A stock phrase from twenty-five years ago suddenly had more relevance—Ronald Reagan’s old saw, “Trust but verify.” I never really understood that comment. It always seemed like a contradiction in terms. Now I see that it has everything to do with intentions. I can keep an eye on customers and engage them in conversation because I’m interested in them and what they do in my store. If that allows me to observe or prevent theft, great—as long as I don’t think of them as thieves.

Posted by: Scott Brown

Book Stores | Libraries

posted on Friday, October 03, 2008 10:52:13 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [2]
 Monday, September 22, 2008
Where is the Library?
It’s election time—time to pretend to care about children and education! Young people are the largest disempowered class in our country and their rights are systematically violated and neglected. Youth issues are feminized and minimized, since women do most of the work caring for and about children. Women’s work is frivolous and sweet and children are cute and certainly none of this is radical or tough or important. “Oh, what about the children?!” cry the folks who really don’t care, who don’t work to end homelessness, hunger, poverty, illiteracy, and the prison industrial complex.

While listening to NPR’s Fresh Air I learned of Geoffrey Canada’s Harlem Children’s Zone and started getting irritated. Terry Gross talked of how “good” teachers and schools are insufficient; at the end of the day kids are returning to violent communities that “don’t value education.” How does she know what “they” value and what does it look like to value education? From what I caught of the conversation, there was no discussion of community activism and organizing, of the structural and institutional disadvantages faced by poor people of color, of the historical tragedy of separating children from their families and communities in the interest of uplift and success building—away from the community. The blame and burden are placed on disadvantaged communities, not on a racist and classist capitalist society. And as always there was no discussion of the library’s role in the community and education.

Public library staff know that public libraries are de facto after school programs.
Libraries are hidden. Libraries are inessential. Library budgets are slashed with ease. And yet libraries function as free childcare for many caregivers and a seemingly safe place for kids to go after school. We are the silent babysitters. After school programs are mentioned in education plans with never a nod to the work that libraries are doing already, to the void we must fill because the system fails so many.

People I meet tell me my job sounds “nice and quiet.” They seem to have archaic notions of early 1900s libraries with long tables, dusty tomes, and austere silence. But the truth is that libraries have a loudly beating heart. Library patrons come to us for their divorce papers, swim trunks, tax forms, free satchels (?), fax machine, restroom, batteries, condoms, voter registration, childcare, Safeway application, money, phone calls, help getting their really bad manuscript published, candy, lunch, bus passes, a marriage proposal, resume help, and yes, books and internet access. Some of these are obvious and wonderful and some are ridiculous but it is what it is.

I have a feeling that libraries had a more clear identity in the early days. Now we are a shelter, a recreation and community center, a day care, a coffee shop, a Claire’s Accessories, or a sacred piece of book heaven. We are everywhere and nowhere. Maybe this is because library patrons are not the media creators and our role in culture is therefore vague and undefined, invisible. Doing library work can be a meta mind swirl. You know there are people who need your services. You feel like “library” is a third place and a public good, an integral part of a functioning democracy, an essential institution like a bank or a grocery store. They have money and food. We have ideas. However libraries often appear only in library publications. I think that’s why the Sarah Palin librarian kerfuffle was important to a lot of library workers. For once we were in the news!

Andrew Carnegie—the scamp—believed libraries were an important part of education, that they were a unique place for people to “share cultural opportunities on a basis of equality." Libraries need to be part of the conversation on education. What can we do and why are we here?


"Libraries will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no libraries." —Henry David Thoreau

Posted by: Kati Nolfi

Education | Libraries

posted on Monday, September 22, 2008 8:59:07 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [1]
 Friday, September 12, 2008
Gossip Girls and Ghetto Girls
Why are so many librarians—advocates of the uncensored right to read anything on all points of view—panic-stricken over teens reading street lit? As Amy Patee wrote in the July 2008 issue of School Library Journal, “There’s no getting around it: urban fiction forces many of us out of our comfort zones—and some librarians worry that by simply offering street lit, they’re endorsing its unsavory actions.” I don’t quite understand this. As librarians we are never endorsing anything that is on our shelves. We are providing free access to myriad ideas through information. Why would street lit be any different?

The moral panic over street lit/urban fiction reminds me of the panic over gangsta rap in the 1990s. Sure, there are critiques and analyses to be made about the harmfulness, context, and value of these media but most commentary seems to come from the perspective of the inherent aspirational goodness of whites and the inherent moral flaws in the black community. And definitely not all, but a lot of the hand wringing and pearl clutching comes from whites ignorant of the black community, white people who are not qualified to moralize on the reading habits of teens. There are also sensible critiques from inside the black community about street fiction being damaging in its literary merit and its moral messages. I can speak only as a (white) young adult librarian who serves a population composed mostly of black teens. We need to select the books they want to read, the books that speak to them and reflect their stories.  

Perhaps there is a fear that the messages in art and commerce created by black people will infiltrate white children, as there is a long history of cultural appropriation by whites. With street fiction, young readers are experiencing their lives on the page—which some libraries fail to offer all segments of the population—or they are escaping through literature, reading about experiences they don’t have (don’t we all—street fiction and non-street fiction readers alike—do this? Wasn’t I doing this when I was reading the Beats as a teen?  William Burroughs didn’t turn me into a junkie.) Libraries must legitimize and validate all of our patrons’ reading interests and their place in the community with titles they crave.

Why aren’t librarians and parents reacting the same way to white books like Twilight, Gossip Girl, The Clique, The Au Pairs, Pretty Little Liars, and The A-List as they are to street fiction (of course I use the words “white” and “black” very crudely; readers of all genders, races, ethnicities, cultures, sexual expressions, backgrounds, etc. read all kinds of materials—not just the ones marketed to them, the ones with their faces on the cover. And the terms “white” and “black” can refer to the creators and the characters and desired readers of the material.) While there have been criticisms of these books, they are not framed in moral panic terms. Critics minimize the racism, sexism, violence, cruelty, homophobia, materialism, and narcissism in white teen books and indict the black community for urban fiction’s isms and brutality, extrapolating from a genre to generalize about all black people. As if books for white teens aren’t execrable, injurious, and offensive. As if oppressions haven’t been created, sold, reinforced, and expressed by whites. As if black readers lacked critical thinking skills that whites are magically endowed with.

Street lit doesn’t occur in a vacuum. It can be seen as social commentary, strands of hip-hop, 1970s pulp fiction, and gangster and blaxploitation movies, and indie capitalism—many street fiction titles are self published, sold on the street or on the Internet. It is cruel to criticize these books without realizing they are partly a response to the social and economic issues created by white people.

Not only does street lit speak to teens, but it fills the near-void of teen lit with black protagonists. Sure we have Coe Booth, Angela Johnson, Sharon Draper, Sharon Flake, Walter Dean Myers, Jacqueline Woodson, and others writing great non-street fiction with black characters for young people. But most of these authors have been at it for a long time and they are outnumbered by white authors. Young people need to see themselves reflected, especially if we want them to read.

I recommend Megan Honig’s article “Takin’ It to the Street: Teens and Street Lit” 
and Margaret Hartmann’s article “Word on the “Street”

This piece was inspired by Latoya Peterson’s wonderful article “Feminism, Race, and Sexist Dating Guides”

“Ghetto Girls” in the title is a reference to the books of the same name by Anthony Whyte.

Posted by: Kati Nolfi

Libraries | Street Lit | Young Adult Books

posted on Friday, September 12, 2008 12:20:35 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [3]
 Friday, August 22, 2008
The Reader's Advisory Secret Weapon: The Read-Alike
Oh reader's advisory...reader's advisory...reader's advisory, why must you torture me so?

I'm not alone though in my torture, for many librarians working a public service desk, especially in a children's or teen department, there is no reference question with the potential to cause as much frustration as a simple reader's advisory inquiry. Why is this true in a world where in a day a librarian may be asked to find the obituary for "this guy who is totally haunting my house...his name is Phil or Bill or Jill...I can't really tell...he mumbles"? Well because at least the ghost-whisperer at the desk has some idea of what he needs. The 11-year old who just wants "a good book," on the other hand, usually has no real concept of what he wants and in worse case scenarios, he just needs something for the book report due tomorrow.

Those of us trained in the art of the reference interview, dig eagerly in, asking a series of questions in order to gage the reading interests, or in some cases, general interests of the patron. Sometimes though, in the case of children and teens, the reference interview will fall flat. The young patron is never really able to articulate any useful information that may be used to recommend appropriate books. At its worst, a reference interview will conclude with the child having answered all the librarian's pointed questions with, "I dunno."

It's at this point that we pull out the standard "what was the last book you read that you liked?" If we're lucky, and if the reader's advisory Gods are smiling down on us, the answer will be a book with enough prominence to generate read-alike lists.

Read-alikes are a of group books that share enough common literary characteristics that someone who enjoys one book from the group may also enjoy other books from the same read a-like group. Usually read a-likes are structured along the lines of "If you like 'Book A,' you might also enjoy 'Book B,''' or "If you like 'Author A,' you might also like 'Author B.'"

Read a-like lists are extremely helpful for young patrons who may have a difficult time explaining what elements they might enjoy in a book. It's much easier for a child to simply realize they "want something like Harry Potter" rather than analyze what they liked about the books. After a book from the past is identified, the truly skilled reference interviewer will continue the questions, trying to narrow down specific elements of the novel the child enjoyed. Though not the end-all for reader's advisory, read a-likes are a quick and easy way to narrow down possible recommendations to a manageable list of books.

Getting back into the spirit of The Bunless Librarian, below are links to popular children's and teen read a-like lists.

Captain Underpants Series by Dav Pilkey
Annapolis Valley Regional Libraries
St.Charles Public Library
Dakota County Libraries
Weber County Library

Gary Paulsen
Charles County Public Library
Jervis Public Library
St. Charles Public Library
Stanly County Library

Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling
American Library Association
Kansas City Public Library
Madison Public Library
Weber County Library

Junie B. Jones Series by Barbara Park
Ames Public Library
Bibliotheque Publique
Rockford Public Library
Weber County Library

Magic Tree House Series by Mary Pope Osborne
Barrington Area Library
Charles County Public Library
Montgomery County

Redwall Series by Brian Jacques
Burlington Public Library
Derry Public Library
Edmonton Public Library
Finger Lakes Public Library

Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket
Allen County Public Library
Strathcona County Library
Wayland Free Public Library
Weber County Library

Twilight Series by Stephenie Meyer
Arapahoe Public Library
Farmingdale Public Library
Liverpool Public Library
Santa Clara County Library

I wouldn't want to give adults the shaft when it comes to the read-alike bounty so visit the Waterboro Public Library for a huge list of adult resources.

—Happy Reading

Posted by: Sarah Lovato

Children's Books | Libraries | Reading

posted on Friday, August 22, 2008 9:11:24 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [1]
 Friday, August 15, 2008
Librarianship and the Loss of Sanctuary
Like many librarians, I grew up with an affinity for books. I won't go revisionist and claim to have been a bookworm; I wasn't. I was, what we in the biz' call, a "reluctant reader;" few and far between were books that drew me in and kept my attention until the final page. Despite this, in my young adulthood, I was drawn to libraries as a place of retreat. Often, I would visit my school or public library just to stand and move among the books, my fingers reaching out to touch the spines as I tilted my head to read their titles. As I browsed, I was humbled by the the knowledge and passion reflected in each book's pages and in awe of the dedication and talent it took to write them. I would pull titles from the shelves and flip through them slowly, the familiar scent of book wafting to my eager nose. There was great visceral comfort and pleasure in sitting among the stacks, surrounded by a universe of intellectualism and literary art.

As I entered adulthood, an unexpected aptitude for literary criticism, and a resulting education in literature studies turned me into a bona fide reader. I then started visiting libraries in search of specific titles, my trips becoming more utilitarian. Still, the physical space of libraries held an alluring power over me. I often found myself ending a long day of errands with an unplanned trip to the library. I subconsciously sought the rejuvenating peace I still found wandering through crammed stacks.

When I decided to become a librarian, my deep-rooted connection to libraries as a place and my newfound love of literature where driving forces behind my decision. Though I had no way to know or anticipate it at the time, my choice to build my career among my beloved stacks would result in an unexpected loss of a sanctuary. No longer do I wander aimlessly among library shelves, content to meander and browse. I now walk with purpose, with a clipboard, with a spreadsheet, assessing, evaluating, and weeding. My retreat now transformed into a place of work, study, and to-do lists.

Early on in my career, I attempted to recapture those lost moments of solace by visiting my own local library. Surely there, among books I had no professional obligation to select, buy, and, maintain, I would find my way back to that lost feeling of instinctual harmony. Each trip, I entered the library hopeful. I walked to a Dewey range of interest and nostalgically tilted my head to read the titles. Still though, I only noticed torn dust jackets, weak bindings, and soiled pages. My tongue actually clucked as I stumbled onto holes in subject coverage. The overall grandeur of the stacks had been replaced by a wall of professionalism that drove me to evaluate, not enjoy. I had utterly lost the ability to lose myself in library patronage and instead found myself ever the sweater-vest-wearing librarian of my work days.

Bookstores too had held a certain attraction in my young adulthood, though not on the scale of libraries; the taint of commerce muddying the nobility of the purveyance literature and knowledge. This space of retreat too has been lost to me. My trips to both local and large chain bookstores have now become exercises in frustration. Too often, I am faced with new or obscure titles I long to read, but refuse to pay for. I'm a librarian after all and spend my days surrounded by free books; to pay seems a betrayal of my trade. So I leave, frustrated, empty-handed, though hopeful a local library will own the coveted $7.00 paperback. Still though, something has been lost.

It's at this point in the post, I should segue into a solution to my quandary or in the tradition The Bunless Librarian, provide a list of links to solutions. Unfortunately, this loss of sanctuary is a drawback of librarianship I still struggle with. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't trade in my profession to get back my moments of contented browsing, but I long to find a balance between the fulfillment of librarianship and the simple serenity of patronage.

So the question remains:

How does this librarian leave her profession at the door and allow herself to reconnect with the uncomplicated, joyful refuge of the stacks?

Posted by: Sarah Lovato

Librarianship | Libraries | Reading

posted on Friday, August 15, 2008 9:25:49 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [2]
 Friday, June 27, 2008
If You Want to Learn, You've Got to Say the Magic Words
We've all been asked some form of the question, "why did you become a librarian," and with my 30th high school reunion looming I expect I'll be asked at least once by an old classmate. I have different answers depending upon whom I'm speaking to, but I think the best answer is simply because I'm curious about stuff. I just find it fun to look things up, help people and in the process learn something new.

Most of the stuff that I've learned about computers and technology was more by accident than by intent. I was simply curious enough to go poking around trying to figure things out. Lifelong learning is often used to describe this process, but it's a phrase that has never resonated with me. To me it sounds way too formal and planned for anything I've ever actually learned on my own. My process of learning is more like what Dorothea Salo calls the six magic words, than anything as stuffed shirt sounding as Lifelong Learning.

What are the magic words?

Ready? Okay the magic words are, "hmmm I wonder how that works."

When I first heard about the Learning 2.0 program, based upon the idea of learning about 2.0 tools through guided exploration (which I’m sure is trainerspeak for the magic words), I became an evangelist for the Learning 2.0 program.

A year has gone by since that day and now my library is in the midst of a Learning 2.0 program, for which I'm proud to be an administrator. When our program started I was naïve enough to be surprised at the negative feelings that some staff would have about it. I had been so involved in developing proposals; finding funding for incentives; determining tools for measuring progress; that I forgot that not everyone wants to learn this stuff. The magic words for these people are like the bell in the picture book The Polar Express; they have lost their power to enchant.

For these staff our 2.0 program is something that is added onto their workday, which makes their regular job harder. Most of these people are busy, and they feel that if they take time to play with these tools they’re letting their coworkers down because the regular work may not get done. As Kathryn Greenhill points out these people aren’t dumb grumps they’re merely expressing some very legitimate concerns. They’d like to know how these tools relate to their jobs, which ones are the most important, and they want a traditional training structure.

A Learning 2.0 program, I would argue, is as much about building a culture of dare I say it, lifelong learning amongst staff, as it is about any of the tools and applications we play with. Since technology is changing quickly and 2.0 applications are developing rapidly and then morphing into something new, the question of which tool is more important than another becomes rather moot. Knowing about these tools can improve the ability of staff to provide excellent customer service. One librarian in our system quickly located close captioned television shows on the internet, for a hearing impaired customer, because she had learned about Hulu the week before. These “aha!” moments are important to share with everyone in the program, because they enhance the power of the magic words.

It’s been a pleasure speaking to you this month, but now I’m going to go play with this thing called 280 Slides which seems like it could be helpful for my next presentation. 280 Slides, hmmm I wonder how that works?

Posted by: Jim McCluskey

Librarianship | Libraries | Library 2.0 | Technology

posted on Friday, June 27, 2008 9:39:30 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [1]
 Friday, June 20, 2008
Compliments, Complaints, and Conversations
Have you Googled your library recently? If you haven’t, what you find may surprise you. That man you saw earlier today picking up his holds may be thinking about writing a review that mentions how much he likes dropping by the library to grab his books and go. The fact is our patrons, both the satisfied and dissatisfied, are talking about us in their blogs on review sites like Yelp. These sites enable our customers to reach larger audiences than ever before, and to share what they like and dislike about the service provided. This is something libraries should be thinking about and preparing for.

Once you’re aware of these review sites the library has some questions to answer. Should the library join these sites and add reviews or other content? Should the library respond to negative reviews, correct inaccurate information, and so on? Who’ll be responsible for periodically checking these sites and what guidelines should they be working with.

I’d encourage libraries to consider adding content to review sites, especially in cases where the library hasn’t yet been reviewed. These first reviews represent an opportunity to share services the library offers such as Wi-Fi, and virtual reference service. Be up front about identifying yourself as the library and keep it brief. Be factual and focus on services, let your customers be the ones to offer praise.

Libraries should consider carefully how or if they’ll respond to reviews. My advice would be to let the community police itself and to have faith that the good service you provide will balance out the occasional poor review. Yelp offers some good advice for business owners that also applies to libraries.

Some highlights:
“Don’t review your own business anonymously or get your friends to do the same.
Don’t overestimate the impact of a single negative review. It happens to even the best businesses. That said if you see a trend of negative reviews, you may want to take this feedback and determine if there is a way to improve your business.
Do add photos to your business page and make sure the business information is correct.
Do review your own business, clearly stating that you are the business owner. Full disclosure is important here, and will be critical in earning the respect of the Yelp community.”

Review sites like these are expanding rapidly, building off people’s inherent desire to create and share information. Libraries that embrace these web 2.0 tools have an opportunity to open a dialog with their customers which may lead to beneficial relationships for both.

A customer, who wrote a positive review about the library, may be the person you think of when you’re looking for a person to offer a patron perspective on the library’s blog. And even a negative review offers the chance to get feedback about ways we might improve our services, practices, or policies. Our customers are talking about us. It’s time for libraries to join the conversation.

Posted by: Jim McCluskey

Internet | Libraries | Reviewing | Technology

posted on Friday, June 20, 2008 9:28:46 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [3]
 Friday, June 13, 2008
Cell Phones Have a Place in Our Libraries
I spend a lot of time on Flickr and every so often I come across something that just really bothers me. No, I’m not talking about someone’s tasteless photograph; I’m referring to mean library signs. Many of the worst ones target cell phone users. Of course, if your sign can be addressed to teen use of cell phones, well then you’ve hit the daily double of nasty. One library I came across the other day even threatens you with a hundred dollar fine if you’re caught talking on a cell phone in the library. Let’s set aside for a moment the fact that bad cell phone policies and unfriendly signs send a message to these customers that we don’t want you in our libraries. These practices are also out of step with the services libraries are already offering or moving towards in the near future.

Your phone is getting smarter.

Remarkably given the state of the economy, cell phone sales are booming, especially smart phones like the iPhone, and the Blackberry pearl. Formerly the domain of techies and executives, these smart phones are now coming into the mainstream, and that represents a great opportunity for libraries. In the past several years more and more libraries have begun offering downloadable content such as audio books, music, video and eBooks all of which are compatible with many smart phones.
One of the big hurdles for widespread acceptance of this downloadable content has been the issue of incompatibility with the iPod. Now that OverDrive has announced it will later this summer be releasing DRM free audio books that will work with iPods—look for more details at ALA—can the announcement that these same materials will also be compatible with the iPhone as well, be far off? Downloads still have some issues, notably the learning curve for first time users, but soon libraries will finally offer them to the vast majority of customers who have been up to now, shut out from these materials.

Kindle the new iPod?

I want to be a fan of eBooks, but I just can’t warm up to them. But like a lot of things I buy for the library whether I personally enjoy them or not is irrelevant, I buy them because our customers expect the library to have them. And the Kindle has the potential to do for eBooks what the iPod did for digital music. Should that happen, library customers are going to expect that the library offer the latest bestseller in eBook format as well. Two of the largest selling points of the Kindle seem to be convenience and an improved experience for the reader. You can already read an eBook on your smart phone and many are, as the success of Harlequin’s eBook program has shown, so the audience for eBooks is there, it’s the experience that has to improve and perhaps only slightly.

Forget about email, texting is where it’s at.

My library is considering moving to another ILS vendor. And as part of our conversation we’ve been asking about the possibility of offering texting of holds notices to patrons. So far none of them have promised anything other than it’s in the purgatory known as development. But all of them admit that they’re hearing this request from other library systems as well.

I love the idea of text message notifications because it reflects the fact that texting is the preferred method of communicating over email, and voice calls for many tech savvy users. Why Library Elf can handle texting me my holds and overdue notices so eloquently, but ILS vendors cannot is perhaps only explicable by the commitment of their resources to adding tags and reviews which seem to be the current innovations they’re all trying to offer in one form or another.
What I find very, very strange is that we’re still talking about cell phones in such negative terms when the technological trends are all moving these devices towards a much greater integration with current and emerging library services.  Yes, cell phone conversations can be annoying, and yes, libraries need to try and offer some spaces for quiet study. But cell phones can be used in a quiet manner, texting and soft phone conversations are no more disruptive to the library than any other patron conversation.

Libraries should separate the patron behavior that is disruptive away from these devices which are now ubiquitous. To allocate resources to collections like eBooks, downloadable music, video and audio books and to move towards developing services like texting hold notifications while at the same time treating cell phone users as pariahs is ridiculous in the short term and dangerous in the long term.

Posted by: Jim McCluskey

eBooks | Libraries | Library 2.0 | Technology

posted on Friday, June 13, 2008 9:25:06 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [2]
 Friday, June 06, 2008
Let's talk ... why we blog.

I love my job.  As a Collection Development librarian I get to buy DVDs, music and downloads for my library system.  This means that I get to follow technology trends-which soothes my inner geek-and also share my passion for intellectual freedom.  Forget the, I  "heart" the First Amendment bumper sticker; I want the first amendment tattoo-Congress shall make no law….  

But for all that passion and love of my job, there's a tradeoff, isolation.  No matter how much I'd like to, I'll never be able to visit branch libraries as frequently as I'd like to discuss collections.   And while I don't consider my library unusual, the collections in our libraries have undergone some significant changes recently.  Since 2004, the year I joined Collection Development, we've added streaming music and video, done away with nearly all analog media, begun offering downloadable audio and video, as well as begun floating our collection amongst our libraries.  

In light of all this change, the Collection Development department began blogging last year as a supplement to our other communication methods.  For most staff, our communication with them was more of a broadcast of information either through email, or our Tech News newsletter which while effective in its way tended to be somewhat formal.   Our blog with its more conversational tone, we hoped would start a dialog between us and staff, and also since we've added librarians and switched around a few selection areas, help branch staff put a face to a name.  

Overall, our blog has been fairly successful at both of those goals, modest though they are.  Since we began, the blog has been visited over 8,000 times and visitors have left 170 comments on our 206 posts.  And while we'd like to see a lot more comments, we're happy with the efficiency that blogging affords us in our communication with staff.  Since blogs are by their nature, archival and searchable staff can locate postings easily-a benefit anyone who's ever lost an email that included a link you needed to retrieve quickly, can appreciate.

The Nuts and Bolts

Before we began we discussed a number of technical and strategic items.  Which software should we use for our blog?  Should the blog be internal and password protected or open to the public?  Who would be posting and what level of administrative rights would they have?  What sort of content would we focus on and how often should we post?  

We decided to use Wordpress as our platform over Blogger because we wanted to quantify the success of our blog and Wordpress offers a free statistical package that is surprisingly robust.  By using Wordpress, we can track which posts are the most popular, see how people are finding us, as well as a number of other useful reports all of which can be run either by day, week, month, or all time.  Since both Blogger and Wordpress are free this choice was easy.

We chose to make our blog open to the public, rather than internal and password protected.  We began our blog with no real marketing push other than an introductory email, and some announcements at a meeting of supervisors.  We had no idea how well the blog would be received and wanted to make it as easy as we could for staff to find us initially.  

Internally we decided that anyone within the Collection Development department would be able to post to the blog, though only a few of us would have full administrative privileges.  By allowing support  staff to post to the blog we could  build off some of the work they were already doing, such as posting lists of newly purchased items  that had been going into a public folder in Outlook email.  These email postings are popular with some staff and we wanted our blog to offer the same information in an alternative stream rather than replace email.  Since the public folders in Outlook are emptied every two weeks automatically, the blog also allowed us to offer an archive of these lists.  Because support staff could publish the list with only a few clicks and a cut & paste the duplication of effort for these lists was minimal.

The content of the blog tends toward the short and sweet.  We want content to change often giving staff a reason to visit frequently.  Though we'll occasionally post longer articles, many of which appear in our Tech News newsletter also,  we tend to blog more in snippets of brief text with links for greater detail.  The most frequent topics are not surprisingly publishing news and technology.  Since our blog is public some purely administrative content goes through our more traditional communication channels.    Finally, since our aim was to create a dialog with staff we opted to allow comments with minimal moderation.   The first time a visitor leaves a comment , it must be approved by myself or another administrator.  Once a comment by a visitor has been approved though, all subsequent comments publish to the blog immediately.  

Though libraries and situations differ, many communication challenges are the same from library to library. Blogs with their archival nature, ease of searching, and conversational tone can provide a channel for fast , efficient, information sharing and communication between staff in libraries large and small.


Posted by: Jim McCluskey

Blogosphere | Libraries

posted on Friday, June 06, 2008 3:03:27 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [0]
 Friday, May 23, 2008
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Reading Log
It’s funny what happens to your reading habits once you make them public. I started out blogging right after graduating from library school, and right before beginning my first professional position. I was wildly enthusiastic about teen literature and constantly feeling that teens didn’t get proper attention in libraries—but I had no outlet for my enthusiasm other than my mother (a school librarian) and the friends I had made at the library system at which I was a paraprofessional. Knowing that I was leaving the people I talked to books about, I wanted to be able to continue that dialog. So, I started a blog. I didn’t do it methodically. I wasn’t a blog reader. I didn’t know what people wrote about. I had no idea what I was doing.

At first, I peppered the blog with events, activities and happenings in my life unrelated to books—but my reading habits were always the cornerstone of my blogging. Then, a curious thing happened. People I didn’t know started reading my blog. People with whom I shared an interest.

And then I started reading more blogs. First the people who had commented on mine, then the ones who made interesting comments on theirs. Then I sought them out. Dialogs were created. I became influenced by what they were reading. I joined in on memes. I volunteered for the Cybils. I said yes when someone asked me to join in on one of those new-fangled blog tour things. Then Reader Girlz asked me to be a poster girl—someone who recommends books to them, primarily to go along with their monthly featured author.  Suddenly I found myself with lists of books to read. What used to be happenstance began to contain a certain level of obligation. And am I really a teen librarian/blogger worth my salt if I haven’t read the latest books buzzing around these communities?

I don’t want you to interpret this as complaining. Through those commitments and through that community I’ve found books that I might not have found. Books that I adore. Books that I hate. Books I can’t get worked up to feel much of anything about. But I do miss wandering the shelves on my own just discovering things. I don’t so much have time for that anymore. But without that wandering, that discovering, I might not have found authors I treasure today—Laurie Halse Anderson, Tamora Pierce, L.A. Meyer, Brett Hartinger, John Flanagan, Justina Chen Headley, and so, so many others. I read all of these authors because I just stumbled upon them while shelving or checking books in or out, or simply browsing. I found them merely by happenstance, without any premeditation, without anyone telling me that I should read them or I had to read them or I needed to vet them for this, that or someone else. I wonder what I’m missing these days.

So what have I been reading lately? What do I plan on reading?  However I found them, here’s what’s been on the menu lately:

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
The Disreputable History of Frankie-Landau Banks by E. Lockhart
Violet on the Runway by Melissa Walker
Songs for a Teenage Nomad by Kim Culbertson
Life Sucks by Jessica Abel
Sovay by Celia Reese
Good Enough by Paula Yoo

What are you reading? What are you looking forward to? How has blogging or blogs affected your To Be Read pile?

Posted by: Jackie Parker

Blogosphere | Internet | Librarianship | Libraries | Reading | Young Adult Books

posted on Friday, May 23, 2008 9:14:29 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [14]
 Friday, April 25, 2008
We Are All Library Patrons (At Least, We Should Be)
We librarians are easily exasperated by our patrons. There are entire online communities devoted to anti-patron sentiments, such as The Society for Librarians who Say MotherF***er and Library Workers Against Stupid Patrons. I’ll admit I read these blogs daily, and have on occasion contributed to them. While some patrons really are horrible and toxic, most are simply people who are not familiar with the library, through no fault of their own. I think that many librarians have lost the ability to empathize with the people we serve.

We get a lot of inane questions like, “Where is the bathroom?” and “Where are your DVDs?” The answers seem so obvious to us. Everything is exactly where it has always been, not to mention that there are squillions of helpful signs to point the disoriented patron in the right direction. Do we think patrons are numbskulls? Many times, yes. In my opinion, this is partly due to the fact that we don’t view them as individuals, we see them as branches of the same entity. Surely if we tell one patron where the New Fiction Section is in the morning, we shouldn’t have to tell another patron the same thing in the afternoon. Didn’t they get the memo?

I think we lose empathy for our patrons because we forget what it is like to be one of them. I don’t know many librarians who visit other libraries as a patron. To see how they do things at that library, sure. But to check out a novel? Use the internet? Sit around and read? Of course not. We can do that at work.

Recently I was forced to be a library patron. It was Tax Day, and I had yet to make photocopies of my W-2s to send in with my forms. Unfortunately, it was also my day off from work, and it didn’t make sense to make the 20-mile round trip commute to use the copying machine when there was another library (that likely had its own copier) less than two miles away. So what did I do? I went to my neighborhood library for the very first time.

I walked through the doors and scanned the area hoping the photocopier would be obvious, but after a few seconds I gave up and went up to the information desk. When it was my turn, I politely asked if the library had a copier. The staff person just pointed wordlessly over my right shoulder. Oh. It was right behind me.

But it was not the same kind of photocopier that I was used to! It was completely different! The staff person had to leave her desk and (patiently, to her credit) show me where to insert my coins and where the copies would come out.

Thoroughly embarrassed, I quickly made the necessary copies and left. Spending forty hours a week in one library did not mean that I could find my way around any library. Who knew? Taken from my home turf, I was just like the people who make me want to tear my hair out on a daily basis.

To serve the community well, library employees need to be library patrons too. The extra time and effort will be worth the understanding we will gain. Maybe then there will be less fodder for angry, patron-dissing blogs.

Posted by: Eva Mays

Librarianship | Libraries

posted on Friday, April 25, 2008 9:59:22 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [0]
 Friday, April 18, 2008
Where Have All the Twenty-Somethings Gone?
Library patrons are a very diverse bunch. Stand any two next to each other, and nine times out of ten the only thing they will have in common is that they both patronize the library. The characteristic that varies the most is age—most libraries profess to serve infants, senior citizens, and every age group in between. In my time as a librarian, however, I have noticed that “Generation Y”, or people between the ages of 18 and 30, make up a very small amount of the people I serve every day.

It’s not that twenty-somethings aren’t using the library. In fact, some research suggests that they are more likely than the older generations to use library services to find solutions for problems they encounter in life. What concerns me is that, while they may drop by for help finding a job or to pick up tax forms, they aren’t using the library for its most basic service: access to free books.

As an eighties-baby myself, I see this in my personal life as well as my professional life. None of my friends get their reading material from the library. My own sisters, avid readers all, buy their books at chain stores and politely refuse when I offer to teach them to use Inter Library Loan! Not only that, but I am convinced that twenty-somethings who read for recreation are in the minority. This is probably because those who are in college view reading as a chore (I know I did), and those who are just entering the work force are too busy submitting resumes and worrying about paying off student loans to spend time on any luxuries, least of all cozying up with the latest NY Times Bestseller.

I like to argue that checking out books from the library not only saves the environment, but it also saves the library user a good chunk of change. I try to keep track of how much I read with GoodReads.com, and recently I thought it would be a fun experiment to add up all the books I had read in the last year and calculate the amount of many it would have cost me if I had bought them at Barnes & Noble instead of checking them out from the library. I would have spent about $1,300 on my reading habit last year alone. Yikes.

My husband thinks this a terrible argument; because as a librarian, I a) am required to read more than the average person, and b) as I work in a library, I have easy access to library services like interlibrary loan and am free of hassles like late fines. I simply have easier access and more incentive to read for fun than the average person my age. While I’ll admit he is right on that point, I won’t back down from my stance that my peers are simply not reading for fun, and when they do they are purchasing books with money that could be better spent elsewhere (i.e. those pesky student loans).

I think it is important for libraries to market more to the twenty-something crowd. Libraries tend to pay a lot of attention to the extremes—early literacy and services to senior citizens. All age groups both need and deserve a daily dose of free reading, and we need to find ways to convince Generation Y to take advantage of what their public library offers!  

Posted by: Eva Mays

Libraries | Reading

posted on Friday, April 18, 2008 9:32:47 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [1]
 Friday, April 11, 2008
Will the Real Librarians Please Stand Up?
How much is a Master of Library and Information Science worth?

In my opinion, not much more than the vellum the diploma is printed on.

Here’s the thing: When I encounter a problem or challenge in my work life, I don’t close my eyes and try to recall a reading or lecture I imbibed while in graduate school. Instead, I call on my on-the-job experience or consult with co-workers and peers. Library Science is not something that can be taught in a lecture hall; it can only be learned in a library!

This realization makes me a little bit cranky (as it does many other degreed librarians) because no one likes to admit that they wasted tens of thousands of dollars and several years of their life on an education that does not prepare them for the career they chose. An MLIS is useful for exactly one thing: landing a dream job in a well-funded library. The degree is nearly useless when actually doing that job.

Here’s another thing: While so many companies now require advanced degrees of their employees, libraries cannot afford to be so selective. Many will fill a vacant position with an un-degreed librarian as long as the price is right. I think it is because, deep down, library administrators know that an MLIS-less librarian can do the same quality of work as one who spent an extra year or two in the halls of academia, but can be paid a lower salary and given the unflattering title of Library Assistant.

I have met librarians with degrees who look down their noses at those without; as if no matter how many years of experience they may have they will always be thirty-six credits short of being a true librarian. I hold to the belief that anyone who works in a library is a librarian. Enough quibbling over titles like library assistant, library worker, library support staff, library technician, and clerk. There are so many better uses of our time!

I have come to the conclusion that the MLIS degree was created by a group of overworked and underpaid librarians who were sick of being disrespected in the professional world and tired of the public ignoring their efforts to contribute to society. What better way to boost confidence and morale than an impressive-sounding acronym to clip onto the end of one’s name? I wish I could tell all librarians not to be so insecure. We are superheroes, with or without the acronym. It’s the wonderful things that we do that make us librarians, not how much money we forked over for a piece of fancy paper.

Posted by: Eva Mays

Librarianship | Libraries

posted on Friday, April 11, 2008 9:28:42 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [3]
 Monday, April 07, 2008
Finding My Place

I decided to become a Youth Service Librarian because I wanted to share my love of reading with young people. When dreaming of my future career while slogging through my MLIS program, I envisioned myself quietly overseeing dedicated young readers as they pursued knowledge, enlightenment, and entertainment. I am a tad embarrassed about how naïve and old-fashioned I was. Luckily, my misconceptions about the librarian job description did not survive my first week on the job in a real-life public library.

Most of the children I work with come from troubled homes. Their parents are usually unwilling or unable to provide any kind of guidance for their children, so the parental duties are left hanging until a responsible adult decides to take them up. Most public libraries are awash with unsupervised children and teens, and librarians are obligated to assume to role of caretaker and disciplinarian in order to keep the peace. That is just one of the many things they don’t think to tell you in library school.

During the course of my employment at the library, I have had to do some things that my pre-librarian self would never have guessed. I have had to pull brawling kids off each other on more than one occasion. I constantly admonish teenagers for calling each other “ugly”, “ignorant”, or a variety of other names that I don’t recognize but am pretty sure are derogatory. I have tried to explain why violence is wrong and why every person should be treated with respect. I have launched a campaign to reinstate “please” and “thank you” into their vocabularies. I have tried to instill a sense of self-worth in them all. And all the while, I have tried to inspire in them a love of reading. Not an easy task!

Contrary to the two-dimensional librarians of yesteryear, today’s librarians have a responsibility to foster not just the intellectual development of children and teens, but the social and emotional development as well. While most librarians take up this mantle willingly, I think the job would be that much sweeter if we could know for certain that our considerable efforts have the power to turn a life around. Do they listen to us? Do they remember what we say? Does our good opinion factor into their decision-making process? And most of all, will we ever convince them that reading is fun?

There are times when it seems that the kids see me as a piece of furniture, but I have to remind myself that because of my close involvement it is difficult to see clearly. Several times in the past year I have had to take a step back from the situation in order to look at the big picture and make sense of it all. When the times get tough and I begin to forget why I ever chose to become a librarian, I reflect the times when I have succeeded (although they are always fewer than I would prefer). I remember all the times when I have been able to get a reluctant reader to sit down with a book, all the times that a child has asked me “please” when before they would have demanded, and especially all the times I have seen some of the local children “play librarian” when they think I’m not looking.

Someone recently reminded me that small adjustments are the least painful and the most successful. Although this person was not referring to library services, I think all librarians should take this aphorism to heart. It is the little changes I see every day, even the ones so subtle they are barely noticeable, that convince me that librarians have the power to inspire, teach, and lead in many different ways (not just by shelving dusty tomes and memorizing the Dewey Decimal System).

Posted by: Eva Mays

Children's Books | Libraries | Young Adult Books

posted on Monday, April 07, 2008 1:01:53 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)  #    Comments [1]
 Monday, February 25, 2008
I Am Magic (And So Can You!)*
I am magic. I can make books disappear.

My magic isn’t always strong. It ebbs and flows with the seasons and even the days of the week. My magic isn’t all-powerful. There are books that continually resist my charms. My magic isn’t reliable. It sometimes works or fails when I least expect it.

But I am magic, and I am not alone.

My skills can be taught, and I am breaking the great vow of the magician to share my secret. It’s astonishing simple, yet can make books disappear from shelves and into the hands of readers more than anything else.

Pull a book from the shelf. Tighten up the shelf of books to leave a six-inch space at the end of each shelf. Put the chosen book in that space with the cover facing outward. Stand back and allow the magic to do its work.

As I mentioned earlier, this particular strain of magic isn’t always strong, powerful, or reliable. In the summertime, the books that face out disappear off the shelves quickly. In the week before Christmas, I could tape Fun-Dip to the covers and they still wouldn’t go out. For me, the early parts of the weeks see more books finding their just-right reader. On Fridays the books may spend the weekend staring out into the library zone dreaming of being read by a warm fire or under a down comforter.

Also like many a great magician, I do have an assistant. Actually, I have three assistants who do their jobs long before the books come gently into my hands. I have no communication with them unfortunately, but as I reveal my secrets today I can also implore them to make my magic – our magic – stronger.

It starts with the author. I wouldn’t even presume to tell authors to write good books, though that does help books find readers. I know that the author is putting her heart into her writing and believes that she has put together the best book that she can. But I would suggest that the author really really think about the title of the book. A great title can move a book. Do you think Sex Kittens and Horn Dawgs Fall in Love stays on the shelf? Not a chance.

The publisher has a huge impact on the book by creating the cover art. A good book with a boring cover will sit on the shelf forever. Not even my librarian magic can move it. An interesting, funny, and/or kid-friendly cover can make that book almost jump off the shelf and find a new best friend. Before the publisher signs off on the cover or title (because they can help here too), someone should find about twenty kids of the target age and find out if the cover and title grabs them. The plain cover of The Seven Wonders of Sassafras Springs was a killer for that book. But lesson learned, as the paperback has a more engaging cover. The girly-looking unicorn on the cover of The Prophecy by Hilari Bell may be keeping the boy readers away from this otherwise boy-friendly book, but the publishers are staying the course with the paperback. (By the way, maybe the book could have had a title that isn’t the tile of say, forty other books. Just saying.)

Online and print reviewers have their own magic to create. By promoting books that may fall under the radar, those titles become prime choices for librarians to pull out from the rows of books and set out for others to find. By interviewing authors, a personal connection is formed that makes it a notch easier to select a title from a new author to display. By promoting special topics or events, they create a reason for special displays and lessons. The kid lit bloggers’ love for Babymouse turned me on to the series and to the author Jennifer Holm (Maybe “turned on” isn’t the right phrase in the context of the author, but she is a very nice person and great writer.)

Here’s how it works for me in a day at the library. I straighten the children’s fiction shelves and pull out The Naked Mole-Rat Letters because the title is cool. At the next shelf I pull out the classic Jenny and the Cat Club because we have two copies and I believe that adults would love to know that it’s there to read to their kids. The next shelf is some book by Avi, because there are so many and they all beg to be read. Then an Ivy and Bean book because girls always grab it within a day or two. Through the rest off the shelves I go selecting books that I like, that have great covers (How to Steal a Dog), that have great titles (My Sister is So Bossy She Says You Can’t Read This Book), and that have great and/or likeable authors (Grace Lin’s Year of the Rat). Then I stand back and let the magic take over.

Scene: From my vantage point at the information desk I see a boy. He’s drawn to the shelf. The cover grabs him, the title reels him in, he picks up Whales on Stilts! by M.T. Anderson. He skims the inside cover. He takes it away with him.

Magic.

*title credit to Steven Colbert’s book, I Am America (And So Can You!)

Posted by: Pam Coughlan

Children's Books | Libraries | Young Adult Books

posted on Monday, February 25, 2008 10:49:20 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)  #    Comments [2]
 Friday, February 15, 2008
A Man Goes Into A Sub Shop And Finds That They Have His Favorite Deli Meat There - Liverwurst
A man goes into a sub shop — let’s call it Subdays — and finds that they have his favorite deli meat there. Liverwurst. He’s thrilled to find it served and goes back to that sub shop frequently. But one day, he’s in a different area and goes into another Subdays shop and finds that liverwurst is not offered there. They have hummus, but no liverwurst. He’s annoyed at this inconsistency and writes to the head of all Subdays expressing his aggravation. (Stay with me here.)

The president of Subdays can basically do three things. She can thank the man for his opinion, but let him know that the Subdays franchises are run independently and can serve what they choose to serve. She can commission a survey of customers and franchises on the feasibility of serving liverwurst and hummus at Subdays, and turn the data into a sophisticated algorithm showing in which locations liverwurst and hummus should be served. Or she can order the Subdays franchises to stick to the original menu with no substitutions or ethnic variations. Oh, and menus should be displayed four inches from the cash register. (Almost there.)

Now suppose that the managers of the various Subdays earned their graduate degrees in delicatessens. How would they respond? Maybe they’d chose to run a deli in an office building, where they’d have some guidelines, but not so many hard rules. Maybe they’d take their degrees elsewhere — supermarkets perhaps, or entirely unrelated businesses.

Without fitting the analogy too tightly, this is where the public library system finds itself today. They want professional librarians trained to make decisions, but the greater library system holds onto the power. The problem may be less prevalent in smaller library systems, but as the number of branches in a system grows, so does the need to exercise more control over collections, policies, and initiatives. If there is a goal of more consistency for the sake of the patron — and at some level, for the sake of the employees — what happens to the librarians trained to run the show?

Well, some of them leave. The school system can offer a huge competition for librarians who want more authority in their library, with the bonus of better hours and summers off. The most energetic librarians may find the public library system too stifling, and look for work where the fold of the brochure doesn’t need to be a matter for committee. The new graduates may skip the public library altogether and use their degrees in business.

In my large, suburban (unnamed) library system, centralized ordering for books and media seems essential. The job would be too big for any particular branch. However, ordering by the numbers results in some waste and lost opportunities. For example, my branch will get new Magic Tree House books because other libraries had worn-out copies, or because the two-year ordering cycle for the Magic Tree House series indicates that it’s time. But our branch gets lots of donated, new copies of books in this series — certainly enough to replace old or lost copies. Perhaps we’d rather use our funds in this area to replace other titles instead, and in doing so, become more involved in the process.

Brian Kenny, Editor-in-Chief of School Library Journal, recently talked about the issue of centralized ordering in his December editorial. As he says, “There’s no greater experience for new librarians than being responsible for buying front-list titles. It engages them in a continuous learning process as they grow familiar with the review literature, publishers, and trends, on the one hand, and their community and its evolving needs on the other.”

A larger library system can become overly dependent on administration initiatives based on research instead of front-line experience. Even small decisions turn into matters for committee, not individual librarians or managers. Again to offer a true example, while it can be helpful to have a “Lost and Found” policy that covers the entire library system, it also slowly chips away at the authority of professional staff.

The library’s connection to the county or city government can add extra layers of bureaucracy and control. That fold of the brochure issue I alluded to before is real. Our government has determined the acceptable brochure folds allowed by the agencies under its jurisdiction. Single-page flyers are fine, tri-folds are taboo. The paper airplane fold is cause for immediate dismissal. (Okay, I made that one up.)

Consistency does provide benefit and comfort. To return to the Subdays analogy, you know what you’ll find at each sub shop, whether as a customer or an employee. But in submitting the hummus to surveys and the liverwurst to public polling, we’re leaving out not only the diversity of the library, but also the power of making decisions that makes a job feel worthwhile. The public is important, no doubt, but there should be a balance between the desires of a demanding public and the needs of an educated staff. Ultimately, the customer will want both specific services and excellent staff. He’ll want to have his liverwurst and eat it too.

Posted by: Pam Coughlan

Libraries

posted on Friday, February 15, 2008 3:30:34 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)  #    Comments [8]
 Friday, January 25, 2008
A Librarian's Challenge

In October 2007 a report published by Booktrust found that 92% of UK secondary schools and 61% of primary schools were spending far below the recommended figures per head on books for their libraries.

Meanwhile, a third of respondents reported that the person who ran the primary school library did not have specialist knowledge of children's literature. In secondary schools, 22% of respondents had no special knowledge of children's literature.

When I was nine I was banned from the library. It was my school library, run primly and properly by a Head Librarian - with a little bit of help from a slim cohort of my fellow boarding school peers. They, however, were also School Prefects, and therefore just as much held in awe by me as the Head Librarian herself. It was the fault of Franklin W. Dixon that I was banned from this library. For upon closer inspection, it had been discovered by said Head Librarian that I had a distinct predilection for The Hardy Boys. Distinct, as in, by age nine I had already amassed a personal library of forty of these titles and was well-prepared to stick with brothers Frank and Joe through thick and thin to the end of my days. Not in and of itself such a terrible thing for a nine year old girl - one might think - but au contraire according to my Head Librarian. For in her steely eyes (or I should, technically, say 'eye' as one was definitely glass!) they were deemed unworthy of my budding pre-pubescent mind. Consequently, one fine summer day, as I dawdled at her desk with the latest Dixon title under my arm, I was alarmed to be told in no uncertain terms that I was to be banned from the library on sight. Unless, "UNLESS" she re-iterated - looking straight at me with a small but solid smile - I agreed to take out from the library any other book.

As any parent, and child-acquainted adult knows, challenging a child can be a dangerous thing if you are not fully prepared for the consequences. Luckily, my Head Librarian was a Librarian Extraordinaire and what it meant was this: we resolved our differences by rising to the challenges we set each other. In immediate retaliation (at being told what to do, rather than any sense of loyalty to old F.W.D. it has to be said) I resolved to borrow from this library simply the biggest book I could find. The Complete Penguin Book of Detective Short Fiction, at one thousand and seventeen pages, was not only the largest thing I could find, but the longest thing I'd ever attempted to read so far in my nine year life. So I stormed back to her desk, slammed it down and gave her my own small, solid, smile back. What, of course, I wasn't prepared for was the reaction she then gave. This steely Librarian, all polished and perfect and perfectly stern suddenly lifted both hands off her desk, and after slightly skimming the cover of my book - as if, almost, in admiration - she then gave me a thumbs up, not with just one hand, but with two.

Although I did not, it has to be said, actually enjoy reading this book, what it marked was a true turning point in my reading habits - which had, up until that wonderful intervention, somewhat stalled in Dixon-Blyton-but-not-much-beyond land. A conversion to a whole new wonderful literature world soon found me welcoming the advances of Rosemary Sutcliffe, Robert Cormier, Robert Westall, Michelle Magorian, Alan Garner, Jan Marks, Susan Cooper and Ursula Le Guin (to name just a few of the amazing authors who filled me brimful with imagination at that age and beyond). I, of course, never looked back, but looking back now I recognise the importance of that Head Librarian intervention, and I am thankful that she was so knowledgeable, as well as so kind and so, so wise.

Posted by: Sara Wingate Gray

Libraries

posted on Friday, January 25, 2008 1:37:10 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)  #    Comments [4]
 Monday, January 21, 2008
British Council Libraries and Other English Language Finds From Afar
One of the downsides to carrying around everything you need to live on your own back is the fact there's not really very much room for fitting in a nice, big fat hardback of your latest favourite author's work. Carting a poetry library around too, alongside these banal life accoutrements (which include socks, a sleeping bag, and the indispensable goose feather stuffed booties, amongst many other things) does little to negate this fact, as no matter how much of a poetry fan you are, there are just some times when you want to slip in to something a little more, well, substantial - and even the best beast of a poetry anthology behemoth just won't do. So when the wonderful world of fiction strikes, and I need to find a worthy tome to idle my hours away, it is, of course, wherever my 'local' library is that I inevitably find myself wandering down to. A quick stroke of the shelves, a perusal of the 'new fiction / just in' section and after a mere five minutes often my arms are full of affable, amusing, and downright tasty nuggets of nutritious, creative works ready for me to dive in to. But what happens when I'm in a non-English speaking country, as I found myself in 2006?

Hopping from Amsterdam to Berlin, thence to Dresden, Prague, Vienna and Budapest, operating my travelling poetry library in each of these cities, there were some nights, after a good, long hard day slaving away at my own library, when I just wanted to switch off and jump in to a good book. Of course, many libraries in capital, or metropolitan cities, have a 'foreign language' section, but it's never as good as the main collections of the library overall: so often, when out wandering the vast plains of Europe, I have found myself making use of the British Council Libraries. In particular, I made distinctive use of the BC's Berlin headquarters and library back in June 2006, not only borrowing some enticing reads from their collection for myself, but also installing my library itself too. A week based in their library's space saw me signing up new members to my library within the environs of their own, providing my first (and soon to be favourite) shot at operating perhaps the quintessence of library service itself: two libraries in one!

What also always astounded me about the countries and cities I visited was the extent to which the English Language had permeated beyond borders, boundaries and well, books. It was a welcoming surprise to find the English language reaching the parts other tongues might not dare speak (so to speak) and a number of independently published English Language Literary magazines stand out as championing poetry and literature in translation.

'Blatt' in Prague, 'sub dream' (Vienna's English Language Literary Journal) and 'Pilvax' (Budapest-based) are three great reads for the English reading and writing connoisseur, specializing in publishing writing in English and translations from or to the original language alongside (which might include Czech, Austrian-German, Hungarian and indeed any other European tongue that makes it through the editorial process). Similarly, many poets I met - and especially in Budapest - were keen to emphasize their multi-lingual skills, and from speaking to two Hungarian poets living there it was clear that writing in both Hungarian and English was, for them, an obvious choice - so it seems that English as a global language may well indeed have got a glottal stop or two ahead of the game.

The British Council's longstanding and exemplary teaching of English programmes, as well as the wonderful resource that is their many and manifold English Language Libraries, have, no doubt, played a huge part in this process. Reading recently of another British Council Library closure in Europe however, reminded me of the first story I read last year about the BC's new 'development' programme: reallocating funding from their EU, India and Africa based Libraries to a new priority of, yes you guessed it, the Middle East. While I can't argue that providing an English Language Library service in such places as Iraq, Afghanistan and Bangladesh is anything but an illustrious idea, what is incongruous about it is the perceived need to give with one hand on one side of the world, while taking away with the other, on the other.

I'll leave it to ole Aristotle to have the last words: "One swallow does not make a summer, neither does one fine day."

Posted by: Sara Wingate Gray

Libraries

posted on Monday, January 21, 2008 9:25:47 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)  #    Comments [1]
 Friday, January 04, 2008
Visiting UK Libraries
Visiting some UK libraries this week, I was struck by the vitality of each distinct location. An excited, and excitable, post-Christmas throng of teenagers armed the Teen section of the Norfolk and Norwich Millennium Library, lolling on sofas to the side of the main entrance, eyeing up the latest graphic novel and manga additions, and, no doubt, each other.

Meanwhile, behind the scenes, a minor mini-crisis was being swiftly averted by that day's Duty Manager Librarian: within minutes the public printers were back online, tannoy announcements informed everyone of the solved situation, and the East Anglian public happily continued tapping away on their terminals out front.

A visit with two under-tens to their local branch library, south of the river Thames in London, conjured a completely different scenario: piles of children's books spilled over the soft floor coverings as the silence of a small branch library was suddenly perforated with delighted shrieks. Small hands skimmed the shelves with haste, pulling out new books by favourite authors until we'd created our very own overspill too. A hop, skip and a jump (well, several jumps for the six year old) over to the circulation desk, to take out our books, also gave me a chance to observe another librarian's stamping technique. Visiting the library again meant another stamp on our special children's library card and we'd only one gap left to fill. So now it was complete. There were more delighted shrieks. A completed card meant we got to choose a fee-free DVD to borrow alongside our reading material. Decamping back to home base the chants of "SpongeBob SquarePants, SpongeBob SquarePants" caused puffs of hot breath to shimmer like frozen jellyfish in the cold air of our London street.

Whether serving a whole city's community as a central information point, or a small, diverse local clientele as its nearest accessible resource, a library functions best responding directly to the needs of its specific user group, its patrons, who place trust in the library's ability to gauge their needs, their knowledge-acquisition requirements. Knowledge, trust, friendliness, vitality: these are words I value, traits I look for in the people I meet, and, I'm happy to report, ably on offer at these two libraries I ventured into while enjoying the season's holidays.

I am always surprised by the diversity of library experience, whether it's visiting libraries on home ground, or venturing further afield to explore what Barcelona, Berlin, or San Francisco offer in the library exploration stakes. I wonder what other interesting community libraries are out there I have yet to visit - certainly the mule libraries of Venezuela (known as bibliomulas) are top of my list, and I'd love to hear from readers about their own interesting library experiences, so do get in touch if you've one special library place that should just not be missed!

Posted by: Sara Wingate Gray

Children's Books | Fiction | Libraries | Young Adult Books

posted on Friday, January 04, 2008 5:20:12 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)  #    Comments [3]

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