Collection Reflection

Ruth Rendell: the peer who never stops plotting Literary Labours Lent -- offered without comment.  But feel free to leave YOUR comments. Ebook Choices and the Soul of Librarianship  Rita and Golden Heart award winners .  Congrats!  Secret world of romance writers .  (not so secret) "Reading racy titles under cover of e-books"   The media just can NOT let this go. Colson Whitehead's Tips for Writing.   20 years of Goosebumps.  Happy Monday!

Leah White talks about building an adult graphic novel collection . Librarians anticipate the next great reads iDreamBooks Applies Rotten Tomatoes Model to Book Reviews A loooong New Republic article on the Bookless Library . English Teacher: " I was wrong about ' Hunger Games '." This sounds way more like a tabloid article than it ought to, but the basic point is that The Art of Fielding  is no more "literary" than the Collins trilogy. From the Guardian ,  Crime Fiction: Evidence Points to a Clash in Genres : Some big names in detective fiction argue that their novels are closer to the fantastical genres--science fiction, fantasy and horror--than many had suspected. The bestselling Sci-Fi books of all time . Not sure how Lord of the Rings  ends up on this list. Just For Fun : From PWxyz, Ugly Covers for Great Books . Don't you want to see what people are reading on the New York subway ?

You may have heard of a movie releasing this weekend about a certain Caped Crusader.  After you've seen it (and, if you're like me, seen it AGAIN ), you'll be looking for something to keep the superhero buzz going until the next movie.   Fear not, the library is here to fill the need. "A Movie in Your Mind."  Graphic Audio takes on audiobooks in a whole new way.  They are full cast, complete with sound effects that sound incredibly real.  More than once, I've thought a siren in the audio was about to pull me over.  For an immediate post-DKR Batman fix, try.... Batman: Inferno   Batman: The Stone King Batman: No Man's Land Pt. 1 and Pt. 2 Batman: Dead White If you're ready to upgrade to the full Justice League, we also have Crisis on Infinite Earths , Infinite Crisis Pt. 1 and Pt. 2 , 52  Pt. 1 and Pt. 2 , Trail of Time , Exterminators , and individual stories featuring Green Lan...

The Bookless Library iDreamBooks -- identifying "good" books based on critics reviews. Getting Freaky with Edith Wharton The Fifty Shades bump for classical music . The Guardian talks 5 books that will make you cry . Enter (more) Sandman . NPR talks crime in Rhode Island . Scaninavia's Crime Lords: Stockholm's Salomonsson Agency Larry McMurtry and "The Last Book Sale" (whoa!)       2012 ITW Thriller Awards as reported by Library Journal Winners of the Shirley Jackson award as reported by SF Signal Eisner award winners as reported by EW.com Science Fiction: Why it's a must read for IT pros Whew! And, just because SF Signal loves you, check out the Firefly reunion panel from SDCC .  (this is just one reason why I love *them*)    

So, Anna tells me that someone came to the blog looking for audiobook publishers who were similar to GraphicAudio in style.  I talked about my love for GraphicAudio in May 2011 , and it is still one of our most popular posts. I hope that translated into lots of new customers, because I really do love their stuff (and I want them to stay in business!) But, here is another good place to find similar audiobooks: Big Finish.  Big Finish is a British production company that makes audio productions similar to what you will find at GraphicAudio: multiple cast members, great sound effects, and high enjoyment. They specialize in SF/F based on tv shows, so expect to find Dr. Who , Stargate , Highlander , along with Big Finish Classics , drama, comedy and many other series. I bought Stargate for the library, just to see how they would do, and they've done pretty well. Because those are one disc, and are packaged in DVD type cases, they often were missed by the patrons looking f...

At ALA last week, I participated in a panel called "The Great Non-Fiction Readalike: If You Like This, You'll LOVE That," which featured readalike recommendations in different subject areas based on carefully chosen "touchstone" books. What does reader's advisory have to do with collection development? Good collection development requires a librarian to look ahead in the publication schedule and figure out what books patrons will need and want, based on the library's collection policies, patron requests, past demand, and intuition. Reader's advisory uses many of the same skills to match up patrons and books; the two processes are part of the same continuum of collection management and customer service. Ideally, patrons should end up checking out books they want to read and know that they can come back to the library for similar books. What we were trying to address with the panel was a perception among librarians that it is somehow more difficult...