Collection Reflection

Ebook articles abound! From the Digital Shift:  All Hat, No Cattle: A Call for Libraries to Transform Before It's Too Late . Jamie LaRue outlines four streams of e-content that libraries need to address: mainstream commercial publishing, independent and midlist publishing, local history, and self-publishing. And as for stealing profit from the front list, "we don’t steal sales; we generate them." Ebooks now outsell hardcover print books . A few articles about Penguin's deal with two New York library systems to offer ebooks on a limited basis: Libraries Cut Ebook Deal with Penguin Penguin to Pilot Library E-Book Lending Program in New York, Windowing Front-List Titles In other news:  Why Amazon's Rumored Retail Bookstore Will Be Huge From the Atlantic , The Incredible Resilience of Books . Although I'm not sure who's going around suggesting that the written word is going to become obsolete? Reading Rainbow is back! As an app!? There a...

Robin wrote a post about collection development over at Heroes & Heartbreakers! My favorite quote: One of the easiest things mark off the list are popular books. Is there any library that will take a pass on the new Nora Roberts? It could be in hardcover, trade paper, mass market, or exclusively on a SIM card, with military grade digital encryption, we’d still buy it. 

Hey Collection Reflectors! It's our birthday today.  One year ago, the first post went up and things have really taken off from there.  We've talked about a host of different topics from the start of the library materials cycle (or where we find stuff to buy) to the end. (how we decide what to weed)  We've talked about donations , statistics , mistakes (my personal favorite), and  audiobooks.   We've had guests posts , things that seemed like good ideas at the time , and  author interviews about the intersection of books and libraries on specific topics. And, of course, you've Clicked My Link at least a dozen times. If I have one thing I would like to see more of in Year 2, it would be more author interviews. Who doesn't like talking to (and reading about) authors and books? What kinds of things do YOU want to see from Collection Reflection going forward? We want to hear what you think about: the blog, collection development, authors, libraries, ...

Patron: "Do you have any GED books?" Librarian: "Uh, mayyyyybe, let me check. Sorry, not right now. Can I put one on hold for you?" Replace "GED" with books on witchcraft or sex; titles by Stephen King or Sister Souljah's  The Coldest Winter   Ever ; memoirs like A Child Called "It " ; almost any popular DVD you can name, especially horror films; rock and rap CDs . . . this interaction plays itself out with depressing regularity. A quick check of the catalog shows that my library (just this building, not any of the branches or the extensive network we belong to) has purchased 26 copies of The Coldest Winter Ever , all but three of which have disappeared from the collection. They've been stolen, lost, or taken home and never returned. Each time we purchase one of these items new (in paperback) and process it for circulation to the public, the cost is around $8.00, meaning that we've spent over $200 just to keep one book on the shelf...

Don't lose an author's manuscript. Jose Saramago novel published after 59 years. Ann Patchett's Bel Canto to be an Opera An interview with SF/F author Patrick Rothfuss A little Reader's Advisory: If you like.....a very specific kind of urban fantasy Get your rare book on: ABE lists the top sellers (price) in Feb 2012. Star Wars Yoga. (oh, click it. you know you wanna.) Happy Monday.

Today's guest post comes to us from that rare breed (around here): an academic librarian. ____ This may be the understatement of the month (and in the running for understatement of the year), but collection development works a little differently at college and university libraries than it does at public libraries. In some ways, the library where I work has a foot in both camps, since we’re semi-rural and miles away from the nearest public library. This dichotomy is especially obvious when you examine one part of the Hiram College Library I manage: the children’s literature collection. Being in charge of our kid lit section presents a lot of challenges, but the biggest one is that the collection has to serve multiple masters. Master #1: It needs to be appealing to school-aged children. There’s been a lot of faculty turnover recently – due to retirement, mostly – so quite a few of our professors have young families. Master #2: It needs to be appealing to our students...

Publishing's Ecosystem on the Brink  -- reading this makes you wonder WHY publishers are turning away from libraries.  New Pelecanos novel lands in the Top 50 . (Part interesting new marketing scheme, part gratuitous advertising for one of my fave authors.) Paretsky on Nurturing her Female Private Eye . The Power of Paper in the Digital Era . Have some AAP numbers  (it's probably just about what you'd imagine, except Religion is up in all formats!) Charles Dickens at 200 and the corresponding list from Library Journal. The World of Dickens: Photos of locations described in his books . Red Box tells Warner Bros where it can go with its hold for rental policy. The Elsevier boycott seems to be making an impact . Potter and Twilight feed generation's "Hunger" for fantasy lit  (except......there has always been a hunger for fantasy lit. For every generation...)  Bernhard Schlink would like to be paid for the movie adaptation of The Reader . ...