I'm a Librarian!

Library in Aspen

Well, technically, not yet, but still! I need to pass the physical... I wonder what that entails?
In the meantime, while I am going through the process, I went on a trip to Colorado to climb rocks, hike mountains, bike historic rail routes, tube and paddle board down Glenwood Canyon (then bike back up it), sit in hot sulfur springs and of course, visit libraries. I like to see what types of buildings are used for libraries, what services are being offered and best of all, what books inhabit their new material shelves.

Here is a list of titles I'll be looking up soon in order of when I discovered them:

• The Year of the Flood by M. Atwood after Oryx and Crake
• Da vinci's Ghost by Lester 
• High-Tech, High-Touch Customer Service by Solomon 
• Floating Worlds: The letters of Edward Garey & Peter e. Neumeyer 
• Just Send Me Word by Figes
• Tyranny of the Textbook by Jobrack 
• the Voluntourist by Budd
• Queen of America by Urrea
• Book of Madness and Cures by O'Melveny
• Lone Wolf by Picoult

• Absolution by Flannery
• Liberator by Harland (teen)
• Rash by Hautman (teen)
• Unwind by Shusterman (teen)
• Among the enemy by Haddix (teen)
• Americus by Hill (graphic novel)
• Wonderland by Kovac (GN)
• Permaculture Handbook by Bane
• Handy Dad in the Great Outdoors by Davis
• Rust by Mars
• Hitchers by McIntosh
• Men in Space by McCarthy
• Taliban Cricket Club by Murari
• Second Person Singular by Kashua and Ginsburg

I didn't get any pictures of the Denver library exterior, but here's some cool stuff I found inside:

 Lost? Can't find your book? Don't know what floor you're on, much less which floor you need to go to or where the escalator is?

Pick up one of the many phones at the Central branch of the Denver Public Library and ask a librarian!

Love it.

So here's a unique concept... instead of staff recommendations or at least along with them, recommendations by users of the library! We go from experts to community.

There were several other browsing topics like this such as the "We Live" which had health, personal safety and genealogy sections and "We Explore" for travel in and around Colorado.


Finally, some cool posters. I love the idea behind the digitization service and the blue poster is just really cool use of typography.

Juliet, Naked

I had a post interview followup (which reminds me, I need to send a thank you card) call with one of the members of the interview panel in which I let slip that "honestly, I read more children and teen fiction than adult fiction."

"Yes, that seems to be the trend."

My response, "The quality of adult writing just isn't any good."

It's hard to say a statement like that because it dismisses all adult fiction in one lump. Perhaps it is better to say, "popular fiction," but even then, I enjoyed the clear, direct writing of Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris (up until the point she describes the vampires getting aroused at the sight of one of their kind getting killed and the main character's lover-vamp "plows her into the ground"), although I won't be reading any of the remaining books in the series, because a look through the synopsis shows it is more or less the same plot over and over again and how can a character who professes to love another character within days or weeks of meeting then go on to become the lover of a nemesis or some other fellow, while completely ignoring the guy next door who may very well be pining for her through eleven books?

Anyway, the point of this is to say that I read Nick Hornby's Juliet, Naked, which I was putting off because I didn't want to read a book by the author of High Fidelity, which I didn't read either, but saw the movie and saw that the movie was literary in ways at the age when I saw it I wasn't ready to appreciate. And so, Juliet, Naked is a good book to disprove my above assessment of adult fiction.

And disproves it in a better way that Ann Patchet's State of Wonder, which I wanted to like because everyone else liked it and because it was a bestseller and because I was supposed to like it, but just fell short and completely betrayed itself twice by switching once from plot to character and then in the final chapter back to plot. I was so aggravated by the Hollywood-ran-out-of-budget ending that I turned around and read the Hunger Games trilogy three times.

The Reader's Advisory says to look at the blurbs on the books for info for read alikes to see if any other authors or titles are mentioned, but the blurbs on my copy only refer to Hornby. I don't know how to describe the book better than "subtle," which is the very adjective I was searching for when I saw it on the back cover describing Hornby the writer. I laughed at the dialogue, I loved the development of the characters and their emotional evolution. And maybe that's why I prefer teen/children fiction: because so much of adult fiction, including State of Wonder, doesn't address the evolution of an adult's emotional/spiritual/personal being in that cathartic, realistic way that the book the Uses of Enchantment says is so pivotal to children's books. I guess I've been looking for books that address my evolution as an adult and found few books taking it seriously and just focusing on the sex.

Or maybe I just identified with the main character who so desperately wanted to have sex because she is a woman who wants to live, but who wanted her partner to be someone she'd be happy to wake up next to the next morning, even if he's got serious inner conflict of choosing to be an artist over being a parent. And I just didn't get that with Sookie or Dr. Marina Singh. So thanks, Nick Hornby, for writing a book that looks honestly at being an adult. I always liked your column Stuff I've Been Reading in the Believer.

Moyer's Eight Steps to Reader's Advisory

Another tool to beef up my Reader's Advisory skills is to create a journal or log and follow Jessica E. Moyer's How to Read a Book in Ten Minutes: Eight Easy Steps*:

1. Start with the cover: all the colors, images, and text on the cover are meant to convey a message. These elements are critical in the publisher’s marketing of the book and can tell a reader a lot. What does the cover tell you about the book?
1. Do the cover images look like they are aimed at a particular sex or age?
2. Is the cover image off-putting to its intended audience or obviously dated?
3. Does it give you an idea of the potential readership or genre?
4. What does the cover say about the author? Has he or she won any awards?
5. Is the author’s name or title in larger print? A very large name is a good clue that this author might be a best seller.
6. Is an unusual font or color used? Bright red text that drips like blood would be a good indication that this is a scary book.
2. Open the book and read the jacket blurb or the back cover or both.
1. What does the blurb or cover tell you about the book? Is a plot summary given? Is the book directly compared to any other books?
2. What about the author? Is a bio given or a list of previous books?
3. What do other authors think of this book? Who are those authors? Use these to help you start making read-alike connections.
3. Flip to a random page. Check the typeface.
1. How easy is it to read?
2. Is the typeface better for younger or older readers?
3. Is there anything especially noticeable or unusual?
4. Is more than one typeface used?
5. Are there illustrations? Do they have captions or enhance the text? Do they add to the overall story? Are they an integral part of the story?
4. Check the physical characteristics.
1. Heft: Can readers easily carry the book? How big and heavy is it?
2. Will the intended audience be willing or able to hold the book and carry it around?
3. Is it hardcover or paperback or mass market?
4. Can the book be easily opened while reading?
5. Read a sample.
1. Read the first chapter. What happens at the very beginning? Which characters or what setting is introduced? How does the story start—with a description or with action?
2. Read some pages in the middle. Are the same characters or setting still present? What kinds of events are taking place? Is the text mostly dialogue or mostly description? How much white space is on the page?
3. Read the last chapter. How does the story end? Is the ending resolved? Left wide open? Left a little open with room for a sequel? Is it a cliffhanger that demands a sequel? Who is still alive/giving the final speech?
6. Consider the book’s appeal factors.
1. Pacing: How quickly are characters and plot revealed? Is there more dialogue or more description? Check for white space; the more dialogue, the more white space. Are there short sentences, short paragraphs, and short chapters? The shorter the sentences, chapters, and paragraphs, the faster it will read. Are there multiple plotlines, flashbacks, or different points of view, or does the book have a linear plot? Is the ending open or closed?
2. Frame: Is the background detailed or minimal? How is the book supposed to make the reader feel? Is a special background integral to understanding the story? Is the reader assumed to have certain types of knowledge—for example, subject information essential to full understanding or previous knowledge of the world in which the story takes place (e.g., books in a series)?
3. Story line: Does the story emphasize people or events? Is the focus interior/psychological or exterior/action? What is the author’s intent—serious versus light; comedy versus drama?
4. Characterization: Are characters fully developed or are they easily recognized types? Is the focus on a single character or on several who intertwine? Is characterization the most important aspect of the story? Are characters developed during the series or in one book? Are there memorable or important secondary characters?
5. What’s the most important or most dominant appeal factor?
7. Consider other factors.
1. Plot: What is the book actually about? Can you summarize the book in thirty seconds or less? If someone asked you, “What is this book about,” how would you respond?
2. Genre: Is the book part of a recognized genre? If so, which one? What about subgenre? Is it a genre blend? Does the book conform to genre formulas in terms of plot or characters, or does it break the rules?
3. Series: Is the book part of a series? First in a series? Must the other books in the series be read before this book, or does it stand alone? Based on the ending, how eager are readers going to be for the next one?
4. Author: Who is the author? What else has the author written? Does the author usually write in this genre, or is this a new direction for the writer? Is this book a return to a subject the author hasn’t written about for several years?
8. Using all the information gathered in the preceding questions, connect this book to other books.
1. What genre or subgenre might this book fit in?
2. What other books or authors share similar appeal factors?
3. What kind of reader might enjoy this book?

Moyer, J.E., & Stover, K. M., eds. (2010). The Reader's Advisory Handbook. American Library Association: Chicago, IL.

Infopeople Webinar: Digital Preservation: Audio and Video Formats

So in taking a moment to beef up my site, I wandered over the the Infopeople.org website to see what was new and found that they had archived in the webinar section four presentations on Digital Preservation:

• Fundamentals
• Text and Image Formats
• Storing and Managing Digital Collections
• Audio and Video Formats

I just happened to click into the Audio and Video presentation. Key info:

• preservation format should be in WAV and probably in BWV (broadcast wave)
• resolution (96) kilohertz and (24)bit-depth capture is going to be beyond the "limits of human hearing" and while you may ask, why should I capture outside those limits, you may have a collection of animal song (birds, whales) which is outside of human recognition
• video as compared to film is generally captured on "unstable formats" and so digital transfer is a given for video preservation