Book Nook: Something Different

I know that I usually post a review of the book I've recently finished but I have to admit that this week I've been behind in my reading,  *Gasp*.  I'm in the middle of several books, but none far enough to give a good review of anything.  Instead I thought I would let you know about what has been taking me away from my reading time.

The library is in the process of writing a grant for the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners, meaning I've been doing a lot of writing and research lately. The grant is for a Reader's Advisory program to train our staff here at the library to be more knowledgeable about the types of books we offer, how to suggest new titles to you, and generally making your experience in the library more enjoyable.  

"What does that really mean?" you might be asking.  Well to give you an example, many of you probably know that the library organizes the fiction alphabetically but we also have stickers on some of the books to mark Mysteries or Science Fiction, but how hard is it to find a book you want to read if you don't like either of those genres?  One of our plans is to better label the fiction books to have more categories like Romance, Westerns, Historical Fiction, and Classics to help people who like to browse identify the books they want with more ease.  My favorite part of being a librarian is being able to help patrons when I get the question "Can you recommend a good book to me?"  Yes, yes I can and I want to be able to share that experience with my coworkers.  Soon you will be able to ask anyone in the library "can you recommend a book" and we'll all be able to give you our personal favorites, an unbiased choice, and maybe something that you didn't even know you would enjoy.

Everything doesn't have to be hands on at the library.  We also want to create a web component that can be accessed 24-7.  Some of the websites include:

Kent District Library's What's Next : This website is great for finding out what comes next in a series or what else an author has written.

Stop, You're Killing Me : For all the mystery buffs out there, this breaks all mystery down by genre and you can search for authors, characters, series and more!

The Virtual Library and Databases at the Library.  There are two major databases we have, "Books and Authors" and "Novelist".  These can help you search for books by author, title and genre, but they can also help you identify what you enjoyed about a book, like character development, tone, setting, plot.

So hopefully you will start seeing more displays, more lists and more of us here at the library.  We are looking forward to helping you find your new favorite book, movie or soundrecording.