Lost but not always forgotten

I hope you had a chance to read the article in Sunday's Globe (Metro Section) about the most frequently lost books at Boston Public Library. As a librarian who has worked in the field - well sometimes it feels like since Dewey introduced his decimal system - I am only too familiar with libraries and lost books/movies/music.

Most loss is due to folks just never returning the item. Why don't they? There are so many possible reasons - people move suddenly, the individual sadly passes away and whoever is emptying the house isn't particularly mindful, the item was damaged or lost while the person had it. In prior jobs, there have been house fires, floods, people who left it behind when on vacation in Europe, left it on the train/subway/plane. And then, life gets in the way and the situation never gets resolved, or the person is too embarrassed to admit to the loss. We are all too human.

Sometimes, folks don't return the item because they think they will owe fabulous amounts of money in overdues. There is a Jerry Seinfeld episode (this is just one clip of many you can find on Youtube from this episode) on that - very funny, but no doubt detrimental to libraries everywhere. Because the reality is is that there is always a stopping point for fines - either a set fee ($5.00 or $10.00) or the cost of the book. Libraries in general are not trying to be punitive - they just want the item back for others to enjoy.

My favorite interaction with someone that 'lost' an item was a young girl who came up to me and told me she didn't plan to return the video she had out - she liked it too much. And sometimes that is exactly the reason - the person just like the book, movie, whatever so much they keep it - in spite of there being so many options for purchasing even a used copy.

We don't see much of this kind of loss here in Salem. Folks in general bring the item back or pay for the loss willingly. It's a nice thing about Salem.

So I am sure you are wondering what are our most frequently lost books here in Salem. I have to say that in general, the loss is scattered throughout our collection. As the person who decides about replacing lost items, there aren't any contenders that leap to mind. I see more replacement due to damage (I've talked about that previously) or wear. And since reading the Globe article (and you can find the article here at the library), the books that come to mind are the Big Nate books by Lincoln Pierce and the Wimpy Kid books by Jeff Kinney. I have replaced a lot of worn out copies of books in both series. But its a good thing - we like to see books read to pieces because so many people love them. That's what libraries are here to support.

What's the next one?

We work hard as librarians to make the library user friendly for our community, keeping personal preferences on the back burner. So I was particularly thrilled when one of our staff came to me a while back to tell me about another library that was adding the series number on the book to make it easy to find the right title. I realized my days of looking at the list in the beginning of the book, trying to decide if the list was ordered new to old or old to new were finally over. We added the plan to our ongoing list and we have been working the past few months to make it happen. Check out our newsletter for details.

Creating series is a hot thing in the book world, whether it is a mystery/thriller, science fiction/fantasy, or romance. It keeps readers coming back for more. At the same time, it creates quite a challenge for librarians as we so often miss the first in a series just because it is a new author with little buzz. We have to play catch up as so many of our readers are determined to read series in order, no if, ands or buts!

And if that isn't enough, publishers are now cross-pollinating series - main characters from 2 of an authors series meet in a very special book. We then face the challenge of which series to include it in.

But the most challenging for us and for readers is when the publisher and/or author decides to renumber the series. A recent example is the popular Magic Tree House series. There is a subseries that originally was part of the original numbered series that they have now decided to separate and renumber. But what if someone asks for number X of the original series, that now has some totally different number? Do we keep the old number? Embrace the new and find some way to easily refer back to the old number. Reminds me of when highways renumber exits: Exit 299 (formerly Exit 13). How do we make sure we make this all simple and seamless for the user.

Well, we opt for simplicity and consistency. Cross-pollinating series? We put the title into the more established "popular" series. Renumbering? We move to the new numbering, renumber the old, and have a nice reference chart on hand. With some luck we have achieved an easy path to follow for our readers.

Serendipity

Serendipity - there is a word you don't hear very often anymore. It's a lovely sounding word, and it tends to describe a positive sort of event. I'm not sure why words fall out of use. I'll have to look into that further.

But right now I wanted to share a particularly serendipitous experience we had at the library. As you may know, we have been working on the bathrooms in the Children's Room and in the process, needed to change the toilet drains from a wall mount to a floor mount (I know TMI). That required some significant repiping - and here was our serendipitous moment. In the process of reconfiguration, the plumbers discovered a small leak. Yes there was some less that appealing clean-up work to be done, but I believe this was a serendipitous moment of the first order. The thought of what might have been the result if the leak went on undetected . . .

So in the process of making some much needed upgrades in the bathrooms, we were able to prevent a truly awful, if not offal, disaster!

So that all has slowed down the finishing touches in the bathrooms, but they should be ready by the end of next week. I will be interested to hear what you think of the changes.

Who Knew?

One of the many great, unexpected outcomes of our project moving away from the Dewey Decimal System is being able to look at our books in an entirely new way.

My favorite is the "Who Knew" collection. As we went through the collection identifying the right topic for each, we found a number of books that defied categorization. They were all great books and we wanted to be able to highlight them in some way. After many months of discussion and creative thinking, we decided to try "Who Knew". When we evaluated these books, our consistent reaction was just that.

We just purchased a book that will end up in that collection - and it is guaranteed to make you say this. I promise. The book is The Secret Lives of Color, by Kassia St. Clair. This is a really fascinating book that tells how different shades of color got their name. The book is arranged by color, and the entries are quick, clear, and attention grabbing. Who knew that Shocking Pink got it's name from a young woman who had a bit of a reputation for being shocking and she loved this shade? Who knew Fuchsia is named after the plant that was named for a botanist?

So consider browsing through this book. You don't really need to be all that interested in color, the information in the book is just really interesting - and a great bit of trivia for impressing people at work or at a party. You can reserve it here.

But you can say that about all the books in the "Who Knew". Cool books, cool information, books you probably overlooked, but shouldn't. Give it a try - I promise you won't regret it.

Suggestions, recommendations and ideas

I have talked often about changes we are doing around the library, and it is always our intent that these changes will be an improvement. At the same time, we are always happy to hear ideas, suggestions, and recommendations from our users. The customer's point of view is key for seeing the need for improvements, and how better to see things from the customer's POV than to hear directly from you.

In reality some of our greatest improvements have come from complaints from our users. That might seem counter-intuitive, but it still is a fact. Complaints tend to highlight one of our blindspots, and so make us see something in a fresh ways.

So, we are saying that we welcome your input - after it is our goal to make the library what you are looking for, and so need your thoughts to achieve that goal. So drop me a line (abaker@kelleylibrary.org) or stop by for a chat and share your ideas.

A Meandering Path

I was browsing the internet this morning looking for inspiration for this blog. As always, I started with one topic and just by clicking random links that looked interesting, I strayed far from my initial search. It wasn't a waste as I learned something along the way - some valuable, some not so much.

But that reminded be of a similar experience while I was doing some book repairs. It is always interesting to see the varying and far-flung array of titles that end up on my mending shelf. And I peek through them - reading a picture book here, dipping into a non-fiction title, marking down an interesting fiction title to follow up on later. But yesterday it was a large format book on the filming of Star Wars. The repair needed was towards the back, and as I was adding the needed glue, I realized that the photo was of the whole special effects team for the movie. Much to my delight, there was John Van Vliet - a high school classmate and an FX professional. After work, that lead me to catching up with some old HS friends.

This meandering link leading ever further along can be done easily on-line, but just as rewardingly with books. I vividly remember reading a fiction book some years ago that included someone with cancer, and another character researching a disaster in Canada. It lead me to do some research on cancer treatment following up on the challenges living through cancer treatment. But more rewarding was following the disaster in Canada thread. First I did some online research about the Halifax Explosion of 1917 - the largest man-made explosion pre-atomic era. That lead me to a fascinating book - I can't remember the title and looking today I found so many possibilities! (And one that is coming out in November - check for it on our shelves then). But such fascinating information about an event, a location, and results that I had no clue about. And to top it off, I found out why Canada supplied a Christmas tree each year since 1917 to Boston. (Though I believe they just stopped that? - I will have to do a bit of research on that). It was in thanks for all the help Boston sent to Halifax after the disaster.

I came across a quote recently about life being like dominoes - and I have always found reading to be like that. One book leads to another in some way or other, which leads to another, and before you know it you are far from the first point, and all the richer intellectually for it.

Best Laid PLans

There is that famous quote about plans often going awry - and this summer has been daily proof of that for us here at the library.

We are delighted to welcome 3 new employees here at the library - be sure to take a moment to meet them when you stop in. At the same time, we lost a valued employee to retirement, several others moved into new positions at the library - a real shake up. So we planned for all this. We thought. Then came the awry. One of our employees required emergency surgery and is out for months. So we scrambled to create a new plan to handle that. Then others on the staff had some health issues which opened some more holes. We are feeling a bit like that cartoon character trying to plug multiple holes in the dike.

We are now planning for the new operating hours starting September 5th. And we are hoping that these plans may remain secure. If not, we certainly are familiar with thinking on our feet at this point.

But in any challenging situation there is always a positive. In this case, we found that our staff are great folks that are ready to rise to the occasion. We discovered some wonderful qualities in staff members that never had an opportunity to really shine before. We have discovered that we can weather problems (knock on wood).

So my apologies for any erratic service, or more than average errors. Hopefully, as we move forward, our best laid plans will ensure we give you the great library service we work hard to provide.