Week 7 Prompt - Book Controversies

Thinking about book controversies, last summer's publication of Go Set A Watchman comes first to mind. In the five months between the announcement of the discovery of a second Harper Lee manuscript and its publication, the biggest news in publishing became a frequent discussion topic among colleagues and patrons.

Did the author really want this book published, or was she manipulated by associates motivated by greed? Is Atticus really a racist? After doing a bit of my own research, particularly reading a detailed Bloomberg article (Suddath), I felt that publication truly was not the author's decision, and for that reason alone I initially planned to skip this title.

 But the more I heard people saying they would refuse to read it, more often because they didn't want to spoil their reverence for To Kill A Mockingbird than from concern about Lee's state of mind, I decided I needed to read it to form my own opinion. Since reader's advisory is part of my job, skipping the biggest book of the year seemed short-sighted.

So, I listened to the audiobook (since I was able to get it on release day), at first a bit distracted by the very recognizable voice of Reese Witherspoon, but my mind soon stopped "seeing" the actress and began "hearing" Scout as an adult. For me, the flashbacks to Scout's younger years are the best written sections and I can see why Harper Lee's editor urged her to write about Scout as a child. Other sections seemed rushed and disjointed, as you'd expect from an unedited manuscript. I understood some of the character's actions, particularly as viewed through the eyes of an adult Scout, but ultimately I don't think the novel was finished.

As a reader, I'm not sorry I read Watchman, but I will always wonder if the author truly wanted her early, unpolished work shared with the world and how she might have ultimately shaped the characters, particularly Atticus, had she fully prepared the novel for publication.

As a librarian, I'm very glad I set skeptisism aside and read the book. I've had numerous conversations with patrons, many of whom ask me almost under their breath, if I've read the book. When I tell them yes, why I decided to read it, and what I thought, many smile with relief and check it out. Apparently all the controversy made a number of them feel they shouldn't read it. In fact, several have come back to say they're glad they picked it up. I'm sorry so many felt they needed "permission" to do so.


References:

HarperCollins Publishers. (2015, February 3). Recently Discovered Novel From Harper Lee, Author of To Kill A Mockingbird [Press release]. Retrieved from http://corporate.harpercollins.com/us/press-releases/425/RECENTLY DISCOVERED NOVEL FROM HARPER LEE, AUTHOR OF TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

 Suddath, C. (2015, July 9). What Does Harper Lee Want? Retrieved from http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-harper-lee-go-set-a-watchman/ 

Journey to Munich - Jacqueline Winspear

Journey to Munich

by Jacqueline Winspear

Genre: Mystery

Setting: London, Munich

Time Period: 1938

Series: Maisie Dobbs, #12

Publication: HarperCollins; 1st edition, March 29, 2016

Synopsis: Psychologist, investigator, nurse, and spy Maisie Dobbs returns to London in early 1938, after tending to the wounded of the Spanish Civil War. She steels herself to confront memories of happier times before she suffered devastating personal losses. But instead of settling back into her former life, she is swiftly recalled to duty in the British Secret Service for a brief but dangerous mission.

Posing as the daughter of a British businessman and inventor, she sets out to retrieve the man imprisoned in Dachau. Forced to confront Nazi officials who have promised to release her "father," her task is complicated by other intelligence agents, someone who played a role in the death of Maisie's husband, and the urgent need to leave Germany swiftly while she still can.

This twelfth title of the Maisie Dobbs mystery series sets the spunky investigator on the path of further suspenseful adventures with a second world war looming, even as Maisie and her contemporaries are still coping with the fallout of the first.

Appeal:

Suspenseful

Character-driven

Leisurely-paced
Historically detailed

Genre Characteristics:

Series Character

Historical Setting

Puzzle to Solve

Read-A-Likes:

An Unwilling Accomplice - Charles Todd

Character-driven, leisurely-paced mystery set in London during World War I, part of a series featuring Bess Crawford, a battlefield nurse who solves mysteries.

Mr. Churchill's Secretary - Susan Elia MacNeal

Character-driven, leisurely-paced mystery set in London during World War II, first in a series of spy mysteries featuring mathematician and code breaker Maggie Hope.

A Fine Summer's Day - Charles Todd

Character-driven, leisurely-paced mystery set in 1914 London on the eve of World War I, featuring Ian Rutledge, Scotland Yard detective.

The Care and Management of Lies - Jacqueline Winspear
Historical fiction examining the effect of World War I on a young British couple, their friends and family.

Week 6 Prompt - Promoting Romance Titles

Romance Display Proposal

For our next theme display on the smaller table between new fiction and recent best sellers, I propose that we give a little promotional love to the romance genre. A well-chosen romance display could draw our patrons who routinely look for their next reads on our display tables to stop and consider some romance titles. This could be especially effective for our voracious readers who always are looking for something new. At the same time, regular romance readers who typically pass by the display tables and head straight for the romance shelves will likely stop to browse a display of their favorite and familiar genre and may then be enticed to check out the adjacent best seller tables.

Sign: Put a Little Love in Your Life

Titles for Display: Pull recent titles by popular romance authors, including books by some popular authors that fit the romance category but are cataloged under fiction, such as Susan Elizabeth Phillips. To highlight the full range of our collection, the display also should include relevant audiobooks, as this format is very popular with our patrons. Displayed DVDs could include Love, Rosie; The Longest Ride, and Brooklyn, alongside the book versions. Our classic film DVDs also should be scanned for romantic titles appropriate for the display.

Half-sheet flyers featuring some of the newest e-book and e-audio romance titles on Overdrive and directing patrons to Overdrive directions and the availability of tech appointments should be available on the display table, along with Hoopla bookmarks. 

Rather than relegating romance to the first two weeks of February leading up to Valentines Day, this display featuring a popular genre would work well for spring. In addition to the display sign, a few artificial or paper flowers could be scattered among the display items for visual interest.

Kirkus-Style Review - The Astronaut Wives Club

The Astronaut Wives Club
A True Story

by Lily Koppel

Review
Announcing selection of the original astronauts, NASA enlisted not just seven men, but also their spouses and children, in a bold venture to prove American superiority in the face of the Cold War.

America's space race, launched as a competition to beat the Soviets to the moon, was both a technological and public relations project. Public interest in every aspect of the astronaut families' lives, stoked by contracts with Life magazine, meant extreme pressure on the wives to project the model of perfect family life, no matter what the state of their marriage. Whatever was going on at home -- infidelity, serious illness of a child -- the astronaut wives were expected to do their patriotic duty by publicly declaring they were "proud, thrilled and happy."  Realizing only their sisters in the space program could fully understand the chaotic, demanding life they were living, the wives band together to weather the loneliness, fear, and public scrutiny foisted upon them by their husbands' careers. Much like a family, the women do not always agree with one another, but they rally for support when any one is facing extreme challenges, particularly the "death watch" of each mission and the too frequent tragedy of sudden death of a spouse. Just as the country is grappling with societal changes in the 1960s, the rewards and expectations of the astronaut wives evolve with subsequent "generations" as the astronaut corps expands in preparation for Gemini and Apollo flights. With the addition of the New Nine (1962), the Fourteen (1963) and the Nineteen (1966), much of the camaraderie of the original group is lost as all of the wives cannot even recognize, let alone know one another, yet they remain members of a small and unique sisterhood.

The unique experiences of the astronaut wives is a compelling story but this rendition, with no citations beyond a breezy four-page acknowledgment, and the curious-for-non-fiction subtitle "a true story," often feels like a collection of interesting information in search of a more effectively organized narrative.


Pub Date: June 11, 2013
Page Count: 384pp
ISBN: 978-1-4555-0325-4
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Week 5 R.A. Prompt

Based on the provided reviews, A Billionaire's First Christmas is definitely not romantic suspense, as the reviewers refute virtually every characteristic of that genre. In fact, even for romance the reviews make the story sound quite cozy. While the Amazon reviewer reveals her bias toward the holiday subgenre, "I do love a good Christmas romance," her review strikes me as more reliable since her personal comments don't overwhelm her assessment of the book. The blogger's review is all over the place with too much personal detail (her travel plans, two mentions of reading on New Year's Eve) and even incomplete sentences. Overall, the too casual tone makes me discount this review. As for buying this title, holiday fiction circs well at our branch, so if I were buying for this genre, I'd consider how many new titles were available for the season from perennially popular writers such as Debbie Macomber, Nancy Thayer, and Elin Hildebrand. If we had money and room to add a few more, I'd probably buy this title. A lot of our patrons, even those who often read literary fiction, tell me they take a break and only read light titles in December and this would seem to fit perfectly -- the author's name is even Holly!

Turning to the Angela's Ashes reviews, they present a compelling case that this is a "must buy, must read" book. For me, the Kirkus Review paints the most engaging description of the book, introducing the reader to the author and his family members with details of their difficult lives that manage to make delving further into this seemingly sad tale seem like the only logical choice. Who wouldn't want to know more about how the author "magically retrieves love, dignity, and humor from a childhood of hunger, loss, and pain"?  Since I did read this book years ago, it's difficult to set aside my personal opinion that Frank McCourt's incredible ability to write so honestly about his horrific childhood makes Angela's Ashes a classic memoir.

In choosing books for monthly book talks and displays at work, and for my own reading, I skim through reviews on a regular basis. While I know not to expect a critical view from sources like BookPage, positive review publications do provide summaries that are useful in sorting through new titles to develop a list of titles worth looking at more closely. An extended BookPage article about Dean Koontz' Ashley Bell prompted me to put it on my "to read" list and I enjoyed the book but probably would not have read it without that article. The monthly LibraryReads and Indie Next lists understandably include positive comments from the librarians or book sellers who have recommended a particular title. I use sources of positive only reviews as an abstract of new titles,  then seek out more critical reviews for books that I am considering for recommendation to our monthly group as I know participants will want to know more about the book's strengths and weaknesses. It does seem unfortunate that some titles are favorably and prominently reviewed in multiple publications while other worthwhile books go virtually unnoticed, but the ease of accessing online information can mitigate the imbalance a bit. Overall I can almost always find useful information on a title I'm considering.

Reader's Advisory Secret Shopper

I recently visited the main library of a three-location system to "secret shop" the library's reader's advisory service. I had never been to this location before.

The circulation desk sits just inside the entryway. No patrons were at the desk when I entered, I made eye-contact with the staff member at the desk but she did not speak. Moving further into the library I found the adult fiction section, then passing through a casual seating area with a new book display, I saw a "Reference and Information" desk, located between the non-fiction shelves and the patron computer area.

Two staff members were seated at the desk. I approached the nearest work station, was greeted by the librarian and I asked if I was in the right place for assistance with questions about fiction. She said she would try and asked what I was looking for. I told her I was looking for suggestions for a new book to read as I enjoyed the last one so much I didn't want to be disappointed with the next. She asked for the title of that book and I told her A Man Called Ove.

She entered the title in her computer and said, "by Fredrik Backman?" and I said yes. "We have a database to do that," she replied and started searching. Her reference to "a database to do that" led me to suspect she was using Novelist, which was confirmed at the end of our interaction. Copies of the library's three-month calendar of activities were displayed in front of her computer and I picked one up and started leafing through it, mainly for something to do other than stare at the top of her head while she worked away on the computer. I did look up frequently from the brochure in order to facilitate any further discussion of my reading tastes, since the reader's advisory interview had been so brief.

There were no further questions, however. For the next several minutes the librarian typed away on her computer, between answering the phone once and leaving her work station four times to answer questions about and assist with the patron computers and printer. As a patron, if she had said, "please excuse me, I'll be right back," I would not have been bothered by her multi-tasking. As an "undercover" library staff member, I cringed when she repeatedly stepped away without making eye contact or saying anything to me. Our service desk protocol includes briefly acknowledging anyone who comes to the desk while we are helping someone else, but immediately returning our full attention to the initial patron. We also do not answer the phone in the middle of a patron interaction. I recognize other libraries operate differently, but I did start to feel a bit uncomfortable just standing at the desk while she tended to several other requests.

After about five minutes she presented me with a Novelist printout of read alikes for A Man Called Ove. Looking at the list, I discovered the purpose of all the typing. She had looked up each of the nine titles listed and marked them as available, available at another branch, or not owned by the library. She did not ask if any of the books looked interesting, or if I knew where to find adult fiction, or if I had any other questions. She also did not offer to have any of the titles available at other branches sent to this location if I preferred. Based on descriptions of fruitful reader's advisory interviews in our readings, she missed virtually all of the recommended elements, other than using resources (Novelist) rather than relying solely on her own reading experience.

Reviewing the list there are two books I'd explore further, one I've already read and several I'd never consider, based on my knowledge of the authors. Overall I'd describe the interaction as very business-like and, as a patron, I'd likely not return for more reader's advisory assistance, unless I didn't really like a lot of chit-chat and was happy with the Novelist suggestions.

Based on the perfunctory reader's advisory interview and lack of booklists or displays promoting portions of the collection, I'd guess that reader's advisory is not a priority, nor have staff been trained to be knowledgable of and comfortable with making book recommendations. The staff member was polite and business-like, but did not engage in a true reader's advisory experience.