I follow The Daily Beast which is a great resource for for new titles, both those which look interesting, and those which look like they might be the next "hot" read. DB also contains in-depth articles and interviews, as well as significant sample excerpts. 

Create an adult fiction popular titles list for Randallstown in CollectionHQ and the titles and authors which appear are the typical bestsellers like Harlen Coben, Nora Roberts and whatever title is the hoppin' in the news, like Gone Girl. Unlike some other branches, African-American interest titles generate a lot of interest here and also show up on the popular list. EarlyWord is great to see what what's hot now, what's heating up, and I love the all the links to external sites (everything you ever wanted to know about books but were afraid to ask,) especially the Awards list/links. I visit EarlyWord regularly, but this training reminded me just how vast the site's resources are.

My guess for the summer's must read?  The Shining Girls is prominently placed on EarlyWord, The Huff Post's top 30 reads, and on The Daily Beast. Serial killers, time travel, psychologically creepy--sounds like a combo of perennial best-selling fast-paced thrillers with a dose of the literary. It could have a broad cross-appeal, and readers of the imaginitively written The Time Traveler's Wife and The Night Circus might be interested in it as readers of Nicci French or Harlen Coben.

Last week's assignment turned out to be more fun than I was anticipating. Even though I've been a goodreads member for a while, I'm not much of a listkeeper and rarely used it. Thanks to this training, I played around with some of goodread's tools and found a few which will be useful for reader's advisory at work, and some others that were interesting to me personally. Too much time was spent using the "compare books with a friend" feature  and sorting friends' books by their ratings, especially with all my *new* BCPL friends, and I found it easy to add new books using the "continuing rating more books" feature which brings up scads of suggestions.  I see as especially useful the general book lists and "readers who liked this book also liked" list associated with a specific title when a customer wants books suggestions based on a title he or she has read in the past.

Based on Rodney Campbells' goodreads lists of books, I recommeded he try The Feud which is a non-fiction choice about the most famous warring families in America...the Hatfields and the McCoys. Rod seems to enjoy both  true crime and history, as well as books where the setting is integral to the story. In this instance, the mountains of West Virginia and Kentucky are as much a part of the story as the families, and author Dean King has produced a well-researched and detailed acount of the decades-long conflict.

I heard customer #1 saying that she enjoyed Eat, Pray, Love most of all for its introspective tone and chronicling of self-growth leavened with humor; as such, I’d recommend she try Anne Lamott’s books, especially Traveling  Mercies which is Lamott’s very honest, and sometimes quite funny, accounting of her spiritual journey.  Since #1 was also drawn to the foreign locale in Gilbert’s book, she might like  Alice Steinbach’s Without Reservations in which Steinbach writes of her travels in Europe whilst rediscovering herself.

Before I’d offer customer #2 some ideas, I’d have to ask another question or two to determine if she didn’t like Twilight because it was too fluffy…or too serious. If she was looking for a more literary vampire read, I’d suggest Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian which takes a more scholarly, and, well, historical, approach combined with the suspense of a dark and gradually unfolding thriller.  If she is looking for more action without the angst, I’d direct her to the Sookie Stackhouse series, which are fast-paced books with plenty of fighting, plot twists, and sexy encounters rather than angsty drawn-out romance.

Customer #3 sounds likes she enjoys non-fiction outdoor adventure and history, so I’d offer her Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson; it’s the exciting story of two recreational scuba divers who discover an WWII u-boat sunk off the New Jersey coast and then, with repeated perilous dives, try to solve the mystery of the identification of this uncharted wreck. I’d also tell her about Manhunt, James Swanson’s account of chasing down John Wilkes Booth, which reads like a thriller.  

I read alot and have a constant "well, if you liked XXX, you should try YYY," litany running through my brain so it was tough for me to decide whom to grace with my recommendations. Kate Sigler, my lovely new Randallstown co-worker, ended up being the  lucky recipient of my largesse. Check out Kate's cleverly named blog at Bmore Bookish where you can also see my choices for her.

Native American author Louise Erdrich draws upon her heritage in The Round House. Set on a North Dakota reservation, the boundaries and buildings of the tribal grounds provide the essential framework for this novel of a Chippewa teen investigating a brutal attack on his mother. Well-defined characters are rounded out with descriptions of Indian customs and traditions and the story unfolds at a deliberate pace as Joe and his buddies zero in on the culprit.

Vanessa Michael Monroe stars in a tautly written and fast-paced series written by Taylor Stevens. In The Doll, Information Specialist Monroe takes on a creepy human trafficker in this grim tale dealing with a dark underworld organization with an international reach. A clipped writing style and rapidly alternating perspectives contribute to the urgent feel of this crime thriller.