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.

Looks like ten full years of being a stay-at-home mom has paid off as I aced the Sporcle quiz on children's book covers. The general covers, not so much. The six year old guessing the classics bit was so painfully tedious that I stopped reading by page two. Also, I am tired today since Sporcle's vast array of addictive quizzes (books! movies! geography! i am a nerd!) kept me up way too late last night.

My new library home is Randallstown. When I worked at Towson, street or urban fiction was a genre for which customers regularly requested help in locating the collection as well as asking about new titles and authors, and I find myself in the same scenario here at the RA branch. So, I’m happy to choose Urban Fiction as my genre, using the resource Street Fiction which includes sub-genres as well as some history on the development of urban fiction and resources for librarians. As a Between the Covers blogger, I like to think that I stay abreast of new books and already visit most of the book links suggested but The Daily Beast site is new to me so that’s the one I’ll follow for this assignment.

assignment complete. :)