Week 5: Building Base Knowledge Part II Assignment 3

Firebird by Misty Copeland

Firebird, a picture book written by ballerina Misty Copeland, lyrically tells the story of how a young girl overcomes barriers to become a beautiful dancer (a firebird). The bold illustration perfectly supports and enhances the story to bring her passion and spirit alive for young readers. Readers who enjoy this story of overcoming adversity in dance, may also enjoy Debbie Allen’s, Dancing in the Wings. 

Week 5: Building Base Knowledge Part II Assignment 2

In my branch, people definitely want the universally popular books like anything by James Patterson, Lee Child, Danielle Steel, Daniel Silva, Stephen King, etc. If it’s on the NYT bestsellers list, then our users want to read it. The NYT best seller list site is nice because often our users will just say “the new one by “fill in the blank””. I can check the site and easily get the title if I don’t remember it on my own. It’s also nice to just scan in preparation for the holds we will inevitable get for everything on the list.

NPR is also clearly listened to/read online by our users because we often get requests starting with “I don’t know the title, but I heard about it on NPR”. When that is the situation, I can usually find the book they are referring to by going to NPR Books online.

Early Word— The main site is a nice updated collection of relevant events with respect to the literary world. For instance, today they have a blurb about an author’s passing and their works (this often prompts requests in the library) as well as information about David McCullough’s appearance on the last episode of The Daily Show. These are cultural relevant events that I enjoy knowing about as an information specialist. I LOVE the New title radar. It is an easy way to get a hint of what people might be looking for in the coming weeks. I like the Holds Alert section for this reason too. I also like the various links to the Best Books, Best Sellers lists. It makes it easy to have these resource lists in one location. 

Week 5: Building Base Knowledge Part II Assignment 1

I have been looking at streetfiction.org as a resource.

The Street Fiction website has such a diversity of subgenres that I didn’t know about before—Urban Christian Fiction and Urban Fantasy Fiction, for example. You can look at the Amazon bestsellers if someone is looking for the more popular urban titles. You can also bring up an Urban Author list which is nice. Most of the site is sort of a featured list of books with their book covers and plot summary. Users can leave comments on the book, but it’s not a sophisticated site like Goodreads where you can sort by ratings, etc.

It also seems to be a site where they encourage new writers to become involved. There is an Urban publishers list as well as author writing tips and author interviews.

You can also submit your email to get new books in your mailbox if you’re an avid urban fiction reader.

I think I’ll use this site if someone specifically asks for recommendations within the genre, but otherwise I probably won’t use the site too much.

Assignment 4: Goodreads

Listopia—I love the lists generated on Goodreads because it’s a very fast way to get some recommendations (from a good amount of people) for books and genres I’m not as comfortable with in terms of suggestions. These lists are even helpful when I’ve exhausted some of my go-to recommendations and need yet even more. For instance, when a teen needs a recommendation and has read all of the popular and trending books, I can often find something appealing to the customer based on the extensive subgenre lists available. I also like that the lists are always changing, there are always new ones (Best Beach reads for 2015 is the current “featured list”) and as a part of social media, lists are created as real life happens. Goodreads serves as a great resource for organically generated suggestions.

I use Goodreads for ratings and recommendations, but have never created new shelves until now. I created a bunch of shelves and went back and added my books to my new shelves. Now I have a ton of new recommendations based on each individual shelf I created. Some of these are very accurate and some not so much. The shelf I called “Adventure”, for instance, suggested many similar non-fiction adventure stories. The shelf I titled “Baltimore Author”, however, (for Laura Lippman) just recommended similar mysteries that did not have anything to do with Baltimore. It is clear that the actual name of the shelf does not have any effect on what they recommend. Also I have a shelf titled “Did not finish” (i.e. did not like) so interestingly enough, I know to steer clear of the recommendations for that shelf.

The “Explore” part of Goodreads is great for finding new titles in particular genres. I often don’t read brand new books because there are usually lots of holds on them, so it’s nice to browse the explore page to make myself aware of the new items on the shelves that are going to be popular here in the branch.

I haven’t friended too many people, but just added some coworkers, so I’m excited to see what they are reading and read any reviews they have written.

Based on her extensive reading history of historical-fiction, I recommended Child 44 to Laura. She also seems to enjoy books that are a part of a series where you get to know the character and know what to expect from them, so I think she will enjoy that aspect of the characterization of this book.

Based on Carmen’s reading history of books largely based on women’s relationships and romance (Chick Lit), I recommended Barefoot by Elin Hilderbrand to her. I think she will enjoy reading about the romantic elements in the story as well as the evolving relationships between the three women.