Prompt Response - Week 3 - Novelist

Question 1: I am looking for a book by Laurell K. Hamilton. I just read the third book in the Anita Blake series and I can’t figure out which one comes next! 

Answer: If she was reading the graphic novel, the 4^th graphic novel (not book 4) is Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter: the Laughing Corpse, Book 2: Necromancer. If she was looking for the 4^th book in the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series (the regular book), that one is The Lunatic Cafe.

Question 2: What have I read recently? Well, I just finished this great book by Barbara Kingsolver, Prodigal Summer. I really liked the way it was written, you know, the way she used language. I wouldn't mind something a bit faster paced though.

Answer: If she wanted another book by Barbara Kingsolver, she might try Flight Behavior. If not, she might try The Loop by Nicholas Evans (about a wolf biologist) – this readalike has an issue-oriented theme, with a romantic tone. It was also listed as very popular, and had a 4 star Good Reads rating. If the patron was not interested in limiting the search to eco-fiction (which was tricky, there didn’t seem to be many of those), there would be lots of other options.

Question 3: I like reading books set in different countries. I just read one set in China, could you help me find one set in Japan? No, not modern – historical. I like it when the author describes it so much it feels like I was there!

Answer: There are two questions that would help narrow the search: “Do you want a book that is an adult book or one that is listed as adult and teen?” Also, “Do you want it to be in the general time frame of World War II or before that?” I searched for Japan and limited the search to “historical fiction” and checked adults. I also limited the time from to 1960. I sorted by popularity, and glanced through. I picked out titles that were set in Japan and that were not primarily about WWII. The Samurai’s Garden by Gail Tsukiayama, The Snow Fox by Susan Fromberg Schaeffer, or Cloud of Sparrows by Takashi Matsuoka. (My system actually has all three.)  Also, before giving these recommendations I would want some idea how historical and cultural she was wanting. (For example, if she really wanted a Harlequin set in Japan, she probably wouldn’t like these three books one bit.)

Question 4: I read this great mystery by Elizabeth George called Well-Schooled in Murder and I loved it. Then my dentist said that if I liked mysteries I would probably like John Sandford, but boy was he creepy I couldn't finish it! Do you have any suggestions?

Answer: First, there are others in the series by Elizabeth George. The first was A Great Deliverance. Next, the description of the series lists two authors in particular: P. D. James and Martha Grimes. P.D. James has a series that starts with Cover Her Face, and Martha Grimes has a series that starts with The Man with a Load of Mischief.

Question 5: My husband has really gotten into zombies lately. He’s already read The Walking Dead and World War Z, is there anything else you can recommend? 

Answer:  First, I'd ask: "Was that The Walking Dead graphic novels or the regular novel? Did he want a graphic novel or a book or both?" (My other responses are guessing novels, partly because of World War Z.) Just to make sure: Walking Dead: Rise of the Governor is part of a series by Robert Kirkman. Has he read all the books in this series? Some options are The Rising by Brian Keene and Zone One by Colson Whitehead or Monster Island by David Wellington. I did a search for Zombies and Gruesome. I limited the results to adults and the genre to “horror stories”.  (When I did this search, Walking Dead: Rise of the Governor and World War Z were both included in the results.) (Also, my system has Monster Planet and other titles by Brian Keene, but not Monster Island.)

 Tools:

When answering patron inquiries, the choice of tool depends upon the question. For example, the first question about a series by Laurell Hamilton could be answered by checking the catalog. However, for a different author, I might start with a check of Google. This would normally happen if I suspect (or know) that I am not spelling something correctly. Since Google makes suggestions, anything with suspect spelling goes though Google. If Google doesn’t supply the answer (it might for an author name or the spelling of a title), it will likely list Amazon as a prominent link, and series information or an ISBN number can be found from there. Also, if Amazon doesn’t have a book, it is unlikely that the library does.

However, if I needed to go to the next step and recommend a similar book, I suspect the next stop would be either GoodReads.com or LibraryThing.com. Either of those would give fairly good information on authors, series or individual books. Also, both have recommendations. LibraryThing.com has recommendation lists that are longer and quirkier. I would tend to try GoodReads.com for a patron first and LibraryThing.com for me first. Partly the reasoning is that for a patron I might want to suggest the best three options for a similar read, but for me I can look through a longer list, particularly if I have read several of the similar titles already. For myself I have also looked through publisher sites (baen.com, for example) or compared the recommendations of Amazon.com, goodreads.com and librarything.com. For an unfamiliar author or title, the tags on LibraryThing.com have occasionally helped me get a quick sense of the book. (In particular, there are certain tags I would tend to avoid.)

Knowing that I was going to write this, I asked the branch manager and the adult librarian at my branch what they use for readers advisory. They said that they basically use Amazon.com or GoodReads.com. When I asked them about spelling, they quickly added that they also use Google to check the spelling. Also, I specifically asked about Novelist (which is accessible through my library system), and neither uses Novelist.

The Big Bang, YouTube and Patron Service

I had a very interesting question the other day. It started with someone asking if he could type something up. That was fairly straightforward. He seemed a little unsure with some of the computer skills, and I went ahead and asked about printing and saving. He had brought in some pages to type, and I left him to type.

When he was ready to save I stepped him through that part of the process.

When I asked if he then wanted to email it to himself, he said that he wanted to put it out there for the world. He suggested that he might want to put it on YouTube, but I convinced him that he might actually want a blog. He had convinced me that he didn't want a Facebook page -- he really wanted to post to the entire planet.

I stepped him through the process of signing up for email (Gmail, in this case) and then adding a blog. Then I showed him how to add what he typed as a first posting. After it was done, he was fairly excited, and he even liked the idea that he could post more stuff over time.

He was the first patron to convince me that he really wanted to set up a blog. I was surprised, and he seemed quite happy.

Also, if you're interested, there's been one more idea added to the pile on the nature of the Big Bang and the origin of the universe. I can't give you the inside details, though. I didn't read his whole post.

Prompt Response - Practice Annotation

Captain Vorpatril's Alliance by Lois McMasters Bujold

Science Fiction. Published by Baen Books, 2012.

Captain Vorpatril’s Alliance by Lois McMasters Bujold is part of the Vorkosigan Saga. It is the most recent in the series, and chronologically it falls near the end. This is one of the lighter books in the series, similar in tone to A Civil Cmpaign: A Comedy of Biology and Manners. Also, instead of Miles Vorkosigan (the central character in the series), the central character in the book is, as the title suggests, Captain Ivan Vorpatril. In prior books, Ivan has variously been Lieutenant Vorpatril, Lord Ivan or “That Idiot Ivan.” In this book is much more about Ivan Xav, the man.

The character-focused story does not race, but rather unwinds, if perhaps in some unexpected and occasionally ridiculous directions. Throughout, however, the tone remains wry and witty. The combination makes for a tale that is engaging and fun.
The book starts with an Imperial Security agent buzzing Ivan’s door in the middle of the night. This agent asks Ivan to undertake a special mission for Imperial Security – to meet up with a woman. For the womanizing bachelor Ivan, how hard could that be? The result is one part romantic comedy and another part mad caper.

This book is most definitely science fiction: it has spaceships and floating cars and a blue alien. Wormhole travel and genetic manipulation are possible, and there are some glimpses at some military technology and even some criminal applications of technology. However, the lighter elements set it apart even from some of the other books in its own series, and the particular combination of science fiction, comedy and romance is very nearly unique.

For someone already familiar with the characters this was quite an enjoyable book. However, since this book shifts to Ivan as a new central character, readers new to the series can enjoy this book, too. In short this book is

• A mix of science fiction and comedy with a hint of romance
• A character focused novel
• An enjoyable addition to the series

Some other science fiction titles that might be of interest suggested by Amazon.com

• The Lost Stars: Tarnished Knight in the Lost Stars series by Jack Campbell
• A Rising Thunder in the Honor Harrington series by David Weber
• Dragon Ship in the Liaden Universe series by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller

LibraryThing.com also has the following recommendations:

• Lt. Leary Commanding in the RCN series by David Drake
• Once a Hero in the Serrano Legacy by Elizabeth Moon

Overdrive and Things to Come, Part 2

A second patron that thanked me profusely for showing her Overdrive was my cousin. We were chatting at my parents and she mentioned it.
I had fallen somewhat behind on family news (or perhaps I had forgotten some family news), but my cousin is working in her car. She is doing a delivery job. She was excited about downloadable audio.
She did mention that it was disconcerting to have someone reading words differently than she imagined them when she read the book. Harry Potter has some of those, from what she said. However, she was just fairly excited that she could listen to audiobooks for free while driving back and forth across the city.
I had no idea, but I was glad to hear that I had helped out in that way.

Overdrive and Things to Come, Part 1

I had some rather curious customer interactions as they relate to the library recently. They point to something, I suspect, but I'm not quite sure what.
The first interesting case was a man who came up and wanted another book on CD by a particular W.E.B. Griffin. The name caught my eye because it was mentioned in the book and it sort of stood out. In any case, there were several options, but none of them were available in our branch right then. However, there was the option of putting any number of them on hold, and I selected a couple. The patron travels for his job, and he was more interested in having something available than having the titles in a particular order.
At this point I asked if he had one of the devices that would allow for downloads of audiobooks. Further, I checked the catalog and found that W.E.B. Griffin was in our library's list of downloadable audiobooks. When I pointed this out to the gentleman, his reaction was immediate and rather startling. He put down the audiobooks he had in his hand, he asked me to cancel his holds, and he told me he'd be back later in the day.
When he returned, he had purchased a tablet. From his comments (and the short time interval) I suspect that he went from the library to the store and back then back to the library. He unboxed his tablet and loaded his first audiobook. This necessarily included some instructions on how to navigate pages and launch apps, but it went rather well. He downloaded a book and was quite happy.
He came in a few days later and wondered about the process for downloading audiobooks at his house. With a short discussion of wi-fi networks, he was again on his way.
This patron had mentioned that he was considering buying a tablet, but when he learned of the downloadable materials, he bought the tablet immediately.
As a librarian conditioned to think about giving away (or freely renting) materials, it is sometimes difficult to remember that some of what I handle is valuable, compelling stuff.