Culture minister Margaret Hodge's suggestion that libraries should link up with internet bookseller Amazon greeted with outrage.
by: Alison Flood
The culture minister Margaret Hodge's suggestion that libraries should start selling books as well as lending them has been greeted with outrage by embattled booksellers.
Speaking yesterday at the public library authorities conference in Bristol, Hodge outlined the terms of a consultation process due to begin later this year, saying that with less than 40% of the UK's population using libraries she was "all in favour of pushing our thinking to the boundaries, and testing ideas to destruction".
Highlighting the "worrying statistics" that books borrowed have fallen by 41% over the last ten years, and that there have been 63 library closures since Labour came to power in 1997, Hodge said yesterday that the challenge for libraries was "all about getting whatever the library equivalent might be for 'bums on seats'". "If we make our service popular; if we ensure it is well and widely used, it will be much more difficult to chop it when times are tough," she said.
Hodge also told librarians to consider how private giving to libraries could complement public sector funding, harking back to Scottish American philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, who supported libraries in the UK and the US in the 19th and early 20th century.
With library tickets issued to every newborn baby, home delivery internet lending services and loyalty cards also on the table she suggested that librarians should forge links with the internet retailer Amazon.
"Yes, I am thinking about how LoveFilm or Amazon work. What is it about their way of doing things that generates such popularity, wide usage, such customer delight and satisfaction?" she asked senior librarians. "How about a tie-in with Amazon: You've borrowed the book, now send a brand new copy to a friend."
But the chief executive of the Booksellers Association, Tim Godfray, said today that he was "very concerned" about her proposals. "We will be making representations to the returned minister of culture," said Godfray, who is writing today to protest to Hodge about the plans.
The library campaigner and former managing director of Waterstone's Tim Coates also rejected Hodges' suggestion, saying that "in no way should a library try to turn itself into a bookshop". Fellow campaigner and former director of Faber Desmond Clarke agreed. "It was an idea which came up 25-30 years ago and failed dismally," he said. "Why would anyone visit a library and want to buy a book when they could get it for free?"
Coates admitted there were ways in which libraries could consider selling books, but only on a small scale – for example to children learning to read – and never when there is a bookshop nearby. "If it's an extension of the function of the library, and is carefully thought out and not attempting to be a bookshop at all, there are ways in which it could be done," he said. With falling DVD rentals leaving a hole in library balance sheets he could understand "why people would want to do it," he continued. Figures may be falling across the library sector, but the minister "has to take some sort of responsibility for that".
From: the Guardian
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Friday, October 30, 2009
Librarian forced to resign over fees
by: Ashley Singh
South Boston, VA - It's an amazing show of support for a former librarian in South Boston, forced to resign two weeks ago for waiving some overdue fees.
Hundreds have signed a petition to support Woodson Hughes, and on Tuesday, lots of people came out to show their support for him.
On Tuesday, the library board met at the Halifax Library in a small room, a room that was packed, with a line to get inside that stretched out the door. Most there said Hughes, the former Branch Manager, deserves his job back.
Hughes was a librarian in Halifax County for 22 years. He says he was recently forced to resign, for waiving fines. He never expected the town to rally behind him.
"I was just a person who managed a library in a small town in Southside Virginia. I certainly never expected anything like this. Never," Hughes said.
In September, library director Rhonda Griffin sent an email to staff saying a total of $1,400 in fines had been waived in a three month time period. One patron even had more than $80 waived.
Hughes says he did waive some fines for people who couldn't afford it, the elderly who couldn't get to the library to pay, and those with troubles.
"I tried to uphold the policies of the library to the best of my ability and I also tried to help the patrons to the best of my ability," Hughes said.
Ron Miller was so upset after hearing about what happened to Hughes that he resigned as president of the Friends of the Library funding group.
"When the library dismissed Woodson I just didn't feel like working hard to support a library that would do what it did to somebody like that," Miller said.
Anne Raab, who has been collecting signatures, says she has 300. And says there are still more forms out there.
“I cannot imagine him doing anything to bring discredit to the library, he loves the library,” Raab said.
“Leaving such a place in the best of circumstances would have been difficult. Leaving so abruptly was just ten times more so,” Hughes said.
Griffin says fees should only be waived in extreme circumstances.
The email she sent out to staff says continuously waiving fines for one person is the same as embezzlement.
from: wset.com
South Boston, VA - It's an amazing show of support for a former librarian in South Boston, forced to resign two weeks ago for waiving some overdue fees.
Hundreds have signed a petition to support Woodson Hughes, and on Tuesday, lots of people came out to show their support for him.
On Tuesday, the library board met at the Halifax Library in a small room, a room that was packed, with a line to get inside that stretched out the door. Most there said Hughes, the former Branch Manager, deserves his job back.
Hughes was a librarian in Halifax County for 22 years. He says he was recently forced to resign, for waiving fines. He never expected the town to rally behind him.
"I was just a person who managed a library in a small town in Southside Virginia. I certainly never expected anything like this. Never," Hughes said.
In September, library director Rhonda Griffin sent an email to staff saying a total of $1,400 in fines had been waived in a three month time period. One patron even had more than $80 waived.
Hughes says he did waive some fines for people who couldn't afford it, the elderly who couldn't get to the library to pay, and those with troubles.
"I tried to uphold the policies of the library to the best of my ability and I also tried to help the patrons to the best of my ability," Hughes said.
Ron Miller was so upset after hearing about what happened to Hughes that he resigned as president of the Friends of the Library funding group.
"When the library dismissed Woodson I just didn't feel like working hard to support a library that would do what it did to somebody like that," Miller said.
Anne Raab, who has been collecting signatures, says she has 300. And says there are still more forms out there.
“I cannot imagine him doing anything to bring discredit to the library, he loves the library,” Raab said.
“Leaving such a place in the best of circumstances would have been difficult. Leaving so abruptly was just ten times more so,” Hughes said.
Griffin says fees should only be waived in extreme circumstances.
The email she sent out to staff says continuously waiving fines for one person is the same as embezzlement.
from: wset.com
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Manga library planned for Japan
A Tokyo university is planning to open a library to promote serious study of Japanese manga comics.
The proposed Tokyo International Manga Library will house two million comic books, animation drawings, video games and other cartoon industry artefacts.
It is hoped the new library will open by early 2015 at Meiji University.
"Manga has been taken lightly in the past and there has been no solid archive for serious study," the university's Susumi Shibao told AFP.
"We want to help academic studies on manga as part of Japanese culture," she added.
It is anticipated that the library will be made available to researchers and fans from Japan and abroad.
Initial plans include the opening of the Yoshihiro Yonezawa Memorial Library of Manga and Subculture at the end of this month.
It will feature the late manga critic Yoshihiro Yonezawa's collection of 140,000 comic books.
Woodblock prints
Hayao Miyazaki's Oscar-winning film Spirited Away is a classic example of anime - animation based on manga styles.
Outside Japan, manga comics are mostly associated with science fiction and fantasy, but manga also encompasses a much wider range of genres - from high literature to soap operas.
Their characteristic style descends from the popular woodblock prints common in the 18th and 19th centuries known as ukiyoe, which often featured humorous depictions of Japanese urban life.
The former Japanese government had set aside 11.7bn yen ($128m, £78m) for a museum on Japanese cartoon art and pop culture to be built in Tokyo.
But the plan was axed when the administration was ousted in the elections in August.
from: BBC
The proposed Tokyo International Manga Library will house two million comic books, animation drawings, video games and other cartoon industry artefacts.
It is hoped the new library will open by early 2015 at Meiji University.
"Manga has been taken lightly in the past and there has been no solid archive for serious study," the university's Susumi Shibao told AFP.
"We want to help academic studies on manga as part of Japanese culture," she added.
It is anticipated that the library will be made available to researchers and fans from Japan and abroad.
Initial plans include the opening of the Yoshihiro Yonezawa Memorial Library of Manga and Subculture at the end of this month.
It will feature the late manga critic Yoshihiro Yonezawa's collection of 140,000 comic books.
Woodblock prints
Hayao Miyazaki's Oscar-winning film Spirited Away is a classic example of anime - animation based on manga styles.
Outside Japan, manga comics are mostly associated with science fiction and fantasy, but manga also encompasses a much wider range of genres - from high literature to soap operas.
Their characteristic style descends from the popular woodblock prints common in the 18th and 19th centuries known as ukiyoe, which often featured humorous depictions of Japanese urban life.
The former Japanese government had set aside 11.7bn yen ($128m, £78m) for a museum on Japanese cartoon art and pop culture to be built in Tokyo.
But the plan was axed when the administration was ousted in the elections in August.
from: BBC
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Angels are the new vampires, says Anne Rice
by: Alison Flood
Angels are the new vampires of the literary world, according to the doyenne of vampire fiction Anne Rice, who is about to launch a new series of books starring a contract killer recruited by a seraph.
Taking their inspiration, perhaps, from Milton's arch-fiend Satan, Rice and a host of other authors are plotting celestial assaults on the book shops this autumn, with angels in all shapes and sizes about to hit the bookshelves. The line-up includes Becca Fitzpatrick's Hush, Hush ("a sacred oath, a fallen angel, a forbidden love"), out later this week, Elizabeth Chandler's Kissed by an Angel (about a guardian angel) and the Carnegie medal-winning American writer Sharon Creech's The Unfinished Angel, featuring a celestial being undergoing an identity crisis.
"Being on the side of the angels, it feels much better than being on the side of the vampires. Vampires were tortured, tragic figures," Rice told the Wall Street Journal. Her novel, Angel Time: The Songs of the Seraphim, follows the adventures of Toby O'Dare, an American killer who is given the chance by a mysterious stranger (who turns out to be an angel) to go back to 13th century England to find salvation.
"Vampires for me were always like feeling grief for my lost childhood faith, being cut off from that life. I reached the point where I didn't have any more stories to tell from that point of view," explained the author, who said the angel series was "In keeping with [her] commitment to do Christian fiction in a variety of forms" since she converted from atheism back to her childhood Catholicism in 1998.
Now that she doesn't write her vampire chronicles any more, Rice said she feels "free to enjoy" the recent glut of all things vampire. "I think it's wonderful fun," she said. "When I was writing my own, I wouldn't have wanted to be influenced."
She hasn't, however, read any of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight books – although she has seen the film. "I felt that it reflected the deep desire of young women to have the mystery and protection and wisdom of older men," said Rice, whose own vampire novels have featured the cruel but sensual Lestat – a long way from Meyer's abstinent vampire family the Cullens. "I think many girls mature much earlier than boys, and they are frustrated when they approach young boys for love or protection. Hence the fantasy of a wise and protective vampire coming into the life of a young girl who, of course, appreciates him in a special way."
From: the Guardian
Angels are the new vampires of the literary world, according to the doyenne of vampire fiction Anne Rice, who is about to launch a new series of books starring a contract killer recruited by a seraph.
Taking their inspiration, perhaps, from Milton's arch-fiend Satan, Rice and a host of other authors are plotting celestial assaults on the book shops this autumn, with angels in all shapes and sizes about to hit the bookshelves. The line-up includes Becca Fitzpatrick's Hush, Hush ("a sacred oath, a fallen angel, a forbidden love"), out later this week, Elizabeth Chandler's Kissed by an Angel (about a guardian angel) and the Carnegie medal-winning American writer Sharon Creech's The Unfinished Angel, featuring a celestial being undergoing an identity crisis.
"Being on the side of the angels, it feels much better than being on the side of the vampires. Vampires were tortured, tragic figures," Rice told the Wall Street Journal. Her novel, Angel Time: The Songs of the Seraphim, follows the adventures of Toby O'Dare, an American killer who is given the chance by a mysterious stranger (who turns out to be an angel) to go back to 13th century England to find salvation.
"Vampires for me were always like feeling grief for my lost childhood faith, being cut off from that life. I reached the point where I didn't have any more stories to tell from that point of view," explained the author, who said the angel series was "In keeping with [her] commitment to do Christian fiction in a variety of forms" since she converted from atheism back to her childhood Catholicism in 1998.
Now that she doesn't write her vampire chronicles any more, Rice said she feels "free to enjoy" the recent glut of all things vampire. "I think it's wonderful fun," she said. "When I was writing my own, I wouldn't have wanted to be influenced."
She hasn't, however, read any of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight books – although she has seen the film. "I felt that it reflected the deep desire of young women to have the mystery and protection and wisdom of older men," said Rice, whose own vampire novels have featured the cruel but sensual Lestat – a long way from Meyer's abstinent vampire family the Cullens. "I think many girls mature much earlier than boys, and they are frustrated when they approach young boys for love or protection. Hence the fantasy of a wise and protective vampire coming into the life of a young girl who, of course, appreciates him in a special way."
From: the Guardian
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
'Wicked' author Gregory Maguire's new novel is free - take that, Walmart!
by: Thom Geier
As giant retailers continue their price war over books (Target just joined Walmart and Amazon in offering pre-sales of top November titles for $9 or less), there’s one new book that seems to take the trend to its logical extreme. The Next Queen of Heaven, a new novel by Wicked author Gregory Maguire, is available starting today for the low, low price of $0.00. That’s not a typo. Queen is the third title from the year-old Concord Free Press, which is giving away 2,500 copies of the book (half through its website and half through select independent bookstores) to readers who agree to make a donation “to a local charity, someone who needs it, or a stranger on the street.” (Distribution of the book is strictly first come, first served.) As a box on the paperback’s back cover explains: “When you’re done, pass this novel on to someone else (for free, of course) so they can give. It adds up.” The press claims that its first two releases have generated more than $85,000 in charitable donations to various causes.
The Next Queen of Heaven is a farcical holiday yarn set in 1999 in a fictional upstate New York town where strange events occur after Leontina Scales gets clocked by a Catholic statuette and begins speaking in tongues. Why in the world would an author as prominent as Maguire publish for free? “I admire that the books as well as the publishing model raise questions about art’s inherent value and the commodification of content,” he said in a statement. “I like knowing that this book is out in the world, helping to generate donations for great causes.”
Neither the author (nor the book designer) is paid for their work; as Concord Free Press notes on its website: “Our unique agreement with our writers…is 100% lawyer-free.” That said, all authors who publish with the Concord, Mass.-based outfit retain the rights to their works and can republish them later with conventional publishers. The first book in the series, CFP founder Stona Fitch’s novel Give + Take, is due from St. Martin’s imprint Thomas Dunne Books next year. According to Fitch, “Authors donate (voluntarily) 20 percent of all earnings from the book’s life after CFP back to the press to support our subsequent books. So in this way, we’re semi-self-sustaining, with one writer helping the next.”
Fitch says the idea for the press came to him in the wake of his experience on Give + Take, which was orphaned when his editor left the publishing house that had acquired it. “The novel is about a jazz pianist who steals diamonds and BMWs, sells them, and gives the money away,” Fitch says via e-mail. “So it was thematically aligned with the idea of a press that publishes beautiful books for free and gives them away.” Instead of shopping his novel around when his first publisher dropped it, Fitch decided to make it the Concord Free Press’ inaugural title. He’s since recruited other writer friends, including fellow Concord, Mass., resident Gregory Maguire, to publish through CFP.
It’s an intriguing idea, the free book. But I suspect that there are more than 2,500 Maguire fans out there clamoring to read his newest novel — and willing to donate a pretty substantial sum to charity for the privilege. Given the paucity of the print run, though, some may be reluctant to pass the book along to others when they’re done. Perhaps I’m just being cynical. What do you think of free books to promote charitable causes?
From: Entertainment Weekly
As giant retailers continue their price war over books (Target just joined Walmart and Amazon in offering pre-sales of top November titles for $9 or less), there’s one new book that seems to take the trend to its logical extreme. The Next Queen of Heaven, a new novel by Wicked author Gregory Maguire, is available starting today for the low, low price of $0.00. That’s not a typo. Queen is the third title from the year-old Concord Free Press, which is giving away 2,500 copies of the book (half through its website and half through select independent bookstores) to readers who agree to make a donation “to a local charity, someone who needs it, or a stranger on the street.” (Distribution of the book is strictly first come, first served.) As a box on the paperback’s back cover explains: “When you’re done, pass this novel on to someone else (for free, of course) so they can give. It adds up.” The press claims that its first two releases have generated more than $85,000 in charitable donations to various causes.
The Next Queen of Heaven is a farcical holiday yarn set in 1999 in a fictional upstate New York town where strange events occur after Leontina Scales gets clocked by a Catholic statuette and begins speaking in tongues. Why in the world would an author as prominent as Maguire publish for free? “I admire that the books as well as the publishing model raise questions about art’s inherent value and the commodification of content,” he said in a statement. “I like knowing that this book is out in the world, helping to generate donations for great causes.”
Neither the author (nor the book designer) is paid for their work; as Concord Free Press notes on its website: “Our unique agreement with our writers…is 100% lawyer-free.” That said, all authors who publish with the Concord, Mass.-based outfit retain the rights to their works and can republish them later with conventional publishers. The first book in the series, CFP founder Stona Fitch’s novel Give + Take, is due from St. Martin’s imprint Thomas Dunne Books next year. According to Fitch, “Authors donate (voluntarily) 20 percent of all earnings from the book’s life after CFP back to the press to support our subsequent books. So in this way, we’re semi-self-sustaining, with one writer helping the next.”
Fitch says the idea for the press came to him in the wake of his experience on Give + Take, which was orphaned when his editor left the publishing house that had acquired it. “The novel is about a jazz pianist who steals diamonds and BMWs, sells them, and gives the money away,” Fitch says via e-mail. “So it was thematically aligned with the idea of a press that publishes beautiful books for free and gives them away.” Instead of shopping his novel around when his first publisher dropped it, Fitch decided to make it the Concord Free Press’ inaugural title. He’s since recruited other writer friends, including fellow Concord, Mass., resident Gregory Maguire, to publish through CFP.
It’s an intriguing idea, the free book. But I suspect that there are more than 2,500 Maguire fans out there clamoring to read his newest novel — and willing to donate a pretty substantial sum to charity for the privilege. Given the paucity of the print run, though, some may be reluctant to pass the book along to others when they’re done. Perhaps I’m just being cynical. What do you think of free books to promote charitable causes?
From: Entertainment Weekly
Monday, October 26, 2009
First black woman tipped for top French book prize
In a historic first, a black woman writer is a hot favourite to scoop France'stop literary prize next week for a haunting novel on family, betrayal and the hellish ordeal of illegal migration from Africa.
French-Senegalese writer Marie NDiaye, 42, is a frontrunner among the eight authors shortlisted for the Goncourt, the most prestigious of France's annual crop of literary prizes which is to be announced November 2.
NDiaye published her first novel while still at school, aged 17, and has since carved out a place in the French pantheon as a novelist, screenwriter and the only living playwright in the repertoire of the Comedie Francaise.
"Her voice, perfectly clear and original, rises above the chatter," wrote Le Monde of her latest work, "Trois Femmes Puissantes" (Three Powerful Women).
Like much of NDiaye's recent work, the book touches on the troubled ties between Africa and its former colonial rulers, and between blacks and whites.
Set between France and Senegal, the three-part novel weaves together the stories of women whose lives straddle the two continents and who are weighed down by family secrets, humiliations and betrayals.
Hailed as "dizzying" and "masterful", it took French critics by storm upon its release in September, shooting to the top of the book charts.
Part one follows a schoolteacher from Paris to Dakar on a difficult pilgrimage to the home of her estranged father.
The second story is told through the eyes of an African woman's French partner, who has dragged her back to a mediocre existence in France and where both their lives are clouded by demons from his past.
The third follows the plight of a destitute young woman who is forced to join the migrant route from Senegal towards the European El Dorado, a brutal illustration of what NDiaye calls "a modern-day tragedy".
Narrated in exquisite stream of consciousness, the novel is shot through with rich touches of fantasy and symbolism.
"Her language is a gateway to the mysterious world of our most secret thoughts -- the dwelling place of magic and the supernatural within each person," wrote Le Monde.
NDiaye recently co-wrote a film with French director Claire Denis, "White Material" starring Isabelle Huppert, about whites terrorised by roving child soldiers in west Africa.
But she denies she is pushing a political message.
"My books are criss-crossed by various aspects of the contemporary world. But I am not a thinker," she told AFP.
The writer's brother Pap NDiaye is a prominent French historian and campaigner for black minority rights.
She wrote the preface to one of his books, and feels France is a step behind Britain or the United States where powerful writers from ethnic minorities have emerged in recent decades, from Zadie Smith to Hari Kunzru or Kiran Desai.
"The huge majority of France's writers come from educated or bourgeois backgrounds -- a fairly small world in other words," she said recently.
"Writers here tend to be people who have been to university, who can master the complexities of the language, which may not be case for minorities."
NDiaye would be the first woman laureate of the Goncourt in a decade and the first black woman in its history.
But the soft-spoken writer refuses to be made a "symbol".
"I have never thought of it in those terms: 'black woman' and 'Goncourt'. I find it impossible to see things that way," she told AFP.
Raised by her French mother in a modest home in Pithiviers, a sleepy provincial town south of Paris, after her father returned to Senegal, she did not travel to Africa until she was in her twenties.
"I grew up in a world that was 100-percent French. My African roots don't mean much, except that people know of them because of the colour of my skin and my name," she said recently.
"I don't represent anything or anyone," she told AFP. "I have met many French people raised in Africa who are more African than I am."
While she rages at the discrimination still faced by French blacks -- in looking for jobs or housing, or being stopped by the police -- NDiaye says she has been sheltered by her writer career.
"I have always had a quite special, marginal life, the life of a writer lucky enough not to have to ask anyone for anything," she told AFP.
From: The Independent
French-Senegalese writer Marie NDiaye, 42, is a frontrunner among the eight authors shortlisted for the Goncourt, the most prestigious of France's annual crop of literary prizes which is to be announced November 2.
NDiaye published her first novel while still at school, aged 17, and has since carved out a place in the French pantheon as a novelist, screenwriter and the only living playwright in the repertoire of the Comedie Francaise.
"Her voice, perfectly clear and original, rises above the chatter," wrote Le Monde of her latest work, "Trois Femmes Puissantes" (Three Powerful Women).
Like much of NDiaye's recent work, the book touches on the troubled ties between Africa and its former colonial rulers, and between blacks and whites.
Set between France and Senegal, the three-part novel weaves together the stories of women whose lives straddle the two continents and who are weighed down by family secrets, humiliations and betrayals.
Hailed as "dizzying" and "masterful", it took French critics by storm upon its release in September, shooting to the top of the book charts.
Part one follows a schoolteacher from Paris to Dakar on a difficult pilgrimage to the home of her estranged father.
The second story is told through the eyes of an African woman's French partner, who has dragged her back to a mediocre existence in France and where both their lives are clouded by demons from his past.
The third follows the plight of a destitute young woman who is forced to join the migrant route from Senegal towards the European El Dorado, a brutal illustration of what NDiaye calls "a modern-day tragedy".
Narrated in exquisite stream of consciousness, the novel is shot through with rich touches of fantasy and symbolism.
"Her language is a gateway to the mysterious world of our most secret thoughts -- the dwelling place of magic and the supernatural within each person," wrote Le Monde.
NDiaye recently co-wrote a film with French director Claire Denis, "White Material" starring Isabelle Huppert, about whites terrorised by roving child soldiers in west Africa.
But she denies she is pushing a political message.
"My books are criss-crossed by various aspects of the contemporary world. But I am not a thinker," she told AFP.
The writer's brother Pap NDiaye is a prominent French historian and campaigner for black minority rights.
She wrote the preface to one of his books, and feels France is a step behind Britain or the United States where powerful writers from ethnic minorities have emerged in recent decades, from Zadie Smith to Hari Kunzru or Kiran Desai.
"The huge majority of France's writers come from educated or bourgeois backgrounds -- a fairly small world in other words," she said recently.
"Writers here tend to be people who have been to university, who can master the complexities of the language, which may not be case for minorities."
NDiaye would be the first woman laureate of the Goncourt in a decade and the first black woman in its history.
But the soft-spoken writer refuses to be made a "symbol".
"I have never thought of it in those terms: 'black woman' and 'Goncourt'. I find it impossible to see things that way," she told AFP.
Raised by her French mother in a modest home in Pithiviers, a sleepy provincial town south of Paris, after her father returned to Senegal, she did not travel to Africa until she was in her twenties.
"I grew up in a world that was 100-percent French. My African roots don't mean much, except that people know of them because of the colour of my skin and my name," she said recently.
"I don't represent anything or anyone," she told AFP. "I have met many French people raised in Africa who are more African than I am."
While she rages at the discrimination still faced by French blacks -- in looking for jobs or housing, or being stopped by the police -- NDiaye says she has been sheltered by her writer career.
"I have always had a quite special, marginal life, the life of a writer lucky enough not to have to ask anyone for anything," she told AFP.
From: The Independent
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Librarian Trading Cards
Want a glimpse into the lives of other librarians? Well, now you can! Following the tradition of baseball, hockey, football and even bartender and roller derby trading cards, there are now librarian trading cards. As the site says: "Learn fascinating facts about librarians all over the world! Things like: what they wish more people knew about the library, the most memorable reference question, and of course, what they're reading!"
Check it out at: http://librariantradingcards.blogspot.com/
Check it out at: http://librariantradingcards.blogspot.com/
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