Have you bought any fun reference books lately?
12 June 2015
Come on. If you're a librarian type, you remember buying actual books to use as reference sources, right?
Wasn't that fun? Sometimes it was just thrilling to buy a new reference tool that you could actually hold, leaf through, refer to, mark up, etc. Well, if you're a librarian type, and you're going to ALA Annual in a couple of weeks in San Francisco, I'm here to ask you to consider buying a reference book. Have you seen our Libraries Unlimited series of Real Stories readers' guides? I'm the current series editor, so I'm biased, but these are great books. They break up nonfiction books into more digestible chunks of genres, types, and subject interests; they provide ready-made reading lists and book group title suggestions; they can help serve as training tools by helping you to learn big names in the nonfiction writing biz; and they're just a lot of fun to read and use.
I know there's no budget for it. I know that anyone with an Internet connection can Google up any number of free booklists. But still--I'd ask you to consider any one of these titles. If you want to see them or have questions, and you'll be in San Francisco, consider stopping by the ABC-CLIO booth (#814) and looking at them. I'll even sweeten the deal--buy any one of the books on the list I've linked to above, and I'll offer you a free email consultation/conversation about nonfiction RA, books, and ways to train your staff or create your own nonfiction booklists and displays.
All you have to do is buy a book from the Real Stories series, either at the conference, or, if you're not going, buy one through an online bookstore or the ABC-CLIO site, through the end of June. Then just contact me at [email protected], tell me what book you bought*, and we'll use that as a jumping-off point for an email conversation/training about nonfiction reading, readers, and RA.
What do you say? A great reference book and an email training. That's got Google beat, right?
*I'm not offering this through the publisher, or the marketing department, or anything like that. So no proof or receipts required; just tell me you bought the book and we'll be good to go. Gotta love the honor system; it really cuts down on paperwork.