Week Seven Prompt Response

Book Controversies - The Harry Potter Series

Yes you read that right. Today, it feels weird for me to even write the term controversy in the same sentence as "Harry Potter", but I remember a time in my early reading career when the Harry Potter series seemed like it was the most controversial set of books ever created. Let me explain:

The year was 2000. I was in the 3rd grade, the first peak of my avid reading phase: devouring books left and right, always on the hunt for the next amazing book to read. The third Harry Potter book had just been released, the fourth was on its way, and the hushed whispers amongst my peers were all I could hear. I had never heard of Harry Potter before, but was immediately intrigued, especially since it was the talk of the town, but not really paying attention to what the whispers were about. Imagine my shock and surprise when I went to the school library to find out more about them when I was promptly told by the lady in charge (we didn't have librarians, just volunteers or parents who helped manage the collection and were there to help us check out books) that they had no such books and that if I knew what was good for me I would never pick those books up. You see, I went to a small, Christian elementary school. Unbeknownst to me, a lot of the teachers and parents were taken up with some of the negative hype that the books were exposing children to the occult and witchcraft, and were thus dangerous for kids to read. There was a heavy ban put in place at my school that not only prohibited the books from being bought for the school library, but forbade any of us kids from having a copy at school or be able to read on school property. Suddenly, I started to listen more intently to the whispering that was going on by my peers and started to realize the controversy that was happening. Several students were reading the books secretly at home, having gotten the books from an older sibling or from the public library a block away. Several others had the same ban put in place by their parents at home. The overall consensus, though, was about how great this story was and how it was the best thing they had ever read.

As things tend to happen when something is banned, suddenly there was this huge interest in the books, and those that were allowed to read it had all the power and were the royalty of the class. It made me want to read them all the more, until the desire as so strong, it outweighed my fear of talking to my parents about it. They had never said anything to me about the books, but with my dad being a church leader and my mom being a kindergarten teacher at the same school, I just assumed that I would never be allowed to read them. Eventually, I worked up the courage to ask my mom about them. And I will never forget the conversation that followed: the one question she asked was if I knew the difference between fiction books and real life. She had always been incredibly supportive and encouraging of my avid reading, so I think she knew the answer before she even asked. It started a conversation between us and we talked about the power of reading and that some people were so afraid that their kids would not be able to tell the difference between stories for fun and real life that they would rather not have their kids read those things at all. And most importantly, she said that as far as she was concerned, that as long as I knew the these books were nothing more than a really good story, that she had no problem with my reading them (and as long as I didn't take them to school so I wouldn't get in trouble). A year or two later, my grade school (where my mom still teaches to this day) took away the ban and ended up encouraging the kids to read them, and many of the teachers could be seen reading them in their spare time at lunch. I have a suspicion that my mom was one of the main reasons why the school reversed it's policy on the books. A fun side note: the teacher that was most against them is now one of my mom's closest friends!

I will never forget that example my mom set for me. How having an open and honest conversation about a book that controversial did so much more good than just a blanket ban. Even for someone as devout in her faith and with a quiet peaceful personality, she knew the importance of reading and for encouraging her kids to think for themselves, and worked to help shape her school to be reflective of those principles. I'm so thankful that I will always have a piece of that to carry with me into this field.

Science Fiction Annotation

The Gone World

by Tom Sweterlitcsh

Genre: Science Fiction

Publication Date: 2018

Number of Pages: 388

Time Period: 1997 and 2015

Appeal Terms: Intensifying, Intricately-Plotted, Unsettling









Synopsis: The year is 1997: Special Agent Shannon Moss works in a secret division of NCIS that has discovered and perfected how to travel into both "Deep Space" and "Deep Time". This top secret technology allows specially trained agents to travel to the far reaches of space and to time travel to possible realities of the future. Moss' area of expertise involves time traveling to possible versions of the future to help find evidence to solve crimes in present day, 1997, that have hit a dead end and are too important to let go cold. In her latest case, she travels to 2015 to find more information about a murdered Navy SEAL's family when things start getting oddly personal and connecting to her past. To her horror, the longer she spends in these future realities, she begins to uncover that much more than the fate of this one family is at stake in the success of this investigation. She witnesses the Terminus, the horrific and cataclysmic end of humanity, hurtling faster and faster towards present day. Through her time-traveling, she begins to piece together that the murdered family, the Terminus, and her own past are all more intricately intertwined than she ever could have imagined.

Tone: This story, while science fiction, borders on horror and has an incredibly dark and unsettling tone, which leaves the reader constantly filled with a creepy feeling that something just isn't quite right. The impending "doomsday" which is not only approaching, but rapidly accelerating in its approach, gives the story a frantic and hurried feel that is always nagging at the back of the reader's mind.

Characterization: This novel has the sole point of view of one character, Shannon Moss, the entire story. The reader gets to know the character very well as Shannon travels to and from the future, as well as gets glimpses of memories in her past. The reader is thrown into the midst of all that is happening to Shannon, but has a shared comradery with her as both Shannon and the reader begin to piece clues together at the same time.

Storyline: The storyline, as with most science fiction, is centered around the "what if...?" and in this specific story, that what-if is time travel. Not only does it push the reader to consider intriguing possibilities, such as using it to solve crimes, but urges the reader to think philosophically about what sort of impact time travel would have on humanity itself and what it means to be human if we were able to break free from the shackles of time.

Setting: Taking place in both 1997 and 2015, the reader gets to experience both a sense of nostalgia if they were around for the end of the 90s as well as the intrigue of looking at multiple versions of 2015; some that look similar to our current reality, and others that look vastly different.

Pacing: The pacing of this story varies greatly and contributes to the sense of unease that permeates this entire story. There are large chunks of the book that take place over only a day or two, packing in lots of fast-paced action that keep the reader feverishly turning the page. Then there are times when only a few pages cover months of time and not much is happening, lulling the reader into a sense of unsettling calm. Coupled with flashbacks of her past, and the time travel hops between 1997 and 2015, the reader is left feeling just as off-kilter as Shannon does in the story. The cherry on top is the impending countdown to the end of humanity (as mentioned above), that accelerates faster and faster giving the entire story a hurried edge and never truly allowing the reader a moment of rest.

Language: The author is very clever in using language and leaving clues within the writing itself (I won't say any more in order to avoid spoilers, go read it yourself to find out!!). He expertly created a plausible reality in which time travel was possible, giving the reader just enough background science to make the suspension of belief necessary without bogging them down with the lingo and hard science.

Read-Alikes:
Last Year by Robert Charles Wilson
Gate Crashers by Patrick S. Tomlinson
The Peripheral by William Gibson
The Tourist by Robert Dickinson

Week Six Prompt Response

I am a huge fan of horror, both movies and books, and so is my dad. Well, at least the movie part for him.  One of the things that I enjoy doing with my dad is going to see new horror movies when they come out in theaters. An extra special occurrence happens when the movie is based off of a book: we will both read the book before going to see the movie, and afterword, we not only talk about what we enjoyed about the movie, but discuss how it compared to the book. This is also my sneaky way of getting my dad to read more, since he has never been an avid reader. I think this sort of thing could work well at a library too. There are a lot of good horror movies that have been coming to theaters in the last decade or so, and a good chunk of those are based off of books.

If I were in charge of promoting the horror collection at a library, I would start with a special display featuring some of the horror movies that have come out recently that are based on books, and have both the copies of the dvds and the books next to each other to encourage people to pick a pair. Some examples include:

It by Stephen King
Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson (a new hit TV show on Netflix)
I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
The Ritual by Adam Nevill
Bird Box by Josh Malerman (a new Netflix movie)

If there is the space available, this display has the potential to be quite extensive. Here is a list I found on GoodReads of 142 horror books that have been turned into a film at some point:

GoodReads List: Horror Films Based on Books

Depending on the success and interest of this display, I think it would be pretty neat to have a horror themed program/book club devoted to this experience. Schedule an evening to view a particular horror movie at the library and encourage people to read the book beforehand so that an open discussion can be had afterword to talk about how the book compares to the movie.

Romance Annotation

Landline 

by Rainbow Rowell

Genre: Romance

Publication Date: 2014

Number of Pages: 308

Geographical Setting: Los Angeles, CA and Omaha, NE

Time Period: Present Day and 1998

Appeal Terms: Nostalgic, Character Driven, Heartwarming

Synopsis: Georgie is just now realizing how in trouble her marriage is. She is pretty sure her quiet and stay-at-home husband, Neal, still loves her, because she knows she still loves him. When the chance of a lifetime comes for her and her writing partner, however, work comes between her and her family once again. This time, though, the alternative is missing Christmas with her family. When she decides to stay in LA, her husband takes the kids to Omaha without her, and he stops answering his phone once he arrives. Wondering if she made the right decision, she tries again to call Neal, this time from the old landline phone at her mother's house. Instead of reaching present-day-Neal, much to her surprise, Neal from the past answers. Georgie begins to wonder if she is just going crazy or if she is being given an opportunity to fix her marriage from the start. Lost in her memories of when she first started dating Neal, she must decide whether her marriage can be fixed or if they would have been better off never getting married in the first place.

Tone: The reader is immediately pulled into this emotional story because of its realistic and relatable stress: Work vs Family. The tone is fairly heavy, filled with strain as the protagonist grapples with the thought that her marriage may be over. The tension continues to build over the majority of the book, not releasing until the climax, that does not happen until the last few chapters. 

Characterization: Georgie must come to terms with what is truly important to her. The reader only gets to experience Georgie's perspective, and she is also the one in need of growth, as she realizes she has taken her husband for granted and not kept up her end of the promises they made to each other when they were young. 

Story Line: This book tells the story of their relationship: how it began, how it has changed, and the decisions they are making that affect its future. The driving force of the story is Georgie grappling with the memories of her relationship with her husband, but there is also interesting backstory with her writing partner and a subplot involving her much younger sister that add some extra zest to the overall story. 

Setting: As mentioned above, the story flips between the present and the past, specifically 1998, allowing the readers to really get to know the characters. The majority of the story also takes place in Los Angeles, where they went to college together, raised a family together, and where they currently live. A small portion of the story takes place in Omaha, where Neal is visiting his parents with their kids. 

Pacing: The story moves along quickly, happening over the span of only a few days. However, the flashbacks and vivid memories work to slow the pace down and allow the reader to really get to know the characters. 

Language: As with most romance stories, this one is filled with descriptive language that helps draw the reader in and taps into their emotions. While this is a romance novel, there are no erotic passages or overtly sexual scenes, so this story would appeal to a variety of audiences. 

Read-Alikes: 

Hold Back the Stars by Katie Khan

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

Heartburn by Nora Ephron

One Day by David Nicholls
The Shoemaker's Wife by Adriana Trigiani

Week Five Prompt Response

Ebook only books, which are increasingly popular (especially in the romance genre) see little to no reviews in professional publications unless they have a big name author, and then still it's usually only RT Reviews (formally Romantic Times) or other genre heavy publications. How does this affect collection development?
It definitely makes it harder for ebook only books to make the cut for collection development. I think that is just the way things currently are since librarians can't be expected to read every book ever written in order to have an informed decision about including a title for collection development. A lot of these books will unfortunately never even be heard of due to the lack of professional reviews since that is the main place librarians make their collection development decisions from. 


I have posted two more documents in the week five files. One is two reviews of an ebook only romantic suspense novel, one from a blog and one from amazon. Look over the reviews - do you feel they are both reliable? How likely would you be to buy this book for your library?
I think there are several other factors that would weigh in on whether I would buy this book for my library. These reviews are helpful due to the fact that, as someone who is not likely to read them myself,  they give some insight and understanding of the content. However, the informality and the grammatical errors do affect my response to them and, if these were the reviews available, would make me hesitate in buying them for my library. The other factor I would consider are the statistics for circulation for other ebooks similar to this title already in our collection. If there is already a strong interest in similar books, the positive reviews that are there might tip the scale in favor of purchasing them for the library. If ebook romance is not of much interest to the patrons, I think this would be a pass from me personally. 


The other document contains some reviews of Angela's Ashes, by Frank McCourt, an incredibly popular memoir. These reviews are all from professional publications, feel free to find more on your own I just nabbed a few from the Book Review Digest database for you. How do these reviews make you feel about the possibility of adding Angela's Ashes to your collection?
After reading these two sets of reviews, I am acutely aware of my own bias in favor of the professional reviews. As someone not in charge of collection development, I can only  imagine how much stronger that reaction is for someone who reads professional reviews all the time. I have no doubt that I would add Angela's Ashes to my collection based off these reviews, but that also makes me wonder what my reaction would be if there were professional reviews done for the romance ebook. I think due to the content, it makes comparing these books a little awkward, but perhaps a better thought experiment might be if the opposite were true: if Angela's Ashes had no professional review.....

Do you think it's fair that one type of book is reviewed to death and other types of books get little to no coverage? How does this affect a library's collection?  And how do you feel about review sources that won't print negative content? Do you think that's appropriate? If you buy for your library, how often do you use reviews to make your decisions? If not, how do you feel about reviews for personal reading, and what are some of your favorite review sources?
I don't think it is fair, but I also think it is the current nature of the beast. There are so many people writing books and so many being published that, as librarians, we have to rely on reviews in order to learn about as many books as possible in the shortest amount of time. To combat that, I think it is up to the librarian to diversify where they get reviews and to try and occasionally dive deep into genre specific resources and use more unconventional methods. 
As far as negative reviews go, I think there is something to be said about getting a more honest opinion of a book. I don't think it is necessary to go off the deep end and have these scathing reviews (as humorous as  they may be!) because ultimately there really is no point in writing a review if all you have to say is negative things. Having a critique or criticism layered into the review, however, is incredibly useful and, in my opinion, gives a more accurate picture of the book. As someone not yet working in the library field, I tend to use GoodReads for my source of personal reviews. I take many of them with a grain of salt, but I have also found that there are many who put real time and effort into their reviews. If I understand the format correctly, GoodReads also sorts the comments by those voted to be the most helpful or agreed with. I tend to look at several of the 5-star reviews and 1 or 2 star reviews to try and get the entire spectrum of what makes people like or dislike a book before reading it. I also like to go back and look through more reviews AFTER reading a book too, to see where my own perceptions line up. 

Kirkus Style Review

I Am Legend by Richard Matheson

Original Publication Date: 1954

Page Count: 162

A classic tale of horror and loneliness, this story follows the last man on earth as he fights to survive against the bloodthirsty vampires at night and the personal demons that haunt him by day.

Robert Neville may be the last human on earth, but he is not alone. A plague has turned everyone he has ever known, including his wife and daughter, into night dwelling vampires seeking him harm. While the sun is out and shining, he spends his time gathering resources, hunting vampires, and searching for answers. As soon as the sun dips below the horizon he must be indoors in hiding, waiting for the morning light to come again, hoping that his house holds up to the vampires trying to get in. Wracked by bouts of alcoholism and depression, Robert struggles each day to find meaning in his routine as he lives with the memories of the way things used to be. Every so often, he finds a reason to live, only to have it taken away from him again and again. That is, until one day he stumbles into another human, Ruth, who doesn’t appear to be infected. Who is this woman, and can he trust her? Is there something that she is hiding or has he finally found someone to share his existence with? A little slow at times as Matheson dives into the intense and complicated emotions of Robert, fans of the modern zombie genre may be a bit frustrated with the lack of action at certain points.

A classic that inspired an entire genre of sci-fi and horror, this tale not only conveys the terror of being the last man on earth amongst creatures no longer human, but is a thought provoking essay on human nature and the fine line between hero and horror.