New South Wales RA Advisory Group and Evaluating RA Service

I talk about ARRT a lot here on the blog, but that is because I am on the Steering Committee and I want to make sure the work we are doing helps as many of you as possible.

But I also know that ARRT is not the only RA networking group out there. In fact, there is one RA networking group who I have worked with in the past who do amazing work, but I would bet that many of you don’t know about since they are in Australia!

It’s the New South Wales Readers Advisory Group and they have created a wonderful wiki:

This wiki is to provide resources, ideas, and tips for public library staff to use as part of their readers advisory services. It is managed by the New South Wales Readers Advisory Group, however, people from libraries elsewhere are welcome to join.This wiki is about promoting the enjoyment of reading and our library collections.

Using this site they post the videos and slides from their seminars (full disclosure, I was a speaker once; find me), they have this useful RA training page with links to a wide range of materials, and the information about their Read Watch Play program, which was one of the first of it’s kind.  Click through to see more on all of these topics. I promise you, there is at least one [if not 12] new thing you will learn to improve your service to readers with a visit to this site.

But the newest part of the wiki is something I am very excited about. A member of the group, Melanie Mutch contacted me earlier this year as she was developing a set of standards for evaluating RA service.

This is a question I get all of the time-- how do we evaluate if our RA Service is working or not? It is a very tricky question and, honestly, one we will all have to start answering soon. We put staff, money, time, and training into growing and enhancing our service to readers, but are we doing a good job? Should we continue as we have been or do we need to shift our tactics?

I hope together, we can all start diving into the issue of evaluation in 2017, but to get us started as we think about this important and necessary topic, here is the direct link to the page Melanie created with the basics on Evaluating Readers Advisory. And here is a link to a presentation, handouts, and notes Melanie put together. I would like to publicly thank her for allowing me to share them with all of you.

If you have ideas about evaluating your RA Service, please contact me. I would love to share them here on the blog.

Becky's Top Horror Reads of 2016

Over on the horror blog, I posted my personal favorite horror books that were published in 2016. Please click here to see that list. It is important for your collection development.

2016 also marked the first full year I was a reviewer for Booklist. I reviewed almost exclusively horror. In that post, I talk about why I made that choice AND give huge props to Booklist for all they do to help you help your horror readers.

Here is an excerpt:

I do want to make a very big plug for Booklist here. They truly care about helping library workers help genre readers. They appreciate that I am a horror expert, and my editor, Rebecca Vnuk and the Publisher, Bill Ott, defer to me often when it comes to horror. If there is a title that they have not received an ARC for, but I think it needs to be in the magazine so library workers know about it, they let me solicit it myself and review it.

As the person either ordering for your horror collections and/or helping readers as they come to the desk, don’t underestimate how important this behind the scenes step is to making your job easier. If they only allowed reviews of titles they have been sent or if I didn’t alert them to titles that would be great for libraries if only they let me review it, you would not have known about many great books including my #9 and #2 titles (the #2 title even made the Booklist Horror Top Ten for all of 2016).

By the way, this is why I only review for Booklist. If I didn’t think they cared about helping you help readers, I would stop immediately. I only do it to help all of you.

Please click through and read the entire post to see how you can easily access my top 10 AND every title I reviewed some for Booklist and some just for the blog. Overall, I added reviews for around 2 dozen new horror titles this year. Actually, it was more like 35-40 if you count the titles I read and wrote about for my LJ columns here and here.

Why am I telling you this? It is not to brag. Not at all. It is to show you that you have absolutely no excuse not to order good, new horror for your library's collection. I am doing all of the work for you by pulling out the best titles for libraries.

By the way, this post is just about the horror titles I read this year. I also read a few dozen non-horror books too. I will be posting my general top 10 list here on RA for All on 12/29, my last work day of the year before the family and I take a well deserved vacation until 1/9.

Until then, look for my catch up reviews and a few year end wrap ups.

Becky’s Go-To Best List Archives and My Plea To Use Them More Than Once a Year

Back at the beginning of the month, I presented a webinar for PLA entitled "Sure Bet Bests: Matching Readers With Their “Best”Read.”[link goes to slides].

In the webinar, I talked at length about how my wrap up of the “best”books of the year was going to be different from everyone else’s.

Here are screen shots of slides 3 and 4 to make that point quickly:

Slide access with photo credits

As you can see, I was making a very specific point about using best lists in a different way than we normally do.

While that webinar was to challenge you to continue serving readers with their “best”read all year long, I do not want anyone to think that I do not see the value in compiling as many “best" lists as possible as each year comes to a close. Quite the contrary, I love looking at huge indexes of best lists just as much as all of you.

In fact, is when you look at as many best lists as possible, in one place, that you get to see a truer picture of what is the best. The wider the view, the more voices that are included, the more realistic and useful the outcome.

And, when you can look at not only the current year’s lists, but past ones too, especially the 4-5 most recent years, you do your patrons an even bigger service because now they have access to even more options.

But where to go to easily mine this data, quickly, while an impatient patron is standing in front of you looking for their “best”read, one that is on the shelf and can be taken home to read right now?

As I mentioned in the slide above, my 2 favorite places where many best books lists are indexed are:

• Early Word 2016 Best Books Archive: http://www.earlyword.com/category/best-books-2016/ 
• very library specific
• Largehearted Boy 2016 Best Books Archive: http://www.largeheartedboy.com/blog/archive/2016/11/online_best_of_73.html
• a huge list of every best book lists imaginable

Both are wide in scope and have easy and clear access to past year’s lists from the current list. Please treat them each as one more tool in your belt as you help readers....now and six months from now.

If I can teach you one thing in 2016, I hope it is that best books are not something you only read in December.

A New, Old, Winter Storytelling Tradition With A Library Display Opportunity

The weekend after Thanksgiving I went back to my old neighborhood in Chicago to do some holiday shopping and stopped in at Volumes Bookcafe.

While I was there I found a beautiful series of paperback, spooky stories on display.  Below is a picture of the front of the three I purchased and a shot of the back of the Burrage title.

You can zoom in to read the back, but basically, these titles have been produced to revive the Victorian tradition of families getting together to read ghost stories aloud on Christmas Eve. 

I did some more research on this topic and found this interesting article that explains the tradition in more detail. It turns out that the tradition hit it’s heyday in Victorian Times, but probably dates back before that. As the article also notes, while much of our current holiday season traditions are remarkably similar to those from Victorian times, this one specific tradition has all but disappeared.

The winter, with it’s long nights, led to spookier thoughts and more forced togetherness huddled inside, around the fire. Ghost stories made for popular entertainment in these circumstances. But Christmas Eve in particular, when large groups were assembled already, grew to be the most popular time to read ghost stories aloud. 

As I mentioned above, I did purchase three titles in this series and our family plans to spend a few evenings over the days off this holiday season to read these stories together, aloud, around our 21st Century fire place. No screens or other distractions involved. 

While I hope some of you out there give the old tradition a try, I think it is a great display option for all libraries. Any spooky story will do. And, it is not Christmas specific. A spooky story for a long winter’s night works no matter where you live, regardless of whether you celebrate a holiday during this season or not. It is a display you can do now, to take advantage of the time people have off of work and school over the next 2 weeks or wait for the new year.

Let’s bring this tradition back through the public library.

Booklist Online Spotlight on Book Discussions

My second favorite issue of Booklist just came out-- The Spotlight on Book Discussions. (of course my favorite is the one that spotlight’s horror, duh).

I love leading book discussions AND helping to train all of you to be better book discussion leaders. In fact, my book discussion leader programs are my most popular.

For last year’s Spotlight on Book Discussions, I had this article about the important of creating support groups for Book Discussion Leaders. And in 2017, I will be working on more book discussion initiatives with Booklist, initiatives that many of you can participate in with me! So keep an eye out for those announcements.

But that’s 2015 and 2017. Let’s talk about the 2016 Spotlight today.

Here are the links to the current lists and articles that I think are the most useful to those of you leading and/or helping your local book clubs.

• The Carnegie Medal Finalists for Fiction and Nonfiction all make for great book discussion options. [I know because I used last year’s winner to do a series of very successful books discussions myself.] But besides being involved with this award [to be given out at ALA Midwinter in January], Booklist has included a list of the finalists and three readalikes for each title in this issue, giving you 24 excellent book discussion options! Click here for the Fiction finalists with readalikes and here for the Nonfiction finalists with readalikes.
• I love it when someone in my book discussion group has listened to the audiobook of the title we are discussing. These participants ALWAYS have something different and interesting to share about the title and ALWAYS enhance our discussion. Sometime I have even led a discussion, or two, having only listened to the book. Joyce Saricks agrees with me and she has contributed this list of great genre audiobooks for book discussion groups. 
• By the way...I have no patience for those of you reading this who think that listening is not reading by the way. You are wrong. End of discussion. 
• Rebecca Vnuk has this Trend Alert article and reading list for “Genre-X” titles to attract Generation-X readers to your book clubs.

Good luck as you head into your 2017 book discussions. I have my first one on January 12th. If you live in the Chicago are, you can join me. Details here.

What I'm Reading: Little Heaven

My last book review of the year appeared in the 12/15/16 issue of Booklist and it's a STAR!

Little Heaven.

Cutter, Nick (author).
Jan. 2017. 496p. Gallery, hardcover, $26(9781501104213); ebook (9781501104220). REVIEW.  First published December 15, 2016 (Booklist).

Cutter [The Troop] proves yet again why his is the reigning champ of thoughtful, pulp horror. The year is 1980 and a young girl, is lured from her home by a grotesque monster, but this is more than just a random kidnapping. That monster has a score to settle with the girl’s father and his friends, a score that goes back to 1965 and the isolated, religious commune, Little Heaven, deep in the wilderness of New Mexico. And so, the father, and his two oldest friends, all of whom originally met because they were hired, separately, to kill one and other, reunite to save the girl and settle their debts. Told with an alternating time frame between 1980 and 1965, that perfectly enhances the novel’s intensifying pace, this gruesome novel drips with dread from the very first lines, as we meet our extremely flawed but undeniably sympathetic heroes and watch them get dragged into the hell that is Little Heaven only to find a much worse supernatural monsters lurking in the surrounding woods. With it’s claustrophobically isolated setting, gory details and strong action sequences, this book is sure to win over horror fans, but there is also a powerful, underlying philosophical aspect here which ponders the meaning of family, love, and community. It permeates the novel and anchors it even in it’s most disturbing moments. Imagine that Bentley Little or the late Richard Laymon tried their hand at writing a Cormac McCarthy novel and you understand who will enjoy this story.

Three Words That Describe This Book: Dual [but linked] times frames, gory details, philosophical

Readalikes: Besides the authors mentioned in the review, I would also suggest the work of Brian Keene who shares an ability to write great characters and gory action sequences, while still having a powerful overall message in his horror works.

One thing that Nick Cutter does well in all of his novels is to craft a claustrophobic, isolated setting that in and of itself is chilling [even without the introduction of a supernatural threat]. Another book which does this well is Sparrow Rock by Nate Kenyon.

Tournament of Books Long List Announced

Next to the NPR Book Concierge and A Year of Reading from The Millions, my other favorite best list is The Morning News Tournament of Books [or ToB].

Now, the tourney itself doesn’t start until March, which is one of the reasons I adore it. They give you time to digest all the best of the year hoopla and lists before diving into the tourney on 2016’s best books a few months into 2017. The pause and the perspective it affords are nice.

But, so as not to miss out on “the season of besting,” the ToB released their awesome long-list this week. 120 Books! The finalists for the ToB will contain titles from this 120 book grouping.

This long list and the tourney itself are a wonderful example of the overall point I have been trying to make this month about Sure Bets Lists being better than Best Lists. Because the ToB always considers genre and trends into their compilation of titles, AND because they are willing to consider best sellers alongside more literary offerings, AND because they allow the judges to make a personal decision on the winner of each head to head pairing AND because they allow for “zombies” who were eliminated to come back from the dead and keep competing AND because they always have some great under the radar titles that I have missed.... for all of these reasons [and a few I must be forgetting], the ToB lists are a great sure bet option for readers.

The ToB uses different perspectives of what was “Best” in 2016 to crowdsource a list that considers as wide a range of tastes as possible. The just released long-list alone can help you to help many readers looking for a good, “best” read this holiday season. Yes some are hot titles that will be checked out, but many will be on your shelf right now. And, they each come with an annotation so you can book talk the title immediately.

Click here for much more from me on the ToB. And don’t forget to look at the past years’s lists [links in the right gutter]. If you put those lists together with the narratives from the judging process, you get a great sense of what type of reader to give the books to even if you have never read them, or even heard of them, yourselves.

ToB is both fun and a great RA tool. Click over and see for yourself. There are hundreds of sure bet options there for a wide range of library patrons. The work is done for you, if you only visit the site.

End of the Year Adult Reading Round Table Updates

Today I have a bunch of links, information, and announcements having to do with my work with ARRT. Please remember, while ARRT is a networking and training organization for Readers' Advisory Library Workers, we provide much content, lists, and training documents for everyone, everywhere.

From our Popular Author lists (both for Adult and Teen authors) which are always available in the RA Toolbox on NoveList to allowing anyone to signup for our newsletter [the form is on every page of the website in the right gutter] and much in between, ARRT is here to help anyone who is helping leisure readers.

Here is a sample of our most recent updates and information:

• Back in November, I presented as part of ARRT's RA Hacks program. You can click here for my slides.  I also was one of five breakout session leaders. As promised, we compiled the notes from the breakout sessions and they are now available here.
• The Speculative Fiction Genre Study is about to enter it's second, and final, year. The last meeting was on December 1 and we discussed the Doorway of Character. Here is the assignment we used. Just before that meeting, the notes on our first Doorway discussion, this time of Setting, went live at this link. Our next meeting, on the Doorway of Story will be on February 2, 2017. Details, including the assignment, are here. In general, anyone can access all of the information about the Speculative Fiction Genre Study, and even past genre studies, including all assignments and notes, here. We encourage others to use our Genre Studies as a guide to frame your own. Use as much of what we have up here as you want, all we ask is that your cite us as your source.
• The Book Club Study [formerly known as the Literary Book Discussion and Leadership Training] is going strong. We are meeting on January 12, 2017, from 2-4 pm at Schaumburg Township District Library to discuss Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyemi. The book discussion will be led by Emily Vinci. The Leadership Topic, led by me, will be about managing the group dynamic during book discussions. All of the details are here including how you can sign up.
• Finally, we are in the middle of our annual membership renewal drive. Here is the form so you can renew or join. Remember, while the notes from all of our programs are free on the web, in order to attend the Book Club Study and the Genre Study you must be a member.

I truly believe in the work we do through ARRT for everyone out there helping leisure readers. We all volunteer our time to be on the Steering Committee because we know that we are lucky to have such a long standing RA networking group in our area. But please know we realize that many of you are going at your work alone. Don't forget we are here to help, either through the ARRT website, our social media [Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest], or here on RA for All with the ARRT tag.

A Year in Reading

Today I want to point everyone to one of my favorite year end book things... The Millions A Year In Reading, a series in which they ask writers to share the best thing they read this year and why.

The link I included goes to the entire archive. Each essay not only talks abut a book that impacted a current writer in the last year, but it also provides background on the author of the essay too; meaning, each entry in the series is enjoyable on two levels, which makes it twice as good.

And finally, every single entry has clear links to every year this series has run so that you can easily access the backlist.

If you have a patron looking for their next good read, and you are stumped in how to help him or her, click on over to A Year in Reading and let the patron look through it. These are books that deeply effected someone enough to write an entire essay about it. Also, if the patron can find an author he or she enjoys [or has at least heard of], that will help you to make a connection to keep the RA conversation going. 

RA for All Roadshow Visits the Kokomo-Howard County [IN] Public Library for an All Staff Development Day

Yesterday I was also at the KHCPL, but I was speaking to library workers who lead book clubs from KHCPL and the surrounding area.  It was a meeting of the book discussion leader minds.

Today, the entire KHCPL system is closed for staff development [as this screen shot I took off their website clearly says].

I will be presenting the Keynote and two break out sessions for KHCPL today.  Below you can find the schedule and the links to all of the slides.

Before I get to that though, I just wanted to mention that today marks my final programs of the year.  Thanks to everyone who had me out to their library or meeting in 2016 and also thanks to all of you who have already booked me for 2017.

Soon, I will have a year end post about how my first full year as a professional trainer went, along with information about the most useful and popular programs. In the meantime, to see where I have been, where I am going, and the types of programs I provide please go to my Recent and Upcoming Presentations page.

But we still have today. Here is the schedule and slides...

• 10:30-Noon Keynote/Training for ALL KHCPL Staff
• RA for All: Readers Advisory belongs in every library, no matter its budget. The implementation of this vital service is the responsibility of every staff member-- from pages to directors, from those behind the scenes to the ones on the front lines. This program will remove the mystery behind providing great RA service. Using her “Ten Rules of Basic RA Service” as a guide, Becky Spratford will use your own love of your favorite books to show you how to help any patron find their next great read. It's not as hard as you think. But more importantly, you will learn why a staff that can harness the power of sharing a great read will become a stronger team and improve service to all patrons.
• Program follows Becky’s 10 Rules of Basic RA Service

• 1-1:50 Breakout Session #1
• Demystifying Genre: How To Help Every Type of Reader: Nothing is scarier than trying to help a fan of a genre you yourself don’t enjoy. You want to help that, for example, Romance reader find the perfect book, but you are having trouble knowing where to begin because...eek!... you don’t read Romance. You are afraid they will find out you are a fraud. How can YOU possibly help THEM?!? Never fear, in this program, Readers’ Advisory expert, Becky Spratford, will teach you how to keep your genre knowledge up to date, explain the biggest trends in genre fiction, and share her time tested tricks for working with genre readers. You will leave this webinar with the confidence and skill to help fans of every genre, regardless of whether you have ever read a book in that genre. And that will leave a trail of happy patrons in your wake.
• SLIDES

• December 9, 2-2:50 Breakout Session #2
• Booktalking: Harnessing the Power of Sharing Books with Patrons: Booktalking is at the heart of what we do with patrons each and every day at the public library. Whether we are sharing books informally at the services desk, presenting a prepared list of books, or posting information online, talking about books is something we do each and every day. It is a core service, but it is also hard to teach. Booktalking is more of an art than a skill, but with the right guidance and some practice, it can go a long way toward engaging your patrons and re-energizing your staff. Join experienced Readers’ Advisory Becky Spratford as she shares the secret behind delivering great book talks, giving you tips and tricks you can begin using right away to hone your own skills. Rediscover the power and joy that comes from sharing books with patrons.
• SLIDES