RA FOR ALL...THE ROAD SHOW!

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Thursday, December 18, 2014

Getting Ready for My End of the Year Best Lists

I have a couple of meetings today and then tomorrow, I will be setting the BPL’s Browser’s Corner blog to run our staff’s picks for the best books they read this year.  Also, next week I will begin the 2 part end of the year Monday Discussions where you get to crow about your favorite reads of the past year.

I love running all of these different best lists from the regular person’s perspective. Yes, the critics’ lists are fun to see and spark lots of heated discussion, but I like hearing from my friends and colleagues about what they read this year that stuck with them, moved them, or simply kept them glued to the page. And often those books were not published in the current year.  The best lists I am talking about are not constrained to the publication year as the critics’ lists are.

So when I run the Monday Discussion over the next 2 Mondays, I will be asking you to tell me the best book you read this year-- regardless of publication date.  But then I will also give all of us regular folks the chance to weigh in on our favorite 2014 too [because the paid critics don’t get to have all the fun.]

But back to the "any publication year" point.  One of my big soapbox issues about helping leisure readers at the public library is utilizing the backlist.  [You can read many of my suggestions and rants in the topic using this link.] So, I thought to get in the spirit I would post the links to all of the books I have put on my personal annual best list here on the blog, going back to 2007. [Wow, that is a long time.]

Take a look and consider giving one of these books out to a patron who wants a “best book” but can’t find any of 2014’s contenders on the shelf.

Becky’s best reads of the year:

[Editors note: Going through those links was like an episode of this is your life. Need a fun end of the year work break? Go back and look through your own personal best books lists from year’s past. It’s a great RA training exercise AND it is a lot of fun.]

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