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45 Books About Libraries and Librarians to Check Out Now
Librarians are good people, and libraries are good places. This is as close to a certainty as can be had in our uncertain world. So it stands to reason—loose reason, but still—that books about libraries and librarians must be good, too. Right? Right.
We’ve gathered below 45 books that feature bibliophilic elements with variations on the term library in the title. This is a surprisingly fun and useful way to sort books, we’ve found, if only for the compelling juxtapositions. You’ll find World War II stories next to existential speculative fiction. Regency-era mystery next to sexy librarian romance. Time-traveling steampunk sci-fi next to Dame Agatha Christie.
We’ve also appended some nonfiction books to the end of this roundup, including the excellently titled real-life story of The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu.
Scan the book images below, click through for more details on each title, and add anything you like to your Want to Read shelf. Do it for the librarians, won’t you?
Fiction
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Nonfiction
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Are you a fan of reading about libraries and librarians? Let us know your favorite books along this theme in the comments below!
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Comments Showing 1-30 of 30 (30 new)
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BiblioTech: Why Libraries Matter More Than Ever in the Age of Google by John PalfreyEvil Librarian by Michelle Knudson
Librarian Tales: Funny, Strange, and Inspiring Dispatches from the Stacks by William Otten
'The Tractate Middoth' by the great M.R.James is a fine short story for those who like their library/librarian tales to be strange and decidedly threatening.
The Rover, The Destruction of the Books, and Lord of the Librariesa delightful romp of a fantasy trilogy.
Did they just do a search for books with "Library" or "Librarian" in the title?
I can´t believe The Shadow of the Wind is not in a list "about libraries". Actually, I can,these goodreads "lists" are notoriously bad and biased.
E wrote: "Did they just do a search for books with "Library" or "Librarian" in the title?"Obviously,because it´s not an accurate list.
feels criminal to not include “the starless sea”
Library of the Dead, by Glenn Cooper, is the first book of a great trilogy. I think it should be included in the list.
I love reading books that are about books, libraries, and librarians themed. This is an interesting list. Definetly going onto my to read list and checking out these new ones I haven't read yet.
I'm obligated to plug this one since one of the authors is a patron at my library: The Long Overdue Library Book Revised
Paula wrote: "I can´t believe The Shadow of the Wind is not in a list "about libraries". Actually, I can,these goodreads "lists" are notoriously bad and biased."Was coming to say the same about Shadow not being on the list!!
Edward Eager's Seven Day Magic. (When the book is due, the magic ...)Garth Nix's The Left-handed Booksellers of London
E wrote: "Did they just do a search for books with "Library" or "Librarian" in the title?"Haha, I was thinking the same thing
The librarians are covering up the Alcatraz conspiracy by not including “Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians”
Wendy the Super Librarian keeps an excellent "Librarians in Romance" booklist on her blog off Goodreads...would not say the list is exclusively romance. Not sure if I can include an external link in this post...in your favourite browser search for "wendy the super librarian librarians in romance" and the top result should be the page I'm referencing. Enjoy!
I translated into Romanian Laini Taylor's duology Strange the Dreamer & Muse of Nightmares, and particularly the first book is one of the most touching I have ever encountered about a librarian and a library and about books and what you discover in and through them: Miracles Before Breakfast, anyone?I would also mention another of my translations, namely The Left-Handed Booksellers of London, by Garth Nix, but it's indeed about booksellers and not librarians, though--
I love books about books and the people who maintain them! Honestly, I'm a sucker for the archivists too. I maintain a shelf for books about books so here are some of those that I enjoyed with librarians:Direct Descent by Frank Herbert
The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections by Eva Jurczyk
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
I really enjoyed The Woman In The Library. And if anyone is generally interested in bibliomysteries, I offer a couple of anthologies:
Death Sentences by Otto Penzler (this is the UK version but there is a US edition & they differ a bit in stories).
Murder by the Book: Mysteries for Bibliophiles by Martin Edwards (a great collection from the British Library Crime Classics).
The Vanished Library: A Wonder of the Ancient World by Luciano Canfora. "The Library of Alexandria, one of the wonders of the Ancient World, has haunted Western culture for over 2,000 years. The Ptolemaic kings of Egypt--successors of Alexander the Great--had a staggering ambition: to house all of the books ever written under one roof, and the story of the universal library and its destruction still has the power to move us. But what was the library, and where was it? Did it exist at all? Contemporary descriptions are vague and contradictory. The fate of the precious books themselves is a subject of endless speculation. Canfora resolves these puzzles in one of the most unusual books of classical history ever written. He recreates the world of Egypt and the Greeks in brief chapters that marry the craft of the novelist and the discipline of the historian. Anecdotes, conversations, and reconstructions give The Vanished Library the compulsion of an exotic tale, yet Canfora bases all of them on historical and literary sources, which he discusses with great panache. As the chilling conclusion to this elegant piece of historical detective work he establishes who burned the books. This volume has benefited from the collegial support of The Wake Forest University Studium."
Asher wrote: "The librarians are covering up the Alcatraz conspiracy by not including “Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians”"Curse them, they're so comprehensive!
Paula wrote: "I can´t believe The Shadow of the Wind is not in a list "about libraries". Actually, I can,these goodreads "lists" are notoriously bad and biased."yes exactly!!!! I went through the whole list trying to find the shadow of the wind.
booked for kidnapping