The Truth About Catalogers

by Will Manley, Richard Lee (Illustrator)

Go behind the scenes as Manley and Lee track down and investigate the myths, legends, and tall tales of cataloging. As a special bonus, the surprising results of Manley's American Libraries cataloger survey are revealed.

Genres: Humor

142 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

Reviews

[Monique · Rating 2 out of 5]

Okay I took time from my academic schedule to get into a little career related literature as I find everything I read now relates back to my passion and my love of books and research and I flipped through this book on the shelf, saw the comics and the references to AACR2 which I am learning all about now and all the cataloging woes you can encounter as a librarian so I checked it out to piece through on my commute and precious spare time while also learning skills I can apply and to shine in class... however this is not and I repeat this is not a scholarly text or informative for any reason whatsoever..The entire 129 book is full of dated humor, overexaggerations and lots of mistruths about catalogers being boring and from another world or something that maybe out of every ten jokes one is semi-laughable and I didn’t get the comic relief with a little knowledge I was looking for and it was bad man I mean some really deadface sad silly humor and it was at the point when they described Warning Signs that Your Cataloger is Turning into a Cat with the most ridiculous twelve point list I have seen in print in a long time about the end of Chapter 6 that I realized this book would not enrich me and I skimmed the rest, can’t recommend to my new librarian school associates because it is just too ludicrous to take up precious time with, but sigh everyone needs a break and I am sorry I chose this one to spend time with LOL..no but seriously I am truly a lighthearted and silly person so maybe I took it too seriously and didn’t take anything from it because of that I don’t know but I can say it was not my cup of coffee (yea I don’t say cup of tea I keep it real ) and my Goodreads friends I have to let you know of any book I get a chance to devour these days and can’t log my texts yet but will soon hope to come back to the paradise land of pleasure reading.I did like the illustrations despite my detachment from the humor however I can't with good conscience give it Wanksta status because of its attempt at originality and insight on the hidden world of those who categorize print and digitally, the silent gatekeepers of knowledge who put it all in manageable form in libraries and the internet for the world...sigh can’t wait….until then back to the books 1st semester girlie…..

[LibraryCin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a little book of humour, poking fun of library cataloguers – little stories, as well as cartoons.

I am a cataloguer and I suspect this will mostly appeal to cataloguers and maybe to librarians and library staff, in general. Overall, though, it was ok. Some were funny, others not as much. I read it over a couple of days, and maybe my mood made a difference, as I found things funnier in the second half of the book, on the second day I was reading it.

[Linda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, I don't know what AACR2 is nor do I understand what O.C.L.C. stands for (I'm betting that last two are Library of Congress), but I still find this book mildly amusing.

[dejah_thoris · Rating 3 out of 5]

At first I would have given this collection 4 stars but the humor doesn't have a lot of staying power. I really liked Manley's single panel cartoons that didn't require long explanations like, "Consider your relationship as a long running serial with updates." And I didn't care much for the longer jokes like how catalogers arrived on this planet. The material is VERY dated (early 1990s) so you can feel the pain of computerizing the catalog and learning how networked resources were going to work, which can be funny but also feels a bit limited. (There are also many jokes about Madonna's book Sex that don't age well.) Overall, a good collection that will make you laugh (if you're a cataloger) whose art reminded me of The Far Side for libraries, so I'm glad I got to read it via ILL.