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This Book Is Overdue!: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All

Marilyn Johnson (Goodreads Author)

3.42 · Rating details · 4,634 ratings · 1,084 reviews

In This Book is Overdue!, acclaimed author Marilyn Johnson celebrates libraries and librarians, and, as she did in her popular first book, The Dead Beat, discovers offbeat and eloquent characters in the quietest corners. In defiance of doomsayers, Johnson finds librarians more vital and necessary than ever, as they fuse the tools of the digital age with love for the writte ...more

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Hardcover, 272 pages

Published February 2nd 2010 by Harper (first published January 15th 2010)

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Feb 11, 2011 RandomAnthony rated it it was ok

This Book is Overdue is a quick read with an identity crisis. Should the book be a serious analysis of the manner in which libraries and librarians are changing, for better or for worse, with the rise of technology? Should it be a memoir-ish narrative of the author's experience visiting libraries (both in real and Second Life) and librarians? What about a huggy chapter on teaching potential librarians from developing cultures how to use technology to improve the lives of their patrons? These par This Book is Overdue is a quick read with an identity crisis. Should the book be a serious analysis of the manner in which libraries and librarians are changing, for better or for worse, with the rise of technology? Should it be a memoir-ish narrative of the author's experience visiting libraries (both in real and Second Life) and librarians? What about a huggy chapter on teaching potential librarians from developing cultures how to use technology to improve the lives of their patrons? These parts coalesce less into a coherent whole and more into what seems like what could have been a long magazine article stretched thin into an undersized book with large font.

The text includes positives, sure. The chapter that compassionately contrasts the desire of an aging New York librarian, who wants to preserve a unique but rarely used collection, with the push of young, hipper librarians who focus on customer service and the needs of the broader public, is well done. And the chapter on “Second Life” librarians made me, um, feel a lot better about the time I spend on Goodreads. And I love that the author acknowledges that some librarians are evil enough to bounce to the front of material waiting lists. Johnson falls flat when she goes into cheerleader mode. Yes, yes, I know, you respect librarians. You said that about 4,000 times, and guess what, your readership probably respects librarians, too. Yay. Near the end I felt like I was reading that part of a sixth grader's essay when she really, really needs to pad a couple pages to reach the required length. And Johnson's distaste of stack-weeding confused me. Ok, I get it, you worry that some valuable books might get lost in the weeding process. But where the hell are you supposed to put these books that no one reads? What about the books that are falling apart? Yes, it's a shame. Is that all you got?

Maybe because I'm already converted to the message Johnson is preaching I didn't get much from This Book Is Overdue. It's ok. If I needed more than a few hours with the book I doubt I would have continued. Johnson failed, I think, to acknowledge that readers are probably going to see through what I perceived as a well-intentioned attempt to sell books on a slam dunk topic (readers love to read about reading, right?) that covers its lack of substance with a chatty narrative. Ok. Not great. Look for This Book Is Overdue within a month of two in the discount sections of bookstores everywhere. ...more

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Jan 02, 2012 Brian Bess rated it it was ok

As a recent MLIS graduate and new library professional, I approached this book with the anticipation that I would read a book that would serve as a standard bearer for my profession and bring all the vital functions that libraries provide to the attention of a wider audience. Here was our champion sounding the clarion call for a profession that has historically been unappreciated and certainly underfunded. Perhaps this book would explain to the world at least what we really do.
Perhaps my expecta As a recent MLIS graduate and new library professional, I approached this book with the anticipation that I would read a book that would serve as a standard bearer for my profession and bring all the vital functions that libraries provide to the attention of a wider audience. Here was our champion sounding the clarion call for a profession that has historically been unappreciated and certainly underfunded. Perhaps this book would explain to the world at least what we really do.
Perhaps my expectations were set too high. Marilyn Johnson possesses undeniable enthusiasm and interest in libraries and I appreciate the admiration. We need more people like her singing our praises. However, the book itself rambles and wastes precious space recounting how she finds these professionals toiling quietly behind the scenes. The book begins with promise. Her accounts of the origin of OCLC and the advantages of using a trained librarian rather than Google are engaging. Likewise, her account of the legal battle that librarians successfully waged against the U.S. government defending themselves against the Patriot Act.
However, she goes to extreme lengths to describe tattooed librarians, ring-nosed librarians, multicolored-haired librarians, lesbian librarians, all-of-the-above librarians that run inflammatory blogs. She spends an entire chapter discussing Second Life and the avatars and alter egos of librarians living colorful virtual fantasy lives. While this may be fun for participants, it seems like a frivolous waste of space when there is so much about real world librarians that can be told.
After Second Life, the book loses the momentum it was building up to that point. Her account of the New York Public Library system reads like publicity literature for the NYPL, fawning over these heroes who not only provide valuable services and amazing collections to the public but also sponsor events for giving authors respect and attention that they themselves do not get, until someone like Marilyn Johnson puts them in a book.
I realize that I speak as a library professional rather than a patron who appreciates libraries but I feel that more space devoted to the days in the lives of librarians and descriptions of what they actually do would have been far more interesting than chapters on Second Life or tattooed bloggers. Perhaps more readers respond more strongly to tales of eccentrics or fantasy lives than they would to straightforward accounts of the work of librarians. I speak from the perspective of one who works in a public library although I acknowledge that those who work in academic libraries as well as special libraries are also given short shrift. I appreciate the intention and I hate to sound ungrateful but I think she failed to use the opportunity to its fullest advantage.

...more

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Mar 12, 2018 Jim rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 1audio, 2non-fiction

Exactly what the blurb says, this was a fun romp through those who serve so proudly. A little goes a long way, especially when it comes to an entire chapter on librarians in the virtual world of Second Life, though. Still, she covered a lot of ground & showed how libraries are evolving to keep meeting their & our needs. They are one of the best democratic institutions allowing free & anonymous access to one & all. The part about the FBI's attempts to gain information is plain scary.

The coverage ...more

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Jan 07, 2012 Susanne E rated it liked it

Shelves: nonfiction

My 3-star rating is somewhat misleading - some chapters were 5-star worthy, such as the one about the Connecticut 4 who challenged the Patriot Act and an account of a collaboration between reference librarians and artists. The book also includes some of the best and most eloquent defenses I've heard of the value of libraries in the 21st century and some good thoughts on technology and libraries. But at other points Johnson veered off into a weird obsession with Second Life, got sidetracked by a ...more

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Jul 22, 2012 Nathaniel rated it it was ok

As a male, non-hipster library school student with skill in actual library technology (not just social media and empty buzzwords such as "Library 2.0"), I found this book to be incredibly depressing and superficial. I'm sure there are plenty in the library community at large who can appreciate it, but I really thought it did a poor job of showing the true diversity of the library community - not just reference librarians in public libraries, but academic, school, and special librarians as well, ...more

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Jul 05, 2011 Kimberly rated it it was ok

Shelves: library_science, non-fiction

Not my favorite style of book--lots of interesting, but somewhat random stories. Some of the stories were pretty cool, but I also came away from the book feeling like I'll be a failure in life if I'm not some over-the-top amazing librarian who changes the world!!! Those stories and people are cool, but to some extent, they're the exception, not the norm. We can't all take on the Supreme Court by disregarding an FBI letter and challenging the Patriot Act. If we get the opportunity, great, but man ...more

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Oct 08, 2011 Richard Derus rated it liked it

One full star off for snarky reference to avoiding dog ownership and absence of similar judgment on cat-ownership's insanity.

I thoroughly enjoyed (most of) this book. It's true that I'm a recent re-convert to library usage, after many years of avoiding them because of one old prune-faced, pursey-lipped hag's humiliation of me: She wouldn't let twelve-year-old me check out Stranger in a Strange Land "because it has S-E-X in it" until my mother approved. Mama's rejoinder to that was, "Honey, so do One full star off for snarky reference to avoiding dog ownership and absence of similar judgment on cat-ownership's insanity.

I thoroughly enjoyed (most of) this book. It's true that I'm a recent re-convert to library usage, after many years of avoiding them because of one old prune-faced, pursey-lipped hag's humiliation of me: She wouldn't let twelve-year-old me check out Stranger in a Strange Land "because it has S-E-X in it" until my mother approved. Mama's rejoinder to that was, "Honey, so does life. If you're lucky." (Actually, she was middle-aged, plump, and wore a HUGE cross around her neck...when she was done with her mischief, I made my mother laugh by saying, "too bad it wasn't the crown of thorns.")

But the many and various challenges that libraries face are completely transparent to the public that uses them. We just expect that they'll keep on being there, checking books out to us, providing online resources for our kids and grandkids, being waystations for us when our own Internet connections go down or whatever. We're not fond of paying for the libraries, either, as demonstrated by the readiness of governments of all sizes to cut their acquisition, staffing, maintenance budgets to the bone and beyond, to the point of amputation.

Fortunately, The Librarian is a resolute and resilient subspecies of Homo "sapiens", and has cleverly disguised itself in some very odd places...Google "Second Life" sometime and go for a walk on the Weird Side! Lots of librarians talked to author Johnson, and told her tales of woe; but she heard paeans of praise and odes to joy, too, and reports each and all of these classes of utterance with clarity and asperity.

Libraries and librarians have moved onto the World Wide Web with verve and enthusiasm...but back in RL, things aren't so rosy. The New York Public Library's iconic building at Forty-second and Fifth will, for the first time in forty years, house a circulating library. It comes at the cost of the Asian and Russian collections, but what the hell...the money from redeveloping the Mid-Manhattan Branch's site into yet another hotel will do some good, too, right? But...and this is where I get madder than hell...can any amount of material gain make up for the loss to the culture of the world that two collections of rare, irreplaceable material objects (the papers of the Tsarist government! the contents of a monastery's library!) properly curated and indexed represent? I presume the fact that I bother to phrase the question tells you what MY answer is.

I said in another review that "{h}istory is the beautiful, brightly lit foam on top of the annihilating tsunami of the unrecorded past. History books are the spectrographic analysis of the light glinting off that foam." Yes, but I left out a key component: Without a library to house, organize, cross-reference, FIND that book, what good does the damned thing do?

Support your local library in a PRACTICAL way. And go hug a librarian. ...more

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Mar 31, 2010 Beverly rated it it was ok

Shelves: non-fiction

Wow. How unusual. A journalist who does a superficial job in covering a subject that raises more questions than the author can ask let alone answer. This is a good example of why I so often rate non-fiction with few stars. It fails to demonstrate the human ability to think, but is full of examples of the human shortcoming of glibness.

Basically this was a library fan's view of the current state of computer technology in libraries today which raises no questions about the future. The achievements ...more

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Sep 04, 2010 Mike (the Paladin) rated it liked it

Fairly interesting book...I skimmed mostly (forgive me librarians of the world!). It wasn't exactly what I'd expected, still fairly interesting take on what librarians have done for the world (all of us) and are still doing. You might find it what you're looking for, I appreciate what librarians have to put up with (including the bureaucracies). My daughter worked for the Nashville system "back when" and after a few years had done and was doing every job there was to do...but, she topped out at Fairly interesting book...I skimmed mostly (forgive me librarians of the world!). It wasn't exactly what I'd expected, still fairly interesting take on what librarians have done for the world (all of us) and are still doing. You might find it what you're looking for, I appreciate what librarians have to put up with (including the bureaucracies). My daughter worked for the Nashville system "back when" and after a few years had done and was doing every job there was to do...but, she topped out at a salary it would be hard to survive on if you were still living at home with no bills. You see, she didn't have a degree in "library science", so even if she could do and did do the work, she couldn't be paid above a certain amount. She of course left for other office work (and has done well). The other librarians didn't want to lose competent help...but could do nothing about it.

A few years ago we had a mayor who believed in putting money into the library system...we (myself included) got used to finding almost any new book we looked for in the collection, there were new facilities built, buildings refurbished, even a brand new HUGE main library building built in downtown Nashville. Then we changed mayors...the beautiful new building sits half empty and trying to find a new release now is almost a joke. Book funds for the year are spent within the first couple of months... apparently the new mayor (same political party) thinks money for the library is only a waste. the librarians however have to put up with patrons (like me) who got used to finding almost anything we looked for... I try to be nice, I know it's not their fault, and mostly they handle the frustrated patrons.

As I said, not a bad book. We could all probably stand to appreciate librarians more. Okay, they're not all great, there are some painfully poor librarians, but those aren't the norm. Personally if we ever move to automated librarians... I shall be very sad. Librarians are a national/international treasure. That's what I like about the book, it's not the most readable and it may itself contribute a bit to information overload at times (a theme in the book), but it's not bad. 3 stars. ...more

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May 22, 2010 Grace rated it really liked it

Shelves: writing, current-events, education, literacy, read-in-2010, cultural-studies, non-fiction

"In tough times, a librarian is a terrible thing to waste." And so starts this charming and inside glimpse into the life and times of being a librarian in ever evolving libraries in the 21st century. Author Marilyn Johnson takes her readers on a journey through a database migration in Westchester County, New York, to changing the largest research library in the New York City Public Library system into a circulation library, to librarians setting up virtual libraries and reference desks in Second ...more

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May 01, 2010 Becky rated it really liked it

This book was definitely a great advertisement for the profession, especially as it was written by someone outside the profession. Its evocation of the tattooed knitting zinester librarian cliche (certainly better than the shushing bun cliche) could have become a wee bit silly, but I think it mostly managed not to.

*browses other reviews* No, it wasn't a serious-minded document that used dollar signs and political philosophy to change the way government and citizens think about libraries, but it ...more

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Jun 27, 2010 William Clemens rated it did not like it

I tried, I just couldn't get through this book. As a librarian I hoped for some revelations and information in this book, instead I just got bored. I can't do a proper review because after forcing myself through the first 120 pages, which took me four weeks, I threw in the towel.

Marilyn Johnson is clever and somewhat entertaining, but her constant amazement and wonder at everything librarians could do got really old. Blah... ...more

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Sep 26, 2011 Dusty Roether rated it it was amazing

Shelves: libraries-and-information

With the question of the future of libraries on the line in the minds of some, Johnson’s book is a timely work that sheds light on the wildly diverse world of librarianship. Some argue that the library is an antiquated institution that is not necessary in the world of the iPad, ebooks, and Google Books. However, Johnson illustrates the diverse ways that librarians and other information professionals serve the research needs of their users–often in the most unexpected ways. From a unique program With the question of the future of libraries on the line in the minds of some, Johnson’s book is a timely work that sheds light on the wildly diverse world of librarianship. Some argue that the library is an antiquated institution that is not necessary in the world of the iPad, ebooks, and Google Books. However, Johnson illustrates the diverse ways that librarians and other information professionals serve the research needs of their users–often in the most unexpected ways. From a unique program at St. John’s University in which librarians teach students from around the world how to use technology to bring about social justice, to information professionals who serve users in the Internet world of Second Life, Johnson’s well-researched vignettes prove that the field of librarianship is not a dying one.

The book also provides an introduction to other parts of the field of library science, including archives and digital libraries, showing how these institutions too are morphing consistently to suit the needs of society. Perhaps this book should be sent to the politicians and corporate leaders who seek to close public libraries. At the same time, her research reveals new, innovative ways in which information users can be served by information professionals. Society is always changing, in one way or another, and information professionals must adapt to the needs of society. This is why information professionals exist, and without progress, information institutions will not achieve their ultimate goals. Every librarian and information professional should read this inspiring book so that we can learn, from the stories which Johnson so effectively illustrates, how to fulfill our users’ informational needs, whatever they may be, in the most efficient way possible.

“I was under the librarians’ protection. Civil servants and servants of civility, they had my back. They would be whatever they needed to be that day: information professionals, teachers, police, community organizers, computer technicians, historians, confidantes, clerks, social workers, storytellers, or, in this case, guardians of my peace.” (252) ...more

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Feb 20, 2010 Dave rated it it was amazing

Marilyn Johnson has accomplished one of the most difficult tasks a journalist can attempt: she accurately portrayed change in the midst of it happening. In This Book Is Overdue!: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All, she tackles librarianship, a profession undergoing changes that rival the Industrial Revolution. A daunting feat, but she nailed it.

The major change agent in the field is the same one rocketing through the rest of our society, technology. Johnson's singular accomplishment w Marilyn Johnson has accomplished one of the most difficult tasks a journalist can attempt: she accurately portrayed change in the midst of it happening. In This Book Is Overdue!: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All, she tackles librarianship, a profession undergoing changes that rival the Industrial Revolution. A daunting feat, but she nailed it.

The major change agent in the field is the same one rocketing through the rest of our society, technology. Johnson's singular accomplishment was to describe the impact of that many-headed monster with a minimum of jargon and a maximum of humaneness. She did it not by focusing on bits and bytes, industrial statistics and professional arcana, but by presenting the human side of technology; how librarians are adapting (or not) to their new tools, defending their jobs (or not) against the onslaught of automation, and even inventing (or avoiding) new roles in their communities for their cherished libraries. Her eye was on the people, not the machines.

First and foremost, Johnson is a storyteller. Like the good magazine journalist she was in her prior career, she uses people to tell her story of cyber assault on the stacks. Each chapter explains the lives--personal and professional--of outstanding, devoted, and often off-beat librarians. Yet she never strays from the theme of the book, which is that librarians are the people who can "Save Us All" from drowning in the digital ocean. Among the many tales she tells is the one about Kathy Shaughnessy, the Assistant Professor/Instructional Services Librarian at St. John's University Library in Queens who leads a team teaching computer skills to students from a wide variety of countries at the University's campus in Rome. The goal: to enable the students, some of whom had never touched a computer, to return to their native land and complete their master's degree online. In another, she lavishes praise on David Smith, the storied reference librarian at NYPL who retired in 2009 after a career devoted to helping writers use the institution's vast resources to their best effect. In the process, she tells us not only what Smith accomplished, but gave us an accurate picture of what's happening to the home of Patience and Fortitude (the stone lions that guard the library) as it plunges headlong into the digital age.

Johnson also tells the disturbing story of the near-debacle that happened when the Westchester Library System installed new catalog software to serve 37 of its 38 member libraries. Her account has two viewpoints, that of the librarians struggling with the new system and the one of the IT director trying to make it work. There is A LOT OF TENSION in the story. Full disclosure: I was president of the WLS Board at the time and witnessed the events firsthand. Trust me, Johnson's account is distressingly accurate.

It would be easy to get lost and start wandering in the electronic landscape, but Johnson generally steers clear of that danger. The only time her compass went a little haywire was in her chapter on libraries in Second Life, the virtual world constructed by people with an apparently limitless amount of time on their hands. Admittedly, my opinion of the whole enterprise probably clouds my viewpoint, which matches that of Johnson's husband, Rob, whom she quotes as observing, "Yes, yes, but what's it for?"

Even during her foray into Second Life, though, Johnson's exuberance carries the narrative. Her enthusiasm for the topic and her obvious love for the subjects of her tales--the librarians she hung out with for three years while researching the book--are evident on every page. This Book Is Overdue is just what the title says, a long-overdue love song to librarians. ...more

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Mar 17, 2010 Erik rated it really liked it

My strong love and affinity for my local public library system has been put into words in Johnson’s passionately researched book on the twenty-first century public library – internet, books, and all.

Librarians’ values are as sound as Girl Scouts’: truth, free speech, and universal literacy. And, like Scouts, they possess a quality that I think makes librarians invaluable and indispensible: they want help. They want to help us. They want to be of service. And they’re not trying to sell us anythi My strong love and affinity for my local public library system has been put into words in Johnson’s passionately researched book on the twenty-first century public library – internet, books, and all.

Librarians’ values are as sound as Girl Scouts’: truth, free speech, and universal literacy. And, like Scouts, they possess a quality that I think makes librarians invaluable and indispensible: they want help. They want to help us. They want to be of service. And they’re not trying to sell us anything…In tight economic times, with libraries sliding farther and farther down the list of priorities, we risk losing the loss of their ideals, intelligence, and knowledge, not to mention their commitment to access for all – librarians consider free access to information the foundation of democracy, and they’re right. Librarians are essential players in the information revolution because they level that field.

Sure, Johnson is clearly the optimist, and library and librarians biggest cheerleader – next to their uncrowned “leader”, Nancy Pearl – but don’t think for a second that she doesn’t hesitate to get in some libertarian-minded digs at the Patriot Act, which was enacted by the Bush administration, and renewed with little change in substance by Obama’s. The Connecticut Four case that she details in chapter five, “Big Brother and the Holdout Company”, reveals the disturbing circumvention of our constitutional rights by way of a gag-order. When the powers-that-be assert that what is good for the goose is good for the gander is, in truth, a direct attack on our rights. Anyone saying otherwise – Ashcroft, Gonzales, or Holder – is lying through their teeth.

The heaviness of politics and (under)funding aside, Johnson also devotes equal time to the librarians who haunt the internet on Second Life and the blogosphere, the corporate-structure of the New York Public Library system (who would imagine that its CEO earns nearly $800K yearly?), and librarian meet-ups for the young and hip (Parker Posey in Party Girl, anyone?). Never has librarianship been better illuminated.

If you’re a fan and user of your nearest public library, this book is just for you: A delightful and informative journey into the modern day library. Three cheers for all your librarians working your heart out for us!
...more

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Apr 05, 2010 Sarah rated it it was amazing

As a librarian, I always get sucked into reading "popular" treatments of libraries and librarianship, and while this book isn't perfect I definitely do think it's the best of all the library-related books I've read in the last couple of years. On my more cynical days I feel like no one appreciates what great resources libraries (and librarians!) are, and it's good for the ego to hear from someone who is clearly such a fan of librarians, what we do, and what we stand for.

Like many other reviewers ...more

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Feb 14, 2010 Cathe Fein Olson rated it liked it

Being a library advocate/activist as well as an elementary school library media tech, I had such high hopes for this book. I didn't even wait for my public library to get it in, I ordered it so I could get it right away. Unfortunately, I have to say this book did not measure up to my expectations. I loved what it was trying to do . . . show how important and relevant librarians have been and continue to be, but I found this book kind of . . . boring. It was mostly anecdotes of the author's exper ...more

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Jan 17, 2018 Dna rated it did not like it

Shelves: non-fiction, ebook, skimmed-to-finish, books-about-books, 2018

Can I give this non-stars? I don't want to offend anyone, least of all my heroes: librarians. So, suffice it to say, this book was not at all what I expected and I expect my expectations are not really at fault here. I knew I was going for librarian lite when I saw the cover and title, but was excited to learn more about modern librarianship and anything about peripheral library staff that support our amazing librarians -- like media or digital specialists, information specialists and beyond. Bu ...more

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Apr 20, 2010 Dolly rated it really liked it

Recommends it for: Librarians and bibliophiles

Shelves: humor, other-usa, 2010, science, washington-dc, australia, education-school, library, nonfiction, new-england

I have decided that when I grow up I would like to become a librarian. So some time in the remaining 5 years of my military career I plan to pursue a Masters degree in Library and Information Science. In the meantime, I saw this book in the New books section at my local library and thought I would see what I plan to get myself into.

The book is a real eye-opener. The world of the librarian is so much more technical and global now, more so than I even thought it would be. This book demonstrates t I have decided that when I grow up I would like to become a librarian. So some time in the remaining 5 years of my military career I plan to pursue a Masters degree in Library and Information Science. In the meantime, I saw this book in the New books section at my local library and thought I would see what I plan to get myself into.

The book is a real eye-opener. The world of the librarian is so much more technical and global now, more so than I even thought it would be. This book demonstrates these changes in a rambling sort of way and shows how virtual a lot of it is becoming. The author touches on myraid ways librarians are not only changing the face of the typical library, but also how they are changing the world. She spends a lot of time talking about librarians in cyberspace, as Second Life characters, bloggers, virtual archivists, and World-wide cataloguers. She touches on the evolution of the brick and mortar libraries, too, the demographics they are trying to appeal to and the ways they are changing their physical layouts, catalogues, and reading/computing spaces. She waxes poetic about the New York Public Library and the disappointing choices the trustees have made. And she talks about the mystery of archiving. What to save, who should do it, what's the best way to save online material, etc. Overall it was a very good read; the author definitely poured a lot of blood, sweat and tears into it. And although I see some challenges up ahead for me, I am excited to embark on this next career. I just hope I can get a job!

new words: palimpsest, aertheric

of note - I liked the reference to Librarian's values: truth, free speech and universal literacy. (p. 8)

I also was a bit dumbfounded at the coincidence to the reference to Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. (p. 141) I just (within the last week) reread that book and I wasn't sure why I picked it out. And a week later I find a reference to it here in this book (one of the surprising few fictional books she refers to in the book.) This seems to happen to me all of the time. Odd... ...more

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Feb 16, 2010 Joan added it

I requested this book from the Amazon Vine program because I love libraries and librarians. I thought I'd be reading a real discussion about the place of the library in this cyber-age. But I didn't get that. In fact, it's hard to say what I did get.

The problem is stated clearly and succinctly by the author early on (though I doubt she realized that she was describing her book!), when she says, "This is a story . . . researched partly on a computer in mazes so extended and complex -- every link a ...more

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Jan 17, 2011 Melanie rated it liked it

This was a really fun book, and I'm glad I finally got around to listening to it. I wasn't a huge fan of the reader, but the content was interesting enough that it didn't matter too much.

I couldn't help but wonder what a non-library reader would think of the book. Does everyone consider librarians to be defenders of freedom like we do? Does anyone else find the necessary, and seemingly unlikely, symbiosis between the IT department and the cataloging department interesting? Librarians have sued t ...more

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May 24, 2010 Julia rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-fiction, best-books-i-read-in-2010

I'm a book lover, a library-holic (no 12- step programs for this!) and when I visit my or any library I love talking with the librarians. So when I saw this on the shelf I had to borrow it!

This non-fiction is about the superhuman job librarians and archivists perform to preserve, protect and make accessible our culture, our knowledge, our values.
David Smith was a reference librarian at NYPL whose mission it was to help writers find the data they needed in the enormous reference library there. H ...more

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Apr 16, 2010 Pam rated it liked it

Shelves: non-fiction

Who knew there were librarian fan boys! As one myself, I guess I shouldn't be surprised but this woman wrote an entire book about the changing nature of librarians and the information world. You really have to be into finding out stuff or keeping stuff in a codified way in order to love this book. However it gives an excellent, comprehensive view of the librarian world today, from community-use librarians and their struggles with circulation systems to research librarians and the role of the web ...more

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Jan 25, 2015 Megan Tristao rated it it was amazing

Shelves: nonfiction, bookish-books

Well, perhaps I am biased, but this book was fantastic! (And this possible bias is because I'm currently in school to earn a Master of Library and Information Science, if anyone was wondering.) Marilyn Johnson is NOT a librarian, but she followed some around for years (or so it seems) to write this book, and I appreciate her perspective as an "outsider" sharing all these wonderful anecdotes with us. The book is humorous yet serious and its chapters cover libraries from the NYPL research library ...more

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Jan 23, 2018 Eli Claire rated it it was ok

I am technically, although not officially, a librarian - I am a recent MA Librarianship graduate, but have yet to work in a library. I picked up this book because, well, duh ... books about libraries and information are right up my alley. Unfortunately, this one was pretty disjointed, and I had to force myself to finish it. The chapters didn’t seem to go together and I didn’t get a sense that the author had any new ideas. It might have to do with the fact that the book was published in 2007 - wh ...more

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Mar 28, 2010 Siobhan rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2010, information-science

Overall informative and entertaining, definitely (as others mentioned) a "feel good" book about libraries, and how essential libraries are to present populations and not as a relic of the past. Though I would knock off a half-star for the chapter on Second Life; as far as I can tell from the literature, librarians are obsessed with it, but as a librarian, I don't know anyone who is (and I'm certainly not, though I'm not going to lie -- I stopped mid-chapter to see if there were any WoW guilds fo ...more

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Jun 10, 2010 Erica added it

Loved it. I was already a fan of marilyn johnson from her previous book, The Dead Beat, which was all about obituaries. At the time, I said her writing was like Mary Roach but better, and I stand by that. I think she's the best "many perspectives on a single subject" author around, and this one is of course of special interest to anyone interested in reading and libraries, which should be anyone reading this review. I'm very excited to work on the marketing for the paperback of this next year. L ...more

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Apr 25, 2019 Donna rated it it was ok

Shelves: books-about-books

Nonfiction about librarians and changes with technology

This should have been much better. I'm a sucker for books about books and books about libraries. I visit my local library about once a week and think librarians are amazingly wonderful. But this book dragged. The author pointed towards a bunch of shiny objects - look at this tattooed librarian over here! - but didn't pull off any kind of actual analysis of the subject. I skimmed a lot in the last half. As written in the tag line, librarians ...more

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Mar 19, 2010 Matt rated it liked it

It was inspiring in a lot of ways, made me feel proud to be part of such an eclectic and awesome profession. I would have given in four stars if it didn't have an entire chapter on Second Life nonsense. Sorry, I just don't see that as relevant for the future at all and it just seemed like a chapter full of "ooh, look at this novelty-- isn't it NEATO?!?!" and little of substance. ...more

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Sep 24, 2010 Tim rated it liked it

Shelves: 3

As a devout library lover in my youth, though finding very little reason to visit in my older years (and actually feeling sad about this) due to largely to lack of reading time... this was a fun book to read. It does its job of making libraries seem exciting, and full of awesomeness. The writer expresses the loves that are close to all library-lover's hearts: books, collecting books, organizing books, reading book, knowing about books and the stuff we found in books -- oh and all that other medi As a devout library lover in my youth, though finding very little reason to visit in my older years (and actually feeling sad about this) due to largely to lack of reading time... this was a fun book to read. It does its job of making libraries seem exciting, and full of awesomeness. The writer expresses the loves that are close to all library-lover's hearts: books, collecting books, organizing books, reading book, knowing about books and the stuff we found in books -- oh and all that other media and stuff as well. She expresses this while describing the struggles, experiments, and changes made in libraries in these internet times.

As a fairly adept computer/database programmer and all-around "IT" guy, and developer of a web site that currently gets about 500,000 unique visits per month, I felt that she could have used the thing she stresses many times in the book that libraries need now: competent computer/IT consulting/staff. Pretty much every library computer/web interface I've seen (in Canada) has sucked extremely badly. Excusing this by saying these companies who supply these systems (and horrifically expensive prices) were the only ones capable of handling such large collections at the time is just ridiculous to those of us who have some knowledge of these things. Excusing great mystery of the missing holds as finally (after how long?!) as being not the fault of the software, but of the librarians, equally misdiagnoses the problem. Were there no simple audit trails? Do the developers have no respect for data integrity?!!! Excusing this on having to interface with or work on top of legacy systems and structures, while certainly a consideration and a constraint, does not seem credible to me.

It's truly broken my heart to see the crap my beloved libraries have installed, and tied themselves to. And continue to. The IT consultants they seem to end up with these days seem more to be sales people --- selling them a bill of goods. A short term we-want-to-be-hip-and-up-to-date solution tied to specific devices, or pathetic DRM schemes.

And the length of time the author spends in Second Life is, to me, also rather startling. She does mention the lag and glitches. But she doesn't mention the relatively steep learning curve and hardware requirements just for entry. She describes the scenes she participates in that world with beautiful imagination: the (virtual) reality is vastly (if not infinitely) more clunky. Yeah, it's interesting and fun that a group of librarians have gravitated there and done interesting things... but Second Life is rather rather old technology by this point, which never really took off as expected: it's a niche of which you can say at least it did better than all of the other "revolutionary" virtual reality environments that were supposed to change the way we interacted with computers. Admittedly it's been years since I looked at it, and frankly I felt like I had entered a time machine and gone back about five years to hear such glowing reviews of it in this book. Five years!

I was more interested in the social activism side of librarians; and some of the history of library initiatives was quite interesting.

Lately, though I have no "information systems" training, I have found myself helping a local non-profit organization (for free) get their old, approximately 2000 volume, card catalog into a computer. I set up Koha for them (an excellent, free, open-source, library software -- even if it feels a bit hodge-podge) and wrote up documentation on the cataloging process, and circulation. Actually I've ended up doing the input for 1500 of the volumes myself in my spare time over the last year. I've become very familiar with MARC (in it's various flavours), Z39.50, worldcat, and related things.

I've also become rather intimate with the blessed cards, and all their peculiarities. Notes written on them by librarians 20 years ago which are now indecipherable. At several points the cart catalog was gone through and a system of small lines, dots or checkmarks were added to the corners of cards indicate some sort of status. No one really remembers what the marks meant -- and what they do remember no one knows if the information is still valid. There are professinionally printed cards with LCC numbers. But most of the cards are manually typed: I am amazed by the skill of the old typewriter formatting! So much time and love went into these cards. Little details. They were lucky to have had a real librarian labouring with love on these. Some cards are hand written...
the physical cards themselves are a treasure which in some ways I hate to supplant.

Perhaps we will image them, and add the card catalog as an item to the online database as a curiosity. (Most are already photographed as part of our digitizing process.) Some amateur librarian in the future who cares about this little library may like to just randomly flip through some of the card images -- for some nostalgic fun, and inspiration.

Anyhow, it was interesting to read the author's own, non-techie, struggle with the simple (yet so complex) business of saving web pages for herself. And it was nice she gave a vigorous and insightful nod to the importance of open source software in cataloging and storing information for the long term (even if it what she meant was "open formats").

I just wish i had more time. ...more

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About Marilyn Johnson

Marilyn Johnson

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Author of three non-fiction books about those who work to capture, preserve, provide access to, and excavate our cultural memories.

Books by Marilyn Johnson

Lives in Ruins: Archeologists and the Seductive Lure of Human Rubble

The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs, and the Perverse Pleasures of Obituaries

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“Good librarians are natural intelligence operatives. They possess all of the skills and characteristics required for that work: curiosity, wide-ranging knowledge, good memories, organization and analytical aptitude, and discretion.” — 46 likes

“In tough times, a librarian is a terrible thing to waste.” — 37 likes

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