Is your library dangerously depleted?
Recently I returned to my local county library to continue my yearly book reading goal of 25 business and 10 fiction books. I rarely achieve it. Something always comes up that cuts into my reading time. This year I’ve been selling off my Shake and Bake Trading Co inventory before the eBay fees and USPS shipping price hikes kicked in.
With inventory decreased, my focus returned to blogging. Product blogging to be exact. But as I researched online,
Photo courtesy Mateusz Zdank (EmZed)
suffering eyestrain in the process, I realized that I didn’t know as much about blogging as I thought I did. Despite my copywriting and sales experience, the sum total of my knowledge seems small compared to the sheer information overload spawned by the internet.
Don’t get me wrong, I really like the internet. Being a graduate of the Old School of Research, finding information online is a heck of lot faster than trekking to the library. Cheaper too. Invariably, when I borrow books, there’s a 50% chance that the loans will become overdue.
And these days, library overdue fees are nothing to sneeze at. Our local country library charges 50 cents a day per book. If the book isn’t returned within 30 days, the patron’s account is charged for it’s replacement. If said patron doesn’t respond to dunning letters within 60 days, the account is turned over to a collection agency.
Once I waited behind an unfortunate borrower who had racked up $35 in overdue fees for his kid’s books. While I admired his desire to educate his child, the torrent of profanity he unleashed at the poor circulation clerk was a poor example for his kid standing beside him. He left, loudly refusing to pay any fine, and collection agency be damned.
Where’s the accountability? Don’t folks realize that there are other people who want to read?
Fast forward to now. I renewed my library borrowing card, one of the few things you can’t do by phone or online. Then I headed to the in-house database with a list of books to borrow in hand.
I was shocked. Out of the 7 books I wanted, none were available. Of those newly published, each had an attached statement that no copies were available and replacement date was unknown. Ditto on others, just a few years old.
I checked with the circulation clerk and asked if there was a problem. He confirmed there was. It seems that folks were borrowing business books but failing to return them. The collection was suffering, since budget cutbacks prevented replacements of lost books and staff.
Cutbacks explained why I didn’t know the circulation fellow, why he was the only one working and why the reference section was staffed by a clueless volunteer who didn’t know where the business section was.
I found it where it used to be. But now there were only two shelves devoted to business, each about half empty. Then remaining books were hopelessly outdated. I grabbed a few anyway. Why waste the trip?
But it got me to thinking. The book collections of my city, county and college libraries are dwindling. The city has just a few current business books, same “unavailable” reason. The county system has a more substantial collection at scattered locations. Ditto the unavailable messages after a quick online search. The local university and Jr. college libraries do not extend borrowing privileges to local residents, only students.
In my blogging focus, I need current business books to review, since I only post reviews of books I actually read and can recommend. Looks like I’ll be buying every one, which at $20-$50 a pop can get expensive.
I can get one or two books from Amazon and save on shipping, or search online seller listings. Since I like to read with a highlighter and Post-It Notes in hand, buying is the best option. Borrowing always involves separate note taking, which is tedious, or photocopying. I’ve done the latter, mostly while I was in college where the process was encouraged. But since I also am a published writer, the thought of ripping off a fellow writer by avoiding buying the book he or she wrote really bothered me. And i have a photocopier in my home office, so it would be easy.
But what about fiction and general non-fiction books? I love to read these as well. A quick search revealed more “unavailable” statements. Borrowing books with no intention of returning them is a lack of accountability at best, and outright thievery. I’ve donated a lot of books to my local libraries. So have many others. But if there are more books going out than coming in, we readers have a problem.
Have you experienced the same problem at your libraries? How do you find the books that you need? Leave a comment. I can’t be the only one facing this challenge. What are some alternative sources for books that you know of? Do you donate? How can you tell a good book to invest in?
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[...] Why build a personal library? Which brings me to why I recommend having a personal library. Two reasons. First, reading is fast becoming a lost art. As a business owner, you need books to use as a reference tools within easy reach to maintain the edge on your competition. He who reads, succeeds. While I’m in favor of borrowing books from a library, this can be frustrating, because you may not find the books you need, like I recently experienced and wrote about in Is your library dangerously depleted? [...]