More: Bests Books from NW Librarians

Here are some more "favorite" choices from librarians in NW:

Sue Sup @ Arnolds Park:
The Road by Cormac McCarthy. I read it out loud while my husband and I traveled on vacation and we liked it so much I would end up reading outloud in the tent by flashlight.

Faye @ Coon Rapids:
Boom by Tom Brokaw. I find it fascinating!

Joleen @ Rembrandt:
90 Minutes in Heaven by Don Piper by I lost my husband to cancer in 2000 and it was just good for me to read. I will see him again, PTL!

Carla Pitstick @ Fonda:
Moon Called by Patricia Briggs. It is first in the Mercy Thompson series, a paranormal fantasy that is a fresh and entertaining escape into an alternate present.

Meg Polly @ Whiting:
The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig. He had wonderfully vivid descriptions, good characterization, delightful humor, and an unexpected twist at the end.

If you haven't sent me your favorite choice, please do! This makes a great reading list for you for 2008!

Librarians' Choice: Best Books of 2007

Northwest Librarians have chosen their favorite books from 2007. Check out what they've been reading!

1. Dave Netz @ Sioux Center: After the Leaves Fall by Nicole Baart and

Winning the Future by Newt Gingrich.

2. Cheryl Hoekstra @ Alton: The Christmas Shoes by Donna VanLiere. It reminded me to appreciate all the small yet important things in my life.

3. Bonnie@ Northwest: John Paul the Great by Peggy Noonan. Really fascinating behind the scenes stories of his life. He's sure to be a saint someday!

4. Emily@ Denison: Animal, Vegetable Miracle: A Year of Food for Life by Barbara Kingsolver. It influenced the way I shopped for groceries, cook meats and think about food.

5. Jeannie Frerichs @ Akron: The Christmas Candle by Max Lucado. The best book I read seems to be the last one I just read!

6. Leann @ Primghar: Rescuing Sprite because it's an emotional read and inspires you to appreciate the pets you have and the small good things in life.

7. Misty Gray @ Storm Lake: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling.I loved it because I am a huge Harry Potter fan and my curiosity was quenced by the final installment!

8. Karen Kerns @ Rolfe: 19 Minutes by Jodi Picoult. Interesting!

9. Pat Bell @ Arthur: The Door Within series by Wayne Thomas Batson. There are 3 books in the series though they are written for young adults I liked them too.

10. Barb Jorgensen @ Schaller: Waiting for White Horses by Nathan Jorgensen. Such a great story line and lots of emotion and humor and compassion.

11. Janie @ Northwest: Splendid Solution by JEffrey Kluger. I knew someone who had polio and I had heard stories about how sick she was and this book really tells how bad it was!

12. Alvina Reitsma @ Sanborn: The Wednesday Letters by Jason F. Wright. I think it reminded me a lot of my folks how as they are growing older you can see the love between them grow and grow.

13. Chris @ Ringstead: Heat by Bill Buford. It is a true story about an amateur's apprentice to a chef in Tuscany. I was just in Italy and I want to go back!

14.Kristen @ Correctionville: Glorious Appearing by Tim LaHaye.

15. Nathan Clark @ Emmetsburg/Ruthven: Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne. I was surprised by how well it grabbed me and kept me going.

16. Mindy Swieter @ Rockwell City: any of Karen Kingsbury's books. She is my favorite author. She makes me cry and I love that! Also Lean Mean 13 by Janet Evanovich. She makes me laugh.

17. Tena Hansen @ Milford: The Secret of Lost Things by Sheridan Hay. Wow! What characters. Thsi book is just rich with the kind of pople we might call characters. It's a juicy trainwreck. You'll love it.

18. Erin Wolf @ Glidden: Babylon Rising series by Tim LaHaye. It's about biblical archeology and is almost a DaVinci Code type of story. I found it intriguing and quite accurate.

19. Connie V.E. @ Melvin: Any book by Karen Kingsbury. I love her books.

20. Sue K @ O.C. and NW: Blue like Jazz by Donald Miller. I was hooked by his description of living a Christian life, and of being who God intended.

21. Karla Chase @ Orange City: Deliver Us From Normal by Kate Klise. It was a fun quick read about middle school. Also Wednesday Wars by Gary Schmidt.

More to come! After all there are 115 libraries in NW. But you now have a new reading list to start 2008 with!

Waiting for OverDrive

Are you gearing up for Overdrive? That's the soon-to-be consortium between Northwest and Central Library Service Areas to provide downloadable audio books from the company Overdrive. This consortium will make downloadable audio books affordable for member libraries and offer much wider selection for patrons.

Most libraries, of course, have purchased audio books on tape or CDs for many years now. Anyone who drives anywhere can make great use of these. How convenient is that, reading and driving at the same time? I'm always in favor of doing two things at once!

Downloadable audios, though, take things to a whole new level. While patrons will need an MP3 player, they'll now be able to download a whole book at once and then "read" while exercising at the gym, driving, hiking, vacationing, cooking...well, you pick the spot! Patrons will have the advantage of downloading books from home because the OverDrive content is web-based.

The price tag for this would be unreachable for most small libraries in the state. Even the mid size libraries would have trouble with this, but with the WILBOR Consortium (Western/Central Iowa Libraries Building Online Resources) all libraries will be able to have the Consortium's digital library available to them. So...be sure you sign on, sign up, sign in....Get your boards psyched up so you'll be able to get in on the ground floor. There will be more details coming...

P.S. The piggy picture above is my submission for WILBOR's mascot. Some consortium, some pig!

LibraryThing & NWILS Collection in a Virtual World

If you haven't had a chance to see LibraryThing yet, you really must. The cool thing about this site is that you have the ability to catalog an entire library, hold book discussions on any number of books, and see what everyone else in the world is reading.

I'm in the process of putting up Northwest LSA's library management collection. Here's a link to the titles on NWILS LibraryThing page right now. I love the book cover view, but you can search the whole collection much the same way as you do in the library: title, author, subject. You'll see we have quite a collection available and encourage you to use NWILS library science collection--it's all there for you to borrow!

You can become a thingamabrarian yourself when you sign up for LibraryThing and catalog your own collection (how about just the books you have in your own personal library!) Other virtual library catalogs out there now are shelfari and Goodreads; they're both similar to LibraryThing, but I don't have much experience with those. Have some fun exploring all 3. To find out even more about these 3 websites, check out this article by Mark Flanagan Book Clubs in the Ethereal World.