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BonnySue
What Kind of Lists do You Use?
Mar 10 2008, 12:57 AM EDT | Post edited: Mar 10 2008, 12:57 AM EDT
The above was the topic our group discussed when the seminar broke up into small discussion groups.

We found that the lists used could be divided into three types.

1. Manual lists - usually linked to the collection. These were generated by public demand and generally were produced as genre lists, though best-seller lists and most popular titles were also produced. They usually came in the form of actual lists, or bookmarks. Genres could include romance, medieval mysteries, nautical, thrillers, legal, westerns, horror etc. The main problems with printed lists were the cost of production and the fact that they became out-of-date quickly.

2. Weblinks. Some are produced by the library. These are usually found via reading links that include genre lists; author/title lists/best seller lists/ latest releases/ junior and teen fiction all linked to the library's collection via their website; as well as links to external links on the web. "Amazon" was also useful for lists of other titles bought by people purchasing a particular title. Databases such as "Novelist" "Fiction Connection" and "Whichbook.net" as well as the ALIA and Readers Advisory sites were also mentioned. Some sites enable very detailed needs to be catered for such as specifying a particular setting etc. However, the main problem with databases and external links is that the authors and books suggested may not be in the library's own collection.

3. The library's own catalogue may have genre searching and special areas such as "Premier's Reading Challenge" may also be accessible via the catalogue.

Problems noted were finding out about new genres and sub-genres and the difficulties of categorizing many books initially into one particular genre, when they spanned several.

We found this an interesting discussion and it clarified the various options available.

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