Readers' Advisory 101

For three years now, students in classes in readers' advisory services for adults in the public library at Queens College, NY, have gone undercover to complete a surrogate user assignment. Each student picks a work of fiction he/she has read and liked and then goes to two local public libraries, tells a librarian at each about the book just finished, and asks for a suggestion for another book the student might like. The goal is for MLS students to remember what it feels like to be a library user and to bring back examples for class critique.

The service mistakes these student encounter, usually at the reference or information desk since typically few libraries here have separate readers' advisory (RA) desks or departments, are so consistent that it is hard to believe that they are localized only to New York City metropolitan area public libraries.

Most librarians turned immediately to OPACs to identify other titles by the same author. They did this before asking whether the student had read other books by the author, or investigating what the student liked about the particular book. This first mistake, rampant in public libraries, is as common in RA work as in classic reference: the librarian assumes that he or she knows what patrons want before they have finished explaining or before the librarian has finished eliciting enough information to understand the question. This is compounded by "computer dependence." The librarian uses the OPAC as a crutch to keep the hands busy and the eyes away from the user when the brain stops. This is just plain bad service.

Instead, the librarian should continue the interaction with the reader until the librarian knows what the person wants. If it is not another book by the same author, how best to find a readalike title. Good subject headings for fiction are not specific enough in traditionally cataloged OPAC databases, and keyword searching may be scattershot. Also, assuming that another book by the same author will have the same appeal is flawed. Librarians who don't seem to read anything themselves, or anything like what is being requested obviously need to be reminded that many authors write very different kinds of books under the same name.

Most of the public librarians encountered by the MLS students had no idea how to conduct a readers' advisory interview, a remarkably simple process. Ask the reader what he or she liked about the book that inspired the query, and then follow up by asking if the reader is in the mood for something similar or perhaps something different.

These likes and dislikes have been described as "appeal factors" by Joyce Saricks and Nancy Brown in Readers' Advisory Services in the Public Library (ALA) and amplified in Saricks's Readers' Advisory Guide to Genre Fiction (ALA), both required reading for librarians working public services desks. Appeal factors include a book's pacing, characterization, story line, and frame. With audiobooks, the narrator adds another appeal factor.

Not understanding appeal factors can lead to suggestions based on theme, topic, or some subcategory similarity, such as "legal thriller." For example, a Scott Turow title is suggested to a Grisham fan although the authors themselves handle the themes quite differently in terms of appeal. Certainly, some readers are not eclectic in their tastes, or omnivorous in terms of a subcategory, but such matches may not be automatically assumed. The all-time mistake in this regard was the student who asked for a readalike for Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones and was offered books on serial killers.

There's a joke that says that the best reference librarian is supposed to be someone who knows nothing but can find anything. The same is true of readers' advisors. It is unacceptable to tell a user that one has not personally had breast cancer or started a business and therefore cannot or may not be able to help find information on these topics. However, such responses seem to be the norm when the same librarians are asked about books. One of the biggest myths is that a librarian must have read a book to suggest it, without resorting to any reference sources. Excusing one's own ignorance is not the same as answering a question, nor is it professional.

RA practice demands no less rigor than the documented use of resources that is standard for reference librarians. Numerous reference tools are devoted to books in general and specific genres, and these should be consulted before checking an OPAC. At an absolute minimum, librarians who may be asked RA questions should be familiar with the following resources: Fiction Catalog, Fiction_L (online discussion), Genreflecting, NoveList (a database), Reader's Guide to Genre Fiction, and What Do I Read Next? The sales-generated lists at amazon.com and Barnes & Noble (bn.com) do pick up readalikes, but they do not analyze the appeal factors of particular books and can be as misleading as they are helpful.

When patrons are referred to shelves to search for themselves, in part because of the queue at a busy information desk, or possibly to allow the librarian time to think or get help from a colleague, it is important to check and see if they find anything. Often, however, librarians act as if their job is not to provide information but to reduce the queue by sending patrons off to help themselves. At minimum, the librarian should tell the user to come back if he or she does not find anything, but this is almost never done. According to the MLS students' experience, once the patrons are gone, they're gone from both the service queue and the librarian's memory, whether they find anything or not.

Follow-up is even more important if a library has few sources like displays and lists available to both readers and to staff. Patrons will have an even harder time finding what they want on shelves arranged alphabetically, with spines out.

When a panicked librarian, insecure with RA questions, inevitably turns to OPAC computers while thinking, the first interpersonal mistake he or she makes is to lose eye contact with the reader. This avoidance behavior is compounded by the pretense that every click onscreen is some sort of secret ritual. Instead, the librarian should look at users, explain what he or she is doing, and invite the patron to look at the computer while moving through the search. This interaction can hold the key, as the user's nonverbal reactions can signal when the librarian has hit the right track.

Another disconnect often occurs when librarians leave the desk to search for specific books or colleagues to help. MLS students commonly report unexplained absences of ten minutes or more. They usually note that were this not an assignment for their MLS class, they would just leave the library.

Listening to the reader's unsolicited as well as solicited comments can be useful. Students report being ignored when they volunteered helpful clarifying comments, a mistake that prolonged inept searching. The user has to be regarded as the primary source of information in an RA interaction, just as in a classic reference interview.

Librarians do not appear "askable," nor do they always greet users. Service librarians rarely say, "Hello." Students report needing to interrupt conversations between librarians at the desk and ask to have the librarian identified. They have also had to calm librarians visibly upset because they don't know how to answer RA questions, are unfamiliar with sources when they do use them, or are annoyed with the users because it is too close to closing time.

The other mistake in public libraries is consistently keeping print and web tools a secret. Some libraries do a good job of listing web-based resources on their own web sites, but staff are never told to use them and they are never included on printed lists. Few libraries, however, pull all the RA tools out of the classification system onto a table or display shelf so readers can pore over them.

It would be nice to see "readers' corners" in public libraries, with a terminal set up with bookmarked tools such as NoveList and genre and book club web sites, surrounded by print RA tools and magazines such as Book and Locus. This might assure the public that our commitment to "information" includes the latest on books they might like to read. In the meantime, I will keep trying to convince my students that there is a better way to do this than what they still encounter in public libraries.