Library Goddess: Bonnie Peirce

Bonnie Peirce, head of children's services at the Dover Town Library, is part children's librarian, part guru to other librarians, part techie, and part entrepreneur.

A former bookstore manager, she has wowed Dover's children and parents with her child-friendly browsing arrangement of the collection, her blog and online book club, and her Media Makers Club, where kids learn how to create their own broadcasts, films, and stories. Library trustee Kate Haviland, mother of three boys, says her sons won't touch the school's summer reading list until they get the scoop from Peirce on which books are really good.

Peirce is known to librarians for her conference presentations and workshops and for the collaborative Library Goddesses blog and companion wiki, an addictive “site” where librarians can share favorite books with one another and library users, as well as their knowledge and professional experiences. She hopes the site will “become a learning platform for those not yet embracing [blog and wiki] technologies.”

Peirce sees the Internet's possibilities for booksellers, educators, and librarians and cofounded thebestkidsbooksite.com, “an Interactive Media Channel where Books, Crafts, Podcasts, Online Video, and Web Resources Intersect.” The site is available in nine languages.

She is a passionate advocate of citizen's media and Web 2.0 technologies in libraries because they virtually compel creativity. “You don't simply study them. You use them, you play with them, you design better applications with them, you collaborate with people and come up with something completely different and new using them,” she says. She believes these technologies make it possible for even the smallest library to have tremendous impact, “giving the public a voice and access to participate and build virtual communities.”

She's certainly demonstrated that in Dover—and in the community of library goddesses.