August 25, 2009
Kindle-coming soon!
The library will be offering a new service very soon. We have purchased a Kindle and will be offering it for checkout as soon as we have purchased some titles and catalogued it for circulation. A Kindle is a wireless reading device, developed for sale by Amazon. Check here for the product specs and more information: http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Amazons-Wireless-Reading-Generation/dp/B00154JDAI/ref=dp_ob_title_def The Kindle will check out for 7 (seven) days and will be non-renewable. If you have any suggestions for titles, please send them along!
July 1, 2009
Google Books
I use Google Books frequently when trying to turn up interlibrary loan material(s) that have been requested with part of a citation missing, or if I cannot verify a citation. Google Books is also great for finding recreational reading. I like the fact that the book cover is indexed with many of the titles.
Google Books for mobile is now available for Android and iPhone users.
You may have seen Google in the news as publishers were concerned about the copyright implications of the Google Books service. However, Google has reached a groundbreaking agreement with authors and publishers. Click on the link to see particulars of this agreement. Bottom line-books that are in the public domain and no longer covered by copyright restrictions can be viewed online or downloaded, free of charge.
http://books.google.com/googlebooks/agreement/#5
Here is a bit of the agreement, from the Google Books site, describing The Library Project:
“We’ve partnered with renowned libraries around the world to include their collections in Book Search. For Library Project books that are still in copyright, our results are like a card catalog; we show you info about the book and, generally, a few snippets of text showing your search term in context.
For Library Project books that are out of copyright, however, you can read and download the entire book.”
June 28, 2009
Summer Reading-Corrected Link
Here is the correct link to the NPR article discussed in yesterday’s post. Seattle Librarian, Nancy Pearl, gives her recommendations for summer reading. There are several suggestions for novels and some non-fiction titles are recommended as well. Happy Reading!
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105259115&sc=emaf
Thanks to Jennifer for alerting me to the broken link.
June 26, 2009
Summer Reading
Summer is a great time to catch up on your reading, ask anyone. Nancy Pearl, the Seattle librarian famous enough to have an action figure modeled after her, has put together a summer reading list. Featured on NPR, Nancy Pearl is the author of Book Lust and has a large following. Okay, maybe most of her fans are other librarians, but she is famous for her effort to get all of Seattle reading the same book. I thought that such a famous reader must have some good recommendations. Here is a link to the NPR feature on Summer Reading:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.phpstoryId=105259115&ft=1&f=3
Nancy Pearl offers a good mix of fiction and non-fiction in her list. I often find that I do not have the time to read as many books as I plan for each summer, but I found a couple of titles in her list that I will make room for. Happy Reading!