Guest Blogger: Selecting non-reviewed Titles

Noreen Fish, who manages our electronic resources at La Crosse Public Library, does monthly training meetings for reference staff.  This month, she went over some sources for finding titles that would likely be great choices, but aren't reviewed.  I asked her to write it up so that we could share it with a bunch more folks (thus making it look like I tend to the blog more often than I actually do, these days).  Please share additional sources if you have them! Thanks, Noreen.

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I ha€™ve been selecting non-fiction for most of the 600s in our library for about eighteen months now. One of the problems I have experienced is getting out timely orders for materials that are reviewed well after publication, if they are reviewed at all. Such topics include collectible toys, firearms, building/remodeling, woodworking, pets and agriculture. In discovering some tools to find these non-reviewed items before they'€™re published, I'€™ve found ways to make selecting in general easier and more timely. I recently shared these tips with the other non-fiction selectors in the library and Rochelle asked me if I cared to be a guest blogger on Tinfoil Raccoon.

ipage.ingrambook.com (subscription)

www.booksinprint.com (subscription)

  www.bloglines.com

  www.technorati.com

Using the subject tools on iPage, I started by identifying publishers that put out a lot of materials in my subject areas. I put their websites in my favorites and checked their new offerings periodically.

Then I discovered BIP Alerts on Books In Print. I could search by subject, by publisher name, by publisher and keywords, and save all the searches. BIP asked only for my e-mail address and a password and they send me alerts every month for new titles that fit the criteria. 

I had been introduced to Bloglines last year and used it for a number of library blogs. But I was checking a publisher'€™s website one day and discovered an RSS feed for their new books. I added it to my Bloglines account and went looking for more. Unfortunately, it seems not many publishers have caught up with this opportunity yet.

I started adding blogs on food and cooking because they'€re of personal interest to me, but found that they often reviewed cookbooks. So I used Technorati to look for other subject blogs that included book reviews.

Then I discovered that I could get the reviews from Publisher'€™s Weekly, Library Journal and School Library Journal sent to my Bloglines account, too. I can even do complicated searches in EBSCOHost and create URLs to paste into Bloglines for regular updates.

As you can imagine, the list of my feeds is starting to grow a little unmanageable. But I'€™m sure that some of them will prove to be less useful than others. If I'€™m not getting useful information after a month, I can delete the feed.

Comments

[Keri]

Hope you got to get outside on this almost too hot beautiful autumn day...

[Jeff]

You should try Amazon Approval Slips. If you use Ipage right now (which there is a subscription level your library can pay for that provides the review of every book EVER), Amazon does the same thing for books that are upcoming this month. You can create a slip here http://www.amazon.com/b/ref=amb_link_2/105-0693389-0546807?ie=UTF8&node=13436541&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-7&pf_rd_r=0VJTAR764SX7H25RTVEN&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=270559901&pf_rd_i=13753131
and then you can see what books in the subject area you want are upcoming in the next month or several months ahead.

Personally, Ipage is the one to go for. It combines all the publisher reviews into one interface. Ingram is our book jobber so it seamlessly goes from review to order very quickly. Not many book jobbers do that sadly.