Books in a Series

Books in a series. The bane of the public librarian’s existence! Just ask a librarian anywhere. Many, many times each week we are asked by patrons “Can you tell me which book is next in this series? Darn those bestselling authors. All they have to do is tell a story. They leave it to hard-working librarians to keep track of those stories in order.
Sitting on my desk right now is a selection of books from series of several different authors. One of the worst offenders is Gilbert Morris. The old guy is 210 years old and still cranking out dozens of new books each year. (Okay. I exaggerate a little.) His books are known in the library world as “inspirational fiction.” Inspirational fiction is often Christian-based, and always free of violence, explicit sensuality, and naughty words.
Ole Gil starts up a new series every few years. Currently on our shelves are the following Morris series: Lions of Judah, American Century, Singing River, The Spirit of Appalachia, The Creoles and Wagon Wheel. There are a few more, but that’s all I could carry in one armload. Writing on his own must be kind of lonesome because he also co-writes with several other authors which complicates my life even further.
James Patterson publishes more books than seems humanly possible. He has The Alex Cross Series, The Women’s Murder Club Series, The Michael Bennett Series among others. In addition he creates at least two more series for young adults. He has various and assorted co-writers, too.
Some series are lighthearted and frivolous like Joanne Fluke’s Hannah Swensen Mysteries with Recipes. Her newest is Devil’s Food Cake Murder. I’ve never read any of her books, but they just must be silly and clever and fun to read. Another series I’ve always intended to try is the Sookie Stackhouse books by Charlaine Harris. The name of the series is: The Southern Vampire Series. The cover art is so laughable, I know the books aren’t really scary stories like Jeffry Lindsay’s Dexter series. The Dexter books are about a forensic criminal blood analyst who kills off only those who really need it. They can be really frightening, but are written with a bit of a tongue in cheek tone that I appreciate.
A couple of authors insist on writing in a series, but make it easy on librarians by keeping track of the order themselves. Sue Grafton’s A is for Alibi, B is for Burglar, etc. (we are up to U is for Undertow now) have never confused anyone. Janet Evanovich does the same thing. ….One for the Money and Two for the Dough, etc. in her Stephanie Plum series are in a delightfully easy to keep track of.
Our Kathy Hensch has made series-reading easy for library patrons. She puts a small little label on the spine of the book with the name of the series and the volume number on it. To make it easy for us to find the right place on the shelf to put a book away, each series is further marked with a colored dot or star. Karen Kingsbury’s Above the Line series all have a small pink dot on the spine label. James Patterson’s Alex Cross series has a green star. See how she does all the work for you?
If you ever need a list of a particular series of books in order, try putting the author’s name into Yahoo or Google. That’s how I do it when I need to know. Amazon should be helpful, but isn’t always. If the author has his/her own website he/she will surely provide a list. Authors want to make it easy for you to buy the next book. Or, you can always ask a librarian…..that’s what we are here for!

Last week I was preparing for my budget presentation to the city council on the same day I needed to write this article for the newspaper. My shallow little mind can only hold one topic at a time, so I will kill two birds with one presentation. First some background information:
Public libraries in Iowa are funded, in the main, by property taxes. The code of Iowa contains some verbiage that requires every property to be taxed, at a minimum level, for library services. If a town does not have a library, the amount of library property tax collected must be given to another town’s library with which it has an agreement to share library services. Dakota City could certainly have its own library if it so chose, but instead, they give an agreed upon amount to the Humboldt Library and Dakota Cityians use the Humboldt Library. Makes sense, doesn’t it?
Rural county properties are also taxed. The board of supervisors divides up that money between the six libraries in Humboldt County. So, rural citizens receive the same service as the rest of us.
Along with the contributions from Dakota City and Humboldt County, we receive a small amount of state funding. Most of what comes from the state is to compensate this library for materials and services we provide to other libraries, such as inter-library loans. The City of Humboldt provides the bulk of the library budget.
For some reason, this year the library is the last city department to go before the city council for its budget planning meeting. Those councilmen are all really nice guys, but if they’ve been sitting there for several hours listening to the other departments ask for money, they might be cranky and ready to go home to supper. I’m keeping my presentation short and sweet.
This city has always supported its library well. We are able to afford to keep up with library trends and technology and provide the services and materials our patrons use and appreciate. In return for the money you’ve spent on the library, the library staff provides you with the best books, movies, programming for kids, computers, and magazines that you’ll find in any library our size. Unless you catch us on a really rare bad day, you won’t find a more chipper, helpful staff anywhere, either.
All that being said, the library has been getting along just fine and we don’t need much of an increase in our budget. The only thing we really, really need is a new roof. It was put on in 1992 or 1993 and was built to last for fifteen years. That’s about how long it lasted before it began to leak. It seems to support a heavy snow buildup fairly well, but when things begin to melt, the water pools on the roof and leaks into the building.
Over the years we’ve had some big puddles of soggy carpet and some ceiling damage, but we haven’t lost any books or equipment. That the losses have been minimal is thanks to our city Parks department. They come over several times each winter to shovel the snow from the roof. That is service above and beyond the call of duty, and we appreciate it.
Next time you are out around town, stop in to see how your library taxes have been spent. We think you will be pleased.