Libraries

Vintage has sold a combined total of ten million trade paperback, eBook and audiobook copies of E.L. James‘ Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy in the last six weeks.

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group president Anthony Chirico had this statement: “This is an astonishing number. The sales velocity for Fifty Shades of Grey is unprecedented, with reader demand still growing. BookScan data indicates that the trilogy has captured twenty-five percent of the adult fiction market in recent weeks.”

At the same time, The New York Times reported more libraries debating about carrying the racy books like the Brevard County Public Library in Florida. The Wisconsin library that serves the Fond du Lac community has refused to purchase any copies. Several libraries throughout the country have chosen to do the same.

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After pulling its new eBook titles from libraries back in 2010, the Hachette Book Group is testing a pilot program to offer new eBooks in libraries this spring.

Hachette currently offers backlist eBook titles for check out in libraries, but not new titles. The American Library Association (ALA) sent a delegation to meet with the publisher.

ALA president Molly Raphael blogged about it: “we were pleased to learn that starting this spring, Hachette is conducting a pilot with two ebook distributors for libraries, which will bring a selection of HBG’s recent bestselling ebooks to 7 million library patrons. These pilot programs will help HBG learn more about library patrons’ interests, usage, and expectations, and help the publisher devise the best strategy to reach the widest audience of ebook readers in libraries.”

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Last year, our readers helped Ballou Senior High School in Washington D.C. buy hundreds of books for its bookshelves.

After watching the video embedded above of the high school’s sparsely filled shelves, Guys Lit Wire led a campaign last year to buy more books. While the library has grown, Guys Lit Wire has created another Powells wish list of over 500 books to add to the growing high school library. Check it out:

A few things have changed at Ballou since the video was made last year. Not only did some much needed books come their way but the bankruptcy of Borders allowed the school to purchase some shelves and other fixtures to dress up their library space. (Those category signs in the above picture probably look really familiar to former Borders customers.) While the area looks fantastic, and the space is being used for an anime club and chess club and scrabble team and many other wonderful groups, the shelves are still way too empty. What we hope to do this spring is give Melissa some breathing room and allow her to use her very limited funds for more expensive reference materials while we pick up the slack and buy the popular titles.

The American Library Association (ALA) has released its annual list of the most frequently challenged library books of the year. We’ve linked to free samples of all the books on the list–follow the links below to read these controversial books yourself.

During the past year, the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom received 326 reports of “attempts to remove or restrict materials from school curricula and library bookshelves.” The list was part of the ALA’s 2012 State of America’s Libraries Report.

Here’s more eBook news from the report: “The rapid growth of ebooks has stimulated increasing demand for them in libraries, but libraries only have limited access to ebooks because of restrictions placed on their use by publishers. Macmillan Publishing, Simon and Schuster and Hachette Book Group refused to sell ebooks to libraries. HarperCollins imposed an arbitrary 26 loans per ebook license, and Penguin refused to let libraries lend its new titles altogether. When Random House raised ebook prices, the ALA urged it to reconsider.”

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Libraries Online Incorporated (LION), a group of 25 public, academic and school libraries in Connecticut, has stopped buying eBooks from Random House after the publisher raised their prices on eBooks.

The Digital Shift has more: “Under Random House’s new pricing policy, an ebook that would have cost the LION consortium $35 to purchase through OverDrive on February 29 cost them $105 on March 1, according to Richard Conroy, the president of LION.”

This is the second group of libraries to report that they will stop buying eBooks from the publisher, whose prices have doubled and even tripled on many titles. Earlier this week, a group of public libraries in Nova Scotia, Canada announced that they would refrain from buying eBooks from the publisher until they lowered their prices.

Troy Myers, the chief librarian of a group of libraries in Nova Scotia, said that they have stopped buying eBooks from Random House and will not buy more from the publisher until they lower their digital book prices.

The South Shore Public Library said the reason that they stopped buying from Random House is a price increase. The release shared prices: “a copy of Catherine the Great, Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie was $30 for libraries in January 2012, $130 on March 1 and $85 on March 20. An individual ordering the same title would pay $25 through Amazon, $22.69 through Kindle or $20 through Random House or Google Books.”

Myers explained: “It would be great if we could just purchase ebooks through Amazon or Random House for the lower price. However because we provide the books for loan, we must purchase copies of the books through a service like OverDrive, instead of buying copies directly.” (Via Quill & Quire).

Call it the Apple Store of libraries. As part of a redevelopment plan in Stuttgart, Germany, Korean architect Eun Young Yi has created a design for a new library (pictured above) that blends old ideas from antiquity with ultra modern details.

While it may look like a modern art museum, the architect was actually influenced ancient architecture.  Designboom.com has more: “influenced by the structure and organization of the ancient pantheon, the design features a linear-shaped ‘heart’ which serves as a central, multi-storey meeting space that draws in natural light through the roof.”

Follow this link to see more renderings of the design. Does this library make you want to read?

Documentary filmmaker Julia Marchesi and public artist Leon Reid IV hope to raise $13,000 on Kickstarter to install a library-themed public sculpture called “The Hundred Story House.” Above, we’ve embedded a video about the project–what do you think?

The interactive art piece will be made in the shape of a brownstone row house and located in Brooklyn’s Cobble Hill Park. It will contain approximately 100 books for people to borrow based on the honor system. The funds will be used to cover materials, fabrication, transportation, installation, maintenance, removal, documentation, insurance, permit fees and awards for Kickstarter supporters.

Here’s more about the project: “The Hundred Story House is a piece of interactive public art.  It is a miniature Brooklyn brownstone whose windows open upon shelves of books (about 100 of them) which can be borrowed by the community. Situated in the Cobble Hill Park on Clinton Street, the House is a tiny lending library open to all and operating on the honor system — take-a-book, leave-a-book. This is an effort to celebrate the BOOK as a physical object, and the pleasure of holding one in your hand.  Or better yet, placing one in someone else’s.”

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Yesterday Penguin revealed that they will no longer offer eBooks to libraries through OverDrive, “due to new concerns about the security of our digital editions.”

Meanwhile, librarians around the country have debated the issue. San Rafael Public Library acting director Sarah Houghton posted a free sign in Google Docs for librarians to share with patrons. We’ve embedded the pointed sign above–what do you think?

Here’s more from the library’s blog: “Sadly, unlike a regular person, a library cannot pay Amazon or Barnes & Noble for an eBook and then lend it out to people.  We can buy a printed book from these companies, stick it on the shelf, and lend it out–but digital content is treated differently by the publishers and the companies who manage digital content licensing.  We desperately want to offer you these eBooks. But the companies won’t let us.  As your library, we commit to continuing advocacy for change in these policies.”

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KLAW reported earlier this week that “state funding for California libraries has been completely eliminated” in the state’s budget for the year.

Check it out: “Now libraries in the Bay Area, as in the rest of the state, will lose funding for literacy programs, InterLibrary Loans, and miscellaneous expenses such as librarian training programs and books. Libraries in rural areas will be hit the hardest because they receive more state funding than libraries in larger cities with larger budgets.”

Visit the California Library Association’s advocacy page if you want to add your support for the state libraries. This GalleyCat editor is a regular patron of the California library system.

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