My coworker made a good point of following Nancy Pearl's advice when a student told her that she stopped reading David Copperfield after fifty pages. The student had started the book in August and kept trying to force herself to read. After college started, and she had homework to do, she gave up. She told us this sounding somewhat embarrassed, but Laura to her that this was acceptable. We told her that at a workshop that we had attended, we were told that it is ok to stop after attempting to read 50 pages because you don't have to force yourself to read a book. She was surprised to hear this but seemed relieved. The student is an English major and does enjoy reading and writing. She said she is working on her first novel. I am starting to realize that I have many opportunities to advise readers that can be missed if I don't pick up on these chance encounters.
Right now I am forcing myself to read the Dante Club. I have read over two hundred pages and keep thinking that I'll start liking it. It must be a style of book that I usually would not pick to read. I keep telling myself that I am stretching out of my usual comfort zone for reading.

I brought up Nancy Pearl's idea of suggesting books rather than recommending, and it caused quit a stir at our break table for a few days. I felt we had a good discussion about considering new ideas for working with library patrons. A few of my co-workers were very skeptical about suggesting books based on doorways and discussions with the patrons. They felt they knew better what books should be recommended because of their experience and knowledge. I told them it is not about you, it is about them. (Nancy told us that.) They stopped their disagreeing at that point. I also explained about the shoe salesman routine of offering three book choices. We had a few laughs, when Al Bundy was mentioned (Married with Children.) When he was compared to us, we had to agree we are somewhat like him in our lives.
I also selected a book by Toni Morrison to read, because I would never have chosen this type of book on my own. This will be a language doorway instead of my usual story or character doorway.

Readers' Advisory Workshop

I attended a workshop today with Nancy Pearl as the presenter. We talked about books and how to suggest titles to patrons. The idea is to get the patron to talk about what type of book they would like to read. There are four doorways to books which we enter, with usually one that we favor. They are story, setting, character, and language. According to what the patron tells us, we can suggest books that fit each doorway. I even have a list of titles that we discussed for each doorway. We also want to get the reader to use different parts of the library, so she gave us the model of a shoe salesman to "sell" the books. For example, we can suggest three books, one that is like the doorway that they pick the most, the second that is like that book but by another author, and the third from another area of the library such as nonfiction. If a patron likes books that come from the story doorway, they may say they like books that they can't put down or that they sat up all night reading. This person may like books by Dan Brown or John Grisham. For the third book, they might try true crime stories, outdoor adventures, or history. She told us we should stretch our own reading habits and read one book that we usually would not at least once a month. We were told to suggest books and not to recommend. We need to let the patron tell about what they like because it is about them, not about us. It was very interesting and informational to take part in the workshop. I also bought her action figure doll for my granddaughter. She already loves to have books read to her.