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#TreatYourShelf this Holiday Season!

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Making your ‘To Be Read’ list? Checking it twice? #TreatYourShelf (or others) this holiday season with titles from RUSA’s award lists selected and reviewed by our expert librarians.

The Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction recognize the best fiction and nonfiction books for adult readers published in the U.S. the previous year. A longlist comprised of no more than 50 titles is released in September. Six finalists (shortlist), three fiction and three nonfiction, are announced in October, pictured above.

Notable Books List selected by the Notable Books Council, is a list of 25 very good, very readable and at times, very important fiction, nonfiction and poetry books for adult readers.

The Reading List  seeks to highlight outstanding genre fiction from each of the current eight different categories including adrenaline, fantasy, historical fiction, horror, mystery, romance, science fiction and women’s fiction.

The Listen List: Outstanding Audiobook Narration, seeks to highlight outstanding audiobook titles that merit special attention and includes twelve titles including fiction, nonfiction, poetry and plays.

The Sophie Brody Award is given to encourage, recognize and commend outstanding achievement in Jewish literature. In the context of this award, Jewish literature is defined as fiction, nonfiction or poetry that has as its central purpose the exploration of the Jewish experience.

 

 

 

 

 

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Message from RUSA VP/President-Elect, Chris LeBeau

Hello RUSA Members,

I invite you to volunteer for one of RUSA’s committees or a section committee.

There are so many ways to get engaged and serve our community of over 3,000 members. Check out the RUSA committee list  or look for committees under RUSA Sections. Volunteers must be RUSA members. We need people with many different talents and interests.

To volunteer:

  • Login to ALA
  • Visit the Committee Volunteer Form page
  • Change drop down menu option to “RUSA”
  • Fill out the form about yourself and your current ALA responsibilities;
  • Again, be sure the drop down at the bottom is set to “RUSA” or to a section.

You’re in!

You may also email me, Chris LeBeau, lebeauc@umkc.edu, and tell me about your experience and what you would like to do. Likewise, feel free to contact section vice-chairs to express your interest:

BRASS: Louise M. Feldmann, Louise.Feldmann@colostate.edu
CODES: Daniel C. Mack, dmack@umd.edu
ETS: Courtney Greene McDonald, crgreene@indiana.edu
HISTORY: Christina Thompson Shutt, christina.shutt@arkansasheritage.org
STARS: Heidi Nance, hnance@u.washington.edu
RSS: Amy Elizabeth Rustic, aer123@psu.edu

For book lover volunteers
Many members are interested in serving on the Notable Books Council. The number of volunteers far outnumbers the slots for this committee. As an alternative consider our Listen List, the Reading List, the Sophie Brody award, and all the other awards on our RUSA Awards page. All provide excellent experience in book reviewing.

Thank you again to all our current, past and future volunteers – you are truly what makes RUSA such a wonderful place to belong! We couldn’t do it without you.

Thank you in advance,

Chris LeBeau
RUSA VP/President-Elect

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Shortlist for 2017 Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction

shortlist for 2017 Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction

Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction Shortlist

Nonfiction

“The Firebrand and the First Lady: Portrait of a Friendship: Pauli Murray, Eleanor Roosevelt, and the Struggle for Social Justice,” by Patricia Bell-Scott, published by Alfred A. Knopf, Penguin Random House LLC.
Bell-Scott meticulously chronicles the boundary-breaking friendship of Pauli Murray and Eleanor Roosevelt, telling each remarkable woman’s story within the context of the crises of the times, from ongoing racial violence to WWII and the vicious battle over school integration.

“Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City,” by Matthew Desmond, published by Crown, Penguin Random House LLC.
Desmond shares harrowing stories of eight families who find themselves facing home evictions in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, shining a light on how eviction sets people up to fail.

“Blood at the Root: A Racial Cleansing in America,” by Patrick Phillips, published by W. W. Norton.
Phillips presents a precise and disquieting account of long underreported tyranny and violence against African Americans in a farming community in Forsyth Country, Georgia, in 1912, which resulted in nothing less than racial cleansing.

Fiction

“Moonglow,” by Michael Chabon, published by Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins.
A young writer listens in breath-held astonishment as his ailing grandfather, whose lifelong reticence has been vanquished by strong painkillers, tells the hidden stories of his hardscrabble boyhood, WWII military service, obsession with moon missions, and love for a French Holocaust survivor.

“Swing Time,” by Zadie Smith, published by Penguin Press, Penguin Random House LLC.
Two “brown girls” growing up in London public housing share a passion for dance, but follow divergent paths which lead to adventures in America and Africa, and raise complex questions about family, friendship, race, creativity, and celebrity.

“The Underground Railroad,” by Colson Whitehead, published by Doubleday, Penguin Random House LLC.
Whitehead reimagines the Underground Railroad in this powerful tale about smart and resilient Cora, a young third-generation slave who escapes the brutality of a Georgia cotton plantation and seeks sanctuary throughout the terrorized South.

The awards, established in 2012, recognize the best fiction and nonfiction books for adult readers published in the U.S. in the previous year and serve as a guide to help adults select quality reading material. They are the first single-book awards for adult books given by the American Library Association and reflect the expert judgment and insight of library professionals who work closely with adult readers.

Annotations and more information on the finalists and the awards can be found at http://www.ala.org/carnegieadult. Also, book cover artwork is available for download at http://tinyurl.com/Carnegieshortlist.

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Be Our Guest: Create Your Own Pixie Dust at the Library

originally posted in Cognotes, Monday,  June 27, 2016 – Orlando
By Meredith Myers, American Libraries

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Room W110B in the Orange County Convention Center was packed tighter than Disney’s Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique on the first day of summer vacation. Instead of magical pixie dust, RUSA chose Dave Cobb to make every-day librarians into user experience designers, all with the click of his mouse.

“We tell stories in physical places,” he said, as photos of colorful museums and libraries splashed across the screen in perfectly timed clicks.  As the vice president for creative development of Thinkwell Group in Los Angeles, Cobb has spent years designing roller coasters and attractions for theme parks.  “People often say that I design roller coasters.  No.  I tell  stories  with roller coasters. Libraries are no different. We need to understand the user. Our audience has an audience.”

He suggested asking,  “What is unique about your location?  Who is your audience, and what are their expectations of your library? How are you inviting your audience to take ownership of their library?”

In telling stories, librarians can create Be Our Guest: Create Your Own Pixie Dust at the Library an emotional resonance with patrons, thus inspiring them to tell their own stories.  To illustrate, Cobb filled the screen with swimming metaphors: “waders” being the largest audience, “swimmers” being most curious, and “divers” being true fans – his message being that one should design library spaces for all three types of users. He added a new category of “mer-people,” speaking of those who have been submerged too long. (Which is probably how most librarians feel after a long day of meetings and toting free books from the Exhibits.)

Panel responders were John Blyberg, assistant director for innovation and UX, Darien Library, Darien, Connecticut, and Steven Bell, associate university librarian, Temple University. Bell spoke of being intentional and creating passionate users, and also asked if the patrons or librarians are emphasized.

“Pay attention to the employees,” Bell suggested. “Fix what is broken. Change can’t just be at the circulation desk. You are all user experience designers.” See? No pixie dust needed. Thanks, RUSA.