This is one of a series of reports by attendees of the Public Library Association conference held in Minneapolis March 25-29, 2008.

What’s Love Got to Do With It?
by Lucy Lockley

What a GREAT way to end the day — listening to four best selling romance authors talk about how they got their start, what influenced their writing, trends they see in the Romance genre, and give title suggestions for readers! The audience members even had chances to win copies of the author’s books! All anyone had to do was ask a question which any one of the authors really liked. If an author said “Good question,” then the questioner was awarded a free book which they could have autographed at the end of the program.

Nita Abrams is the author of The Couriers series, a set of five historical romances about a Jewish family set during the Regency period. Ms. Abrams said she had been writing since she was a child and chose the topic and time period for her novels due to an interest in her own family heritage. In researching the time period, she became interested in developing a story about a family that was “wealthy and powerful but not socially acceptable.”

Ms. Abrams said she sometimes thinks that she may have been reincarnated, which is why she seemed to have a “real” feel for the time period. And she has done research for her novels by actually going to the city where they are set where she plotted out the moves of her characters.

Connie Brockway is the author of two winning, and eight nominated, RITA Award romance novels, and her newest novel is Skinny Dipping, a contemporary romance set in Minnesota. She stated she has also been reincarnated, and that it helps her in writing her historical titles and may influence her when she’s working on her books set in Minnesota. She has a “feel” for the settings — living in Minnesota and talking with residents provides her with anecdotes (often humorous ones) which she can sometimes incorporate into her stories.

Ms. Brockway said she was a “middle-class kid from the burbs with no angst in her life.” After settling into married life, her husband asked her if there was something else besides housework, etc., which she might want to do. Shortly thereafter, she met Susan Kay Law, they talked, and both decided to give writing a try.

Susan Kay Law was teased by the other three authors, who are a bit envious of the fact that her very first book was accepted by an agent within two days and then promptly picked up to be published! She jokingly asked the audience of librarians to be kind to her because her mother was a librarian and had always encouraged her to read. The audience applauded and in response Nita Abrams quipped “I can trump Susie — I WAS a librarian!” which garnered another round of applause.

Ms. Kay started out writing historical romances and has switched to writing women’s fiction. When asked why and how she made the transition, she said that the skills are different for each type of novel and that appeals to her. If she could write faster, she would alternate between the two types. Ms. Brockway responded that she finds women’s fiction a bit more challenging to write, and feels it is a way to help her keep from becoming stale on her historical novels.

Kim Harrison is the author of the popular Rachel Morgan series. and says she doesn’t write Romance, but rather Urban Fiction novels with many elements that appeal to romance readers. She stated that she didn’t know that she was going to be a writer — she was “blissfully ignorant,” and that it took her ten years before she started making money as a writer.

When asked how difficult it is to blend genres, Ms. Harrison said she didn’t know there were genres. But she did learn (very quickly) that an author needs to know what the genre fans expect of novels in their favorite genre. The other authors agreed, and they are all very much aware that their fans will let them know if they make a mistake!

The authors were asked if they fall in love with their heroes. Kim Harrison said she had mourned for a year, the hero she killed off. Connie Brockway said she liked them for their “attributes” to which Nita Abrams teasingly replied that she thought Connie didn’t write erotica!

The four authors were also asked to name a title which might get patrons to read romance or to name their favorite book. Connie Brockway named The Crimson Crown by Edith Layton and Susan Kay Law mentioned Morning Glory by LaVryle Spencer. Nita Abrams listed As You Desire by Connie Brockway and For My Lady’s Heart by Laura Kinsale. Kim Harrison said Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury, because it was the first time she “saw monsters among us.”

The authors were then asked about trends in Romance and why you don’t see pirate romance books any more. Kim Harrison mentioned that an author named Misty Massey has a pirate book coming out (it may already be out), but that historicals are falling off. She compared the Romance genre to a bakery which only made chocolate chip cookies and had stopped making other types of cookies. As a result they lost customers because their patrons wanted more variety in their cookies. Susan Kay Law said that she sees a blending of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Romance; more Inspirational fiction; and more Erotic fiction.

The next to last questioner took a page from the twelve-step plan and stated “My name is Nancy and I’m a paranormal romance junkie!” She said that Kim has quite a few fans among romance readers, and asked if she could list other Urban Fantasy authors who might appeal to romance fans. Ms. Harrison mentioned four authors, all with series: Rachel Vincent and her werecat series; Vickie Pettersson and the Sign of the Zodiac series; Jocelyn Drake and her new book, Nightwalker, which comes out in July 2008 and is the first in a new series featuring a jet-setting vampire. And she said that possibly, Faith Hunter’s post apocalyptic series, which has a strong female character, might also appeal to romance readers.

The final comment of the afternoon came from an audience member who had only dropped in to the program because she missed her bus. But she had so much fun and found the authors so intelligent and entertaining, that she plans to go look up and read their books. WE HAVE A ROMANCE FICTION CONVERT !!!

Handouts for this and other PLA programs can be accessed here.

Lucy Lockley, Collection Development Manager
St. Charles City-County Library District, MO

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This is one of a series of reports by attendees of the Public Library Association conference held in Minneapolis March 25-29, 2008.

RX for RA: Training Library Staff in Fiction and Nonfiction
by Jenne Bergstrom

This program highlighted readers’ advisory training methods, and explored ways to incorporate RA into all sizes and types of libraries. A main focus was including staff from all departments, including paraprofessionals and front-line staff.

It was good to see a variety of methods, but all of these seemed very elaborate, coming from a library with basically no formal RA training. I’m excited to try to bring something like this to my own library system, but I think we’ll have to start small and work our way up.

Small Library : Carmel Clay PL (1 branch)
They have a dedicated RA desk, and the person in charge of this will do a 2-week training with new staff.
They also have an ongoing genre study group.
In a library this size, flexibility is important, so the group needs to be big enough that if someone isn’t there they can still meet. They have about 6 people participating, from several departments.

They have “homework” where they practice writing appeal-based annotations which later are posted on the library website. They also do Reader Profiles, where each person chooses 3 books they loved and 3 they hated, and explains why. Then the other members try to make recommendations for them.

They share information, suggestions, and resources with other librarians at reference meetings.

Mid-size Library: St. Charles, Missouri (12 branches)
Ongoing genre study group, from about 6–14 participants, average 9 or 10.
Some participate by email.
Meetings are monthly.
They spend 2 months on each genre; the first month they all read the same book (a title representattive of the genre), then discuss it. The second, they each choose one from a list of representative titles, prefereably of different subgenres), then booktalk them to each other.
The focus is on recently published titles.
Every 5th meeting is a training session on “tips and tools”, e.g. resources and.or methods.

Large Library: Kansas City area libraries (several systems in a consortium)
In such a large system, it’s harder to have an ongoing group, so they do the training in smaller bites. Staff that complete 10 “credits” get a certificate of completion and a prize.

Ist 5 credits are earned by taking 5 courses:
–RA Basics “Facts about Fiction”
–RA Intermediate “More Facts About Fiction” –introduces main genres –United We Read (“City Reads”-type thing, I think) –A major genre workshop of their choice –A minor genre workshop of their choice

2nd 5 credits can be “electives”, e.g. specific genres like short stories, or how-tos like writing book reviews.

The focus is on having front-line staff attend, rather than just supervisors.
Trainings can come to the branch if needed. Trainers are often former students.

Questions to think about:
–How do we decide how much time to spend on each genre? Some libraries spend 2 years on SF, while others spend one day.
–How can understaffed libraries find the time to spend on RA training? How do we make it a priority for administration?
–How does literary fiction fit into a genre study? Some have it as its own genre, others mix it in with all genres.
–How can we include skills for actually talking to readers in the trainings?
–How should we classify NF genres?

Handouts for this and other PLA programs can be accessed here.

–Jenne Bergstrom
San Diego County Library

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