Following up on Week 2, I posted two recommendations on Olivia's blog. She wrote about her passion for character-driven novels with a touch of sci-fi and humor. First I suggested Vonnegut's Sirens of Titan, based on Novelist's suggestions for read-alikes. I also went out on a limb and suggested David Wong's John Dies in the End, which has a good amount of characterization, as well as humor and a sci-fi flavor. In it's chewy caramel center, though, Wong's book is outrageous and zany horror, so I may have missed the mark on that one.
That brings up an interesting point, though. Reader's advisory is necessarily a balancing act. The customer has told us what they like. We need to parlay that into a suggestion. In some cases and some genres, we can suggest a book that hits their every taste exactly (cozy mysteries, I'm looking at you). In the much more common cases, we can find books based on appeal factors, but rarely does a book match everything they want.
Following up from Week 4, I sent a suggestion to my coworker Jaime on
Goodreads. Based on her ratings for celebrity autobiographies, such as
Bossypants, I suggested Nerd Do Well by Simon Pegg. Let me tell you,
though, it was tough to find a book that wasn't already on her
Goodreads! That's only natural since she's a darn good librarian.
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