My Thong's on Fire!

During last week's statewide outreach coordinators conference, we were treated to a fabulous presentation on urban / street fiction by Scott Jarzombek of Albany Public Library. [1]

Scott got me thinking: while I purchase urban fiction for the correctional libraries, I'd never actually read any. As a proponent of Reader's Advisory services, especially for underserved populations, I knew that this was not a best practice. I am now in the middle of Around the Way Girls, a collection of three novellas. I also purchased and will soon read Thong on Fire by Noire.

Noire is also the author of G-Spot, Thug-a-Licious, and Candy Licker, but I chose Thong on Fire because Scott said that it always gets stolen and he has to buy it in batches. I checked our library catalog (of course I would rather take a book out of the library than buy it; I'm a librarian!) to find that only 5 of our 54 libraries own this title. It's checked out at three and presumed stolen or missing at one of those. I can be somewhat impulsive, and I figured that there probably was something to this book, so I decided to buy a copy.

Can I tell you what it's like to call multiple bookstores and ask for a book titled THONG ON FIRE? (I had to visit two different Borders and call multiple B+N locations because - surprise, surprise - it wasn't on the shelf in most locations, even though it was listed as "in stock" on the website).

When I talk about Reader's Advisory, I always say that no one should have to apologize for her reading tastes, but nothing drives this point home like being an actual customer and asking for THONG ON FIRE. I wanted to be all assertive and nonchalant; instead, I was hesitant and embarrassed. I worried that the customer service reps would hang up on me (none did) and offered justifications ("I know it's weird - I'm a librarian and I need to read this.") when none were necessary and I knew it was none of their business.

My challenge to you today is to try this experiment yourself. Call another library or a bookstore as a "civilian" and ask for something totally embarrassing. [2] Ideally, the selection should be something you really want and need to read, so you will feel emotionally invested in this.

Remember that feeling.

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[1] Incidentally, I would like to bring Scott's presentation to Nassau. My thought is that we can all read different urban fiction titles before the workshop and then share with each other. Whatta ya think?

[2] For those of you who aren't library staff: I'm suggesting this because library staff can usually find what they need in the library in which they work without any assistance, and can often check the materials out themselves, so they don't have that same experience of checking out The Joy of Lesbian Sex in front of the town gossip.