Carol A. Singer, London, Facet Publishing, 2012, , 167 pp, £44.95 (soft cover), ISBN 978-1-85604-831-6, (available from Inbooks)
‘This book is designed to explore the various aspects of designing, organizing, and maintaining both tangible and virtual reference collections.’ So writes the author, a reference librarian at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. This is, in fact, the UK edition of a US publication, and the examples, bibliography and spelling are heavily American. Does this matter to Australasian librarians? Whilst the restrictive bias does fail somewhat to recognise the internationalisation of our profession, the content itself is presented so logically, comprehensively and clearly that neophyte information workers and students in this part of the world would certainly benefit from reading this work, though the cost may discourage some from buying personal copies.
Singer writes about the current situation, in which both printed and digital resources co-exist, and in which both internal and mobile access may be used to access them. Areas covered include collection-development policies, staffing, selection, acquisition and budgets, maintenance, weeding and access. Despite this wide treatment, topics are addressed in sufficient depth to ensure that readers will gain a good understanding of current good practice concerning mixed-media reference collections in an era of tight budgets and low staffing levels. A useful feature (which to some extent also serves as an outline of topics and solutions) is an appendix in the form of a template for reference collection-development policies, from which alternative statements may be selected for use by different kinds of libraries. A 15-page version of this template may be freely downloaded at www.alaeditions.org/webextras/ and it is suggested that this be accessed and either viewed on screen or saved for its value in deciding whether to purchase the book itself.
© 2013, Edward Reid-Smith