by Emily Barney and Becky Haagsma
Location: Honoring the wishes of our patron
Mr. Wigglesworth, who wants to create a "collection" of graphic novels in the teenspace section of the library, we've determined that these books should have a separate display and reading lounge area. Whether the comics are located on shelves or in a freestanding display, showing them face out will make a small beginning collection both more accessible and more appealing. It also helps with preservation, as Becky mentions in her post
hereUPDATE: The photo posted on our
teenspace website shows how a lounging area with comfortable seating and plenty of natural light attracts lots of teen readers!
Labeling:
Rather than catalog each individual title with a Dewey Decimal call number, we have decided to label all books by author, but include a sticker to designate that they are graphic novels. This approach alleviates the need to give “non-fiction” titles a dewey decimal number.
The next step is deciding shelving order. Should all of the books be shelved by author, as with most fiction? What about series that would be separated, like the different Batman graphic novels? While it is a good idea to have a policy in place, it's important to know how users will expect to find things. Keeping the location separate and having a simple labeling system in place makes it easier to adjust the order in the future when the collection grows. Here's another example of a very broad labeling system:
The labels in the image above are simply "science fiction" "manga" and "realism"
