"This Book Is Overdue" isn't going to be for everyone (and I still haven't figured out how it got saddled with that baffling subtitle), but Marilyn Johnson has done a great job of putting human faces on a profession that is often either beloved or ridiculed. The stereotype of the prim, shushing matron notwithstanding, Johnson's almost obsessive exploration of the roles, subcultures and future of librarians and librarianship in an era of shrinking budgets, digital media, cyberculture and declining readership turns out to be pretty compelling, enshrining a number of librarians who have changed their field, and in some ways, even our world.
Frequently depicting librarians as a breed apart who are nonetheless indispensable to mere mortals in search of information, no matter how arcane, she has written a book that celebrates the eccentricity and sheer diversity within their profession--a profession that in some ways is changing at breakneck speed and in others is securely rooted in tradition. Her topics veer from the librarians who sued the government, post-"Patriot" Act, to keep their patrons' records out of the hands of government spies, to avid blogger librarians, to the librarian avatars of Second Life, to the changing face of the New York Public Library, to name just a few, carrying readers along for a decidedly unconventional but fascinating ride.
I found the chapters on Radical Reference--activist librarians who take to the streets, using smart phones to dispense information--and the Second Life librarians to be particularly interesting, mainly because they represent such a departure from the traditional roles we're all familiar with. But as a writer who has relied on archivists' expertise to help me research four books, I have a special appreciation for the skills of that subdiscipline and especially enjoyed the chapter about the challenges they face as well.
If you really (REALLY) like books, if you remember the libraries of your youth with fondness (I kept "smelling" the old libraries from my childhood as I read the sections about bricks and mortar libraries), if you're an information junkie of any kind, you'll probably want to add this book to your reading list. There's a lot more going on within those hallowed walls than you may realize, and it may give you a whole new perspective. If knowledge is indeed power, then librarians may well be the unsung power brokers of our civilization.
Four stars for this unexpected pleasure.
