Read The River Runs Free by Geoff Law in order to do a review for ABP magazine. Interesting history of the saving of the Franklin River in Tasmania. Cameos by Bob Brown and Peter Cundall.
Now I'm reading the Kibble winner Nights in the Asylum by Carol Lefevre, in order to do a brief review for Newsbreak. It's quite good but I hate those large and heavy trade format paperbacks, they're such a drag to carry around.
Am cataloguing the papers of Finola Moorhead at work, should try to read her novels to get a better feel for the manuscripts but they're so hard to get into. She's a very experimental writer, lots of fantasy and very strange structures. Not really my style I just like a good story, well told.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Underbelly & The Fragrant Trail
I've started reading Underbelly, based on the TV series, or actually the book came first but I've gone to the book after the show. It's a very engaging read, I always worry that non-fiction will be boring but this is a ripping yarn, a case of fact being more exciting than fiction.
Also on the weekend I read our own Pat Turner's detective book, The Fragrant Trail, it's very good. I like stories set in locations I know and this one is set in Newtown.
I'm currently reading a book to review for Australian Bookseller & Publisher magazine. The review is due Monday and I've barely started it, better get moving soon. Titled The River Runs Free, it's the story of Geoff Law, an activist during the Franklin Dam saga in Tasmania.
I saw The Painted Veil at the cinema last week and am now ready to read the book on which it is based by Somerset Maugham, but must read the ABP one first. So many books and so little time.
Also on the weekend I read our own Pat Turner's detective book, The Fragrant Trail, it's very good. I like stories set in locations I know and this one is set in Newtown.
I'm currently reading a book to review for Australian Bookseller & Publisher magazine. The review is due Monday and I've barely started it, better get moving soon. Titled The River Runs Free, it's the story of Geoff Law, an activist during the Franklin Dam saga in Tasmania.
I saw The Painted Veil at the cinema last week and am now ready to read the book on which it is based by Somerset Maugham, but must read the ABP one first. So many books and so little time.
Wikis
I wish there weren't so many American sources used in this training program, surely there are similar examples of what we are learning that have been done by Australians? So many of the links are to US sites as well, I wish it could be a bit customised for us Aussie students or at least maybe a range of overseas sites apart from just USA. Makes me feel like I'm doing a correspondence course through one of those shonky US midwestern unis that will post you your degree once you send US$10000.
But I digress, the wookiepedia was cleverly titled. I also selected the Princeton one because I've been thinking about book clubs lately. Marion RB mentioned to me that the Library might set up a regular Book Club event as part of its public programs. When I've been trying to think of how blogs could be useful at work it occurred to me that maybe a staff book club could run via a blog. But as for wikis, one could have been useful when Brian Fletcher was researching his book on the history of the Mitchell Library. He researched by interviewing staff to get historical anecdotes, or that was how he conducted part of his research. People kept coming out of the woodwork with information and as he didn't know how knew what he might have been able to post a wiki with the info he had, and staff could enhance or correct the data according to their knowledge and experience and recollections. Potentially I wonder if there is an application for wikis with our catalogue records, if the records could hypothetically be duplicated into a wiki that the public could contribute their knowledge to, however we are so fussy about wanting all our public contributions correctly sourced and 100% accurate that it could become a bit of a minefield. We don't want the public accepting the speculation of other members of the public as being validated by the Library when it's not. Interesting that the German wiki encyclopedia was so accurate, in fact more accurate than the standard encyclopedia. This would suggest users only make contributions that are very high quality, so at least that is reassuring
But I digress, the wookiepedia was cleverly titled. I also selected the Princeton one because I've been thinking about book clubs lately. Marion RB mentioned to me that the Library might set up a regular Book Club event as part of its public programs. When I've been trying to think of how blogs could be useful at work it occurred to me that maybe a staff book club could run via a blog. But as for wikis, one could have been useful when Brian Fletcher was researching his book on the history of the Mitchell Library. He researched by interviewing staff to get historical anecdotes, or that was how he conducted part of his research. People kept coming out of the woodwork with information and as he didn't know how knew what he might have been able to post a wiki with the info he had, and staff could enhance or correct the data according to their knowledge and experience and recollections. Potentially I wonder if there is an application for wikis with our catalogue records, if the records could hypothetically be duplicated into a wiki that the public could contribute their knowledge to, however we are so fussy about wanting all our public contributions correctly sourced and 100% accurate that it could become a bit of a minefield. We don't want the public accepting the speculation of other members of the public as being validated by the Library when it's not. Interesting that the German wiki encyclopedia was so accurate, in fact more accurate than the standard encyclopedia. This would suggest users only make contributions that are very high quality, so at least that is reassuring
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