Amused

[owlectomy]

People are surprised when I know about manga.

People are astonished when I know about urban fiction.

I've been at this for two and a half years. At the first library I worked in, "street fiction" and mellower domestic African-American fiction made up most of our demand for adult fiction; here, it's bestsellers and street lit. Ever since I had such trouble finding Flyy Girl when I didn't know it was spelled Flyy, I've been making an effort to keep up with titles and authors... it's kinda fun to psych people out.

Comments

[mystickeeper.livejournal.com]

I know I would be floored by a librarian knowledgeable about manga!

[lordameth.livejournal.com]

I'm still trying to convince my library to take the comic books out of the young adult room and put them in a regular adult/everyone area. If one of the librarians at my library were knowledgeable about anything I was looking for (manga, kabuki, history of Okinawa...), or if my library even had anything on those subjects to begin with, I'd be absolutely floored as well.

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

Truthfully, if I were in charge of collections at most public libraries I wouldn't get anything on kabuki or Okinawa unless I was lucky enough to find a readable popular book that would appeal to more than two or three people; we just can't afford to collect things that are going to appeal to a niche audience. (Partly, this is because our funding is based on our circulation statistics.) Most public libraries don't even have the space, let alone the money, to house more academic, more specialized collections.

(For the record, I don't have any say in what to buy, so it's a bit of a moot point.)

And that sucks for people trying to do serious research without the benefit of a serious research library -- I know, I've been there -- but ultimately we serve the public better by getting 20 copies of the latest James Patterson, even if it gives me hives as an individual. I feel like, ultimately, it should be up to the serious research libraries to open up their collections more to people not affiliated with the university -- when I was in Raleigh, I could get borrowing privileges at Duke for only $35 a year, but Columbia charges $250 a year, and you can't even get in without paying.

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

So what urban fiction would you recommend to someone who ... let us skip the long descriptions! Can you recommend starter urban fiction for me?

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I'm not the best person to make recommendations - I don't read nearly as much fiction written for adults as I'd like.

That said, I think "The Coldest Winter Ever" by Sister Souljah is a good place to start; it was one of the really big books that jump-started the genre in 1999, and it's the book a lot of the newer authors are trying to copy. And I think "The Last Street Novel" by Omar Tyree is really interesting in the way it riffs on the conventions of the genre.