Hey, librarians. Hey, readers. Hey, Small Press!

Has this happened to you?

You walk into your library. You glance around the shelves filled with row after row of the same best sellers, but you're not interested. Maybe you even know the titles of a book or two you've been wanting to read. Alas, the library doesn't have them in its collection. You walk out empty-handed, or with something you're just not that into.

or

You're in a bookstore. This book looks good. That book looks great! You reach for your wallet, but then you remember you're broke. No use checking out your library, you think, those aren't the kind of book they'd have.

 

Well, you've got the answer to your predicament, and it's already in your own hands. Just pick up that blunt golf pencil and fill out a library request form. For more on this, see Don Antenen's post about the power of the request form here. Don works in a library and he wants to spread his empowering message around. He and Kate Hensley have begun a new site called Hey, Small Press! to highlight some of the best books in the small press world and to encourage us all to start talking about them. That's right, they suggest talking to your librarian:

Tell them how much you like small press literature and why you’re excited about these particular titles. Encourage them to check out this site. There is nothing that brightens up the day of a librarian like a conversation with an enthusiastic reader.

If we can't convince you to go to a library, maybe Linda Holmes at NPR can. She had an epiphany about libraries and their greatness just the other week, chronicling them hilariously on her twitter feed.