We recently chatted with Sulin Jones, senior librarian at the Mono County Free Library, about their community reads program. Mono County Community Reads recently hosted Luis Carlos Montalvan, author of Until Tuesday, in 2013, and will host David Carle, author of Traveling the 38th Parallel: A Water Line Around the World, in April.
Books In Common: Would you tell us a bit about your program? For instance, how long has the Mono County Free Library been hosting a Community Reads event, how did it get started, and how have you seen it change since your involvement with it?
Sulin Jones: Mono County library first hosted a community read in 2008, when we received a grant to participate in the NEA’s Big Read. Fortunately, at the time, the NEA provided training, so we weren’t completely in the dark about how to proceed. The NEA also provided reading guides and promotional materials, which proved to be a big help and time saver. As this was our first project, we didn’t know what was or wasn’t possible, so we went big; we decided to provide programming and events for every member of the Community, no matter what age, reading level, or background. That year we chose Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, because the themes of censorship, mass media, loss of individuality are so universal, we figured we could find a way to appeal to everyone. In addition to book discussions and movie screening at all 7 of our branches, we had bookmark contests, essay contests, and a “build a mechanical hound” contest; we created a separate web page, scheduled censorship lectures, as well as firefighter & sci-fi story times. We took photos of people reading Fahrenheit 451 and plastered them around town. It was a big, exhausting project and I never wanted to do another Community Reads ever again… but they’re a bit addictive! Since 2008, Mono County has hosted 6 more Community Reads: another Big Read (www.neabigread.org), one California Read, (www.calhum.org/programs/california-reads), three collaborations with our neighboring county, and one Book to Action (www.library.ca.gov/lds/getinvolved/booktoaction/) program.
Programs like The Big Read and California Reads are wonderful, especially for small libraries, because 1), they provide grant funding, and 2) they’ve got a whole group of experts to provide support, reading guides, teaching guides, bibliographies, publicity materials, and graphics. The trade-off is that you have less control over the title that your community reads. Which is why my favorite program to date has been Book To Action, funded by a mini grant from the California State Library. With BTA, we get choose our own title (with approval) but also get access to branded materials, support, and funding.
The idea behind Book To Action is to not just get people to read a book, but to get them to act on the ideas they’ve learned: taking the ideas found on the pages and making them happen in the real life. It’s a wonderful idea, and I really appreciate the overall point: don’t just passively read, but think and participate! We have choices, and we can create the communities we want if we all are active participants, rather than casual onlookers.
BIC: What did you learn from the last several programs that is helping you this year?
SJ: I’ve learned that’s it’s all about inclusiveness: Public libraries are about community, and although I will never get everyone in my community to read the selected book, I can get almost everyone to participate in a related program. Reading books, although close to my heart, is not the best option for everyone. People learn in different ways, and consequently, ideas and concepts and knowledge can be spread and shared in an equal number of ways. In doing online research to plan our community read, I’ve seen many entities focus on just the book, book discussions, and author talks. By doing this, they’re potentially leaving out a huge percentage of their library users and community: the younger kids, the non readers, the busy families, the commuters who listen to audio books, those who only read fiction or nonfiction.. Most of us are over-scheduled, and not reading a book isn’t the worst thing you could do. So, no matter what the title, I’ve learned to provide relevant programming so as not to exclude anyone.
