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September 2025 | Volume XLIII, Issue 3 »

Your Next Great Read Starts Here: Readers' Advisory at the Champaign Public Library

September 2, 2025
Rachel Ferrier, Naomi Kufel, & Ruairi McEnroe, Champaign Public Library

Champaign Public Library has a lot to offer our patrons these days–from meeting rooms to public computers to programs for all ages–but there is still an overwhelming demand for the things that made libraries famous: books. Our customers regularly ask for help to find their next read, and while we’ve been making great recommendations all along, we decided that we needed to freshen up our approach to readers’ advisory. Enter the RA Working Group.

We started a conversation in a Teams channel titled “Talking Books;” all library staff members, regardless of  department, were invited to join. It was–and still is–a place to share interesting book news, including adaptations we’re excited about (or not), awards lists, new releases by favorite authors, and of course a recurring thread where we discuss what we’re reading.

A regular in-person meeting came next, evolving from a library-wide genre study created by Technical Services Manager Nanette Donohue. The genre study, one of countless activities put on hold by the pandemic, reconvened in 2022 with a series of meetings on different types of mystery novels (Golden Age historical, police procedural, cozy mysteries, etc.). Library staff members from all departments were invited to read a mysterybook of their choice and then discuss it with the group, book club style. During the conversation, we considered aspects like character development, pacing, mood, and other appeal terms–the exact elements that you might use to help a patron articulate what they’re looking for in their next book.

The RA Working Group now includes folks from our Collections and Technical Services Team, as well as our Access Services (circulation) and Adult Services departments. Staff from our branch library, the Douglass Branch, also periodically attend meetings, which occur once a month for an hour before the library opens. And while other departments aren’t often able to be there in person, staffers from Administration, HR, and Children’s Services regularly participate in the “Talking Books” channel.

One of our regular agenda items is brainstorming ways to continue growing and promoting our readers’ advisory services, including our Book Match service, which provides patrons with book recommendations via email after they fill out an online form. They give us a few details about their interests, and we crowdsource ideas for 3-5 titles (along with the reasons our team recommends them). Customers are delighted by the service (and the quick three-day turnaround) and often reply to tell us so.

Our group also regularly uses NoveList’s online readers’ advisory training as a resource. For example, several staff members participated in the Actively Anti-Racist Service to Readers course, which gave us a great foundation for recommending a broader range of titles and authors from our diverse collection. We also serve as library-wide advocates of readers’ advisory, sharing tips and useful resources and encouraging other staff to get involved. Even if it’s something as simple as replying with a title suggestion to a Book Match request or responding to a “What are you reading?” thread, we believe that anyone can gain valuable experience in readers’ advisory by participating in the discussion.

One of the most ambitious activities our group has done to date was a special breakout session for our 2024 Staff Development Day. Three members of the RA Working Group, Arianna Wasik, Naomi Kufel, and RK Knaur, presented tips and tricks for recommending books based on a variety of appeal factors and gave participants a chance for some hands-on practice. This session became the foundation of their presentation at Reaching Forward South this past April, where they expounded upon their process of executing improvisational readers’ advisory. The talk, titled “Facing the Dragon of Indecision,” focused on not only equipping library staff across departments with recommendation tools, but also assisting patrons in overcoming their own uncertainty in navigating library resources.

One of the key aspects of the presentation was demonstrating that you don’t have to read every book yourself in order to recommend them. There is admittedly some judging a book based on its cover–you can often tell whether a book is a thriller vs. a romance vs. a fantasy based on cover art, for example–but you can also look at blurbs, reviews, and ther resources to clue you in on whether it might be what your patron is looking for. We’ve also established a list of genre “experts” among staff at the Champaign Public Library; that way we can crowdsource recommendations from folks who might be more familiar with certain types of books.

In an age where digital media can often overshadow the joy of reading, our staff has a passion for connecting with patrons and we strive to make each recommendation unique. Our goal has been, from the inception of the RA Working Group, to make readers’ advisory accessible to everyone in the library world, no matter your job title or level of experience. Why? Besides the fact that talking about books is fun, we think that everyone benefits from keeping lanes of communication open and active between library departments. We are connecting by sharing our knowledge, along with our excitement for books, movies, audiobooks, and podcasts. Our hope is that this service will continue to grow and adapt to reach our patrons, who will come to see us as a trusted source for book recommendations along with the vast array of other resources that they depend on us to provide.