Document text
Library gives readers a taste of best-sellers � via the computer By Bill Varble There�s nothing like curling up on a crisp fall night with a good ... e-mail? A new program at the Jackson County Library is set to begin Monday shipping sample portions of best-selling books to readers via e-mail. The idea is to give readers a chance to test drive the books before checking them out or buying them. The program is free, but people must sign up for it. The only thing required is an e-mail address. "As soon as people sign up, they should start getting the first book," says the library�s Meghan O�Flaherty. The Online Book Club � the library�s for-profit partner in the endeavor � e-mails a portion of a chapter of a best-selling book to participants each day. Each segment takes about five minutes to read. More installments follow for several days. After two or three chapters, the club quits sending parts of that book and starts on a new one. "If you read the first three sentences and have no interest at all, just eliminate the e-mail," O�Flaherty says. The excerpts are made available to libraries and their patrons by the OnLine Book Club, a company that has registered the trademark Chapter-a-Day (to find out more, go to Chapteraday.com). Readers can reserve a copy at the library, either in person, over the phone or by going to www.jcls.org, or buy it at www.chapteraday.com. The company hopes enough readers choose the latter option for it to turn a profit. Company spokeswoman Suzanne Beecher says the company gets permission from publishers to send about three chapters worth of new books. To join, sign up by sending an e-mail to: [email protected]. Don�t put anything in the subject box. Type the word "join" in the message box. Or, go to the library�s Web site at www.jcls.org, click on the On-line Book Club icon, and fill out the registration form. The Jackson County Library is among the first in Oregon to offer the club (the Albany library is another), but some 1,300 libraries in the U.S. and Canada now take part. Director Ronnie Budge hails the club as a plus for busy people who like to read but are short on shopping time. "It�s a new way to get people interested in a book," she says. The club offers libraries the ability to add their own news and events and links to their Web sites. The Computer Group, the owner of Chapter-a-Day, asks participating libraries to promote the Online Book Club. The program�s first Online book � coming to an e-mail address near you starting Monday � is "Getting to Resolution: Turning Conflict into Collaboration," (Berrett-Koehler) by Stewart Levine. Recent books in the series have included "White Teeth," by Zadie Smith, "Bee Season," by Myla Goldberg and "I�m Okay, You�re a Brat," by Susan Jeffers. There are also clubs for business titles, romance and mystery titles, and O�Flaherty says the library may offer more clubs down the road. She says the library has no estimate on how many people might sign up. "We have absolutely no idea," she says. The library typically stocks several copies of a best-seller, and maybe 15 of a runaway favorite like the Harry Potter series or a John Grisham book. Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2000 Mail Tribune, Inc.