Virtual books now a reality at Lynn library

LYNN – Chief Librarian Nadine Mitchell says the public library is the first on the North Shore to let readers sample the first few chapters of a book online.?We?re trying to appeal to the Twitter generation,” Mitchell said Tuesday as library summer employee Kayla Milmore demonstrated how she roams the stacks of Lynn?s new virtual library.Signing up for the sampling service at www.noblenet.org-/lynn allows readers to click on a section of the library web page titled, “Read books in your e-mail” and select the types of books they want to sample. The library electronically mails subscribers a portion of a book equivalent to roughly a five minute read every week day.?This is sort of like getting a trailer to a movie,” said Milmore.Online reading is part of what Mitchell calls “Library 2.0″ – a concerted effort to find more ways to give readers a chance to explore books and offer reading suggestions and opinions online.?Kayla?s generation is online. If we want to foster patrons we have to go where they are going,” Mitchell said.The genres available for sample reading include fiction, non fiction, romance, business, “good news,” teen literature and mysteries. E-readers can listen to audio books through their electronic mail and the library also hopes to make available books selected for sampling before they are published.?This new service makes it easy for people to get back into the habit of reading. It only takes five minutes a day and it?s fun,” Mitchell said.Library circulation statistics show a surge in material checked out from the North Common Street library, but nearly a third of the 265,000 checked-out items in 2007 and 2008 were music and video disks.Mitchell wants to pair books with readers and if it means giving them an electronic inducement to read, she is willing to try.?We hope they?ll come to the library and borrow the actual book,” Mitchell said.The library is also launching a book club with meetings scheduled in the Smith Fiction Room at 7 p.m. beginning Sept. 23. The first book selected for reading and discussion is The Lace Reader with different books selected for other months.