Hold it! The Struggle with Long Library Holds
I’m relatively new to the e-library/Overdrive game, but I’m totally here for it. First, it’s incredibly useful. I’m a student, so I don’t always have access to my home library for physical books. I do, however, have access to the e-library. What a godsend. I’ve yet to find the contemporary fiction section in my college library, so it’s nice to have access to newer fiction from the internet.
Here’s the problem, at least with the e-library I use: the good stuff has quite the wait time. That’s cool, I mean, there are a lot of books and there’s only so many I can read before I confuse them all (I think my limit is three or four), so I don’t mind waiting occasionally.
I put my first book on hold in February, and I got it the other day.
Heck, I forgot that I had it on hold. During all that time, I forgot who recommended it to me and why. I’m totally fine with reading it now, but I’d had other things I was starting to think about reading next, and this was oddly unexpected. Of course, I knew it was coming, but I had forgotten. It might be obvious, but I haven’t put that many books on hold. (Although maybe I should, and kind of leave myself random presents in the future).
To be fair, I think it’s great that people are utilizing these resources in order to read. But there’s the rub: you find something new and awesome and you want everyone to use it – and then new traffic gunks it up. The best part about the newest and awesomest thing is sometimes that no one else is using it.
I don’t know how much I’ll use the hold system at the e-library. On the one hand, I’ll definitely read some books that aren’t the newest ones out there, which is good. On the other hand, I’m finally at a point where I want to read some of the newest and coolest books out there. It’s a struggle.
How do you combat library holds?
