Secret Shopper
Secret Shopper
My
husband had an unexpected two-hour lunch break on his Saturday shift, so he
asked me to come over and visit him. The public library is just down the road
from his work, so I suggested we visit to do this secret shopper assignment. His
favorite author is Sarah Maas. She is a young adult sci-fiction genre writer. He
has been complaining recently that he can’t find anything else to read that
interests him. He did not like any of my suggestions, so I thought he would be
the perfect guinea pig for this assignment.
We
approach the front desk, and the library staff member greets us. My husband
asks her: “Do have any books similar to Sarah Maas books?” She looked a bit confused and asked him to spell
the author’s last name. She stated that Sarah Maas was located in the young
adult section. She suggested he browse through that area to find similar books.
She walked us over there and explained these two aisles were dedicated to young
adults. We thanked her, and that was it. My husband asked if this was going to
be enough to put in my paper, and I said probably not.
There
was a teenage worker in the next aisle shelving books that overheard our
conversation. He came over and said he loved Sarah Maas too. He asked my
husband what else he liked to read. Somehow, they got onto the subject of
dragons, and my husband told him he was obsessed with the Eragon novels when
they came out years ago. The shelver became excited and took my husband over to
the new fiction book display. There before us was the new Christopher Paolini
book, Murtagh. The shelver said, the book was set in the same timeline
as Eragon. My husband’s face lit up, and he profusely thanked the shelver
for his help. The shelver said “No problem, I’m here every Saturday if you need
anymore suggestions.” This teen had helped my husband find a book, where I and
the front desk staff had failed. My husband is a picky reader, and it took
someone who had the same interests as him to find what he what he was looking
for.
What is
the moral of this story? With all my training, I could not find my husband a
book he enjoyed after Sarah Maas. No book was going to compare to her writing. Everything
I tried to offer him, he would read one chapter then stop from lack of
interest. It never occurred to me that he needed to talk to someone who held
the same interests as him. A teenage boy was able to connect with my husband
and find him that elusive book. What I take from this experience is that all
library staff members are important. Who
better to recommend a young adult book than a young adult?
What
could they have done better? The front desk staff didn’t put any real effort
into finding a book similar. It was pretty busy in the library, so I imagine it
would have gone differently if they were slow. If I was in that situation, where
I had a line of patrons waiting for help, I probably would have suggested the
patron tried the app Goodreads. I have had success using this app to
find other authors to read. The true hero of this story is the teenage shelver.
He didn’t have to come over and try to help us. Next time my husband has an
unexpected two-hour lunch break on a Saturday, he knows were to go to find his
new buddy and book suggestions.
References
Paolini, C. (2023). Murtagh. Random House Children’s
Books.
Jennifer, What an important lesson to learn! It would be so helpful to have a staff list with their reading interests so we could direct patrons to someone with shared interests. I'm really disappointed with how the desk staff handled this question. Did she have to look up the author to know what section, or do you think asking for the spelling was a way to stall because she needed time to process the question?
ReplyDeleteIn the case of there being a lot of patrons to help, I probably would have started with directing the patron to where the OPAC and young adult sections were located, and asking him to browse a bit while I waited on the rest of the patrons in line. However, it would have been accompanied by the promise that I would assist soon.
The teen shelver is absolutely the hero of this story, and I hope he will continue to share that excitement about books and eventually be a librarian.
The urge to direct patrons to the shelves to browse for books is so strong. I had the same happen to me for this assignment, haha. It really is disappointing when the front desk can't help you with something, but I always try to keep in mind that I have no idea who the frontline workers have had to deal with that day ahead of me. I totally get patience being thin and unfortunately sometimes customer service takes a momentary hit because of it. It would have been nice if the first staff member had tried a little harder, or passed you off to someone who could have helped you better instead of leaving you to yourselves. I'm glad you & your husband had some success in the end, though!
ReplyDeleteI think reference staff will often send patrons to shelves to look when they are busy or when they don't really have a lot of experience with Reader's Advisory. It's interesting to see how that plays out in reality when we're learning about how to do the work in a classroom setting. Hopefully, you'll have a better experience with the first person you get help from next time!
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm so glad that other worker was able to help out! I also love Sarah J Maas books! Her most recent Crescent City novel came out this past Tuesday, and I have to admit that I've been not doing homework because I've been so consumed with it! If your husband hasn't encountered it yet - Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is a newer fantasy (romance heavy) series that focuses on a bunch of dragon riders as they learn to ride the dragons. I'd say it's similar in style, storytelling, tone, and genre as Sarah J Maas. You'll have to let me know if he likes Murtagh! I've been wanting to read it but I remember nothing about the original series so I need to reread that first.
Hi Jennifer!
ReplyDeleteWhat a coincidence! I am reading through the ACOTAR series at the moment! And how wonderful that you and your husband were able to get quality RA service after the failure at the front desk. I am more than a little shocked that the front desk librarian did not help you any further. It almost sounds like they were not even listening to you in that they sent you to an entire section to find one single read-alike. Also, I know that not everyone is reading SJM at the moment, but I genuinely cannot believe that the librarian had never even heard of her! She is THE author of the moment, at least in my library. I am curious, did they look busy or in the middle of a task? I am surprised that they did not even attempt a basic Google search. How disappointing, but all the gold stars for the teen worker and their budding enthusiasm for RA!