OK, I have thought about getting the latest Harry Potter, and just don’t have the money right now. My niece is reading it, but it may be a while before I am able to borrow it from her (she got it from Amazon on the first day of release).
So, just for laughs, I decided to test the local library system by making an online reservation for the book. The Cleveland library system is one of the best in the country (third largest, first in number of books on open shelves) and the Cuyahoga County system is also among the top 10 in terms of circulation. So I put reservations on each of the two systems to see which would get it to me first. (I will cancel the other reservation as soon as I have the book.)
So, any bets as to how long it will be before I have the book in my hands? (No prizes, just bragging rights.) Or anyone care to challenge my library system with their own?
Rules:
No cheating. You are on your honor that you don’t have a relative or friend in the library system who is setting the book aside for you.
You have to be notified by the library and pick it up after receiving the notice either by e-mail or snail mail or online notification. No checking the library stock online and running to that branch to get it before someone else does. (I could probably have it today using that method.)
I placed my reservation at about 2:30 PM EST on June 24, 2003.
I am betting that I get a notice in less than 7 days by the Cleveland system, and 14 days by the Cuyahoga county system.
I can’t take you up on your offer because I already have a copy that I preordered from Amazon several months ago. But if my library system is anything like yours, I would be very surprised if you got the book in less than seven days. The consortium I work in has 220 copies of the Order of the Phoenix and over 1000 people waiting to get their hot little hands on it. And that’s just for the print copy! Good luck! I can’t wait to hear how we compare to Cleveland
In the Ottawa library system, there is 273 (english) copies in the system and last week there was over 1200 people in the queue. I just tried to reserve it online to see where it is now, but my card has expired .
Not that it matters, 'cuz I bought it at Costco last night. Good little read so far.
I reserved the book back in the end of January, and I was number 350 on the waiting list. Right now, I’m at 186 out of 1117 on the list. I’m not sure how many copies the Seattle Public Library got, but I’m not expecting to get a hold of it for a couple of months.
I put my hold in the Denver Public Library system o 6/23. There are 240 holdable copies, and yesterday when I put in my hold I was number 794. When I checked just now I was at 776. So if it keeps going at this rate, it’ll take me over a month to get it! Ugh!
I didn’t look to see if I could reserve it before it actually came out…now I wish I had, but I just figured that you couldn’t reserve a book that the library didn’t technically have yet.
There are 483 copies in the king county system, and I am about #2100 in line. I suspect it will take 2-3 months for me to get a copy, which is fine by me. Plenty of other good books to read
Sunshine. I don’t know about the Denver system, but in Cleveland you can reserve a book before it is even in print. I did that with Sue Grafton’s Q is for Quarry, and got it within 3 days of its release.
Checking on the County Library today, I see that they had 700 copies. They say that I am #436 of 477 holds. I think that means that they are holding a copy for me, (possibly in process) – if it was just being on a list, they usually use the term “reserve”.
The city library system is not as convenient in telling me what position I am on the reserve system. But I think I will still end up getting it from there first because they usually have more copies, and they process and transfer copies faster.
Hmm… I wonder what the librarys will do with all these books after the first month. While it may make sense to have 1000 books at the start to cope with demand, I cant possibly imagine them having more than 5 out on the shelves after about a year. I dont think they could give them away very easily either since every man and his dog seems to have one. What can you do with 1000 HP books?
I worked at a library during the release of the last Harry Potter book; in fact, I worked in circulation. We were holding every single HP that came in until maybe the beginning of October–probably longer, and, IIRC, it was realeased sometime in July (I wasn’t reading the series at the time). In fact, I think that, when I checked out GoF in December around Christmas, it was selected for a hold when I turned it back in. So I wouldn’t count on it coming in anytime soon.
Just checked and I am now # 765. Woo hoo! People in Denver, read faster!
btw, Shalmanese, the 240 copies in the Denver system are for ALL the libraries in the Denver Public Library system, including bookmobiles and whatnot. That’s like 25ish libraries, which prolly equals out to 7 or so copies per library when you get rid of all the copies that go missing. I’m guessing it’s the same situation for Los Angeles which has 901 copies and prolly a lot more branches than here in Denver. Just a guess, but that’s what I figger.
Yeah, I’m sure there will be a long time before the copies are just put on open shelves rather than the reserve shelf. But that doesn’t mean that someone who went on the list in July had to wait until October to get the book. Some people probably waited to put their name on the list.
Like I said, I am on the list (right now 428 of 501 holds out of 700 copies in the county system – the city system doesn’t indicate position on the list). But the city system usually moves faster.
It sounds like it’s humming along nicely. Some people have cancelled their holds here because they just succumbed to the marketing pressure and bought the thing–I preordered mine ages ago So that’s made our list move a little bit faster.
What did you pay at costco, I am curious to see what the difference between chapters and costco will be. I am also gonna check out walmart and see what their price is.
Yeah, I can understand their reluctance to wait. The temptation for me is to break my own rules (rule #2 to be specific – I happen to know that there are 8 copies right now sitting on the shelf of one of the inner-city branches.)
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