If assembled, Hillary Clinton, Stephen King, Bill O’ Reilly and Malala Yousafzai might share a contentious dinner conversation. But they peacefully coexist on the Bryant Libary’s Nook e-readers, all 20 of which are preloaded with 180 titles and can be checked out for 14 days at a time.
“We load the Nooks with the hot titles that everybody is reserving,” assistant director Joan Casson Sauer said. “Whatever is really, really popular.’’
The library has operated the Nook loan program since 2012. Unlike many libraries that only allow patrons to download e-books from an online database onto their privately owned tablet devices, Bryant Library lends the tablet directly to its cardholders. “We’ve never had a patron lose one or damage one,” Casson Sauer said. “Once in a while screens get old and cracked but we have a warranty with Barnes and Noble to get them fixed.”
The downloading of digital books onto a privately owned e-reader is also available to patrons of the Bryant Library.
The library chose to stock Barnes and Noble’s Nook e-reader, as opposed to Amazon’s Kindle because the library already had a preexisting tax-exempt account with Barnes and Noble. “We do not have a preference between the Nook and Kindle on usability. The choice has to do with our billing and purchasing needs,” Casson Sauer said.
The library pays for the digital titles just as it does print books, but it saves money because a single digital purchase can be uploaded onto five different devices. Glen Cove and Westbury have similar tablet loan programs, Casson Sauer said.
The devices are most popular among adults, because most of the preloaded titles appeal to an older audience, Casson Sauer said. However, young adult fiction and history books are available on the Nooks as well. “Sometimes when people go on vacation they’ll check one out for each member of the family,” she said.
This program, and others like it, signal another way that libraries can accommodate those who prefer reading books on digital platforms. “At any one time, I usually have a print book I’m reading, an e-book I’m reading, and an audio book I’m listening to in my car,” Casson Sauer said. She believed that “print will never die because people like to hold a book.”
At any given time the Bryant Library usually has at least one Nook available for loan, she said.
