LEWISTON — It’s one thing to keep track of every book you’ve read, but it’s something else try and keep track of someone else’s reading habits.
Try doing it for 30 voracious readers, for eight years.
“It works most of the time,” said Pete Alberda at the Lewiston Public Library. “I talk to a few of them every month, but most I just know what they like and I do my best to keep them all in order.”
Alberda has been the coordinator of the library’s book outreach program for a few years, but he’s been involved for nine. He started out delivering books to shut-in patrons.
“My daughter was in first grade and I took her here for a reading buddies program, and they had a sign-up sheet,” he said. “I told them I’d drop books, but I wanted to go to people that like to talk. I figured, if you’re 85 years old and you’re sharp enough to read books, you probably have a lot of stories to tell.”
He eventually took a job at the circulation desk, and took over the responsibility for coordinating the program. He spends 12 hours a week on it, pulling books he thinks his readers will like, talking to them and coordinating with volunteers to deliver them.
“In a perfect world, they tell me what books they want — or at least what authors they like,” Alberda said. “It gets tough when they give me a list that says ‘I don’t want any violence or sex and I don’t like mysteries.’ They have all this criteria.”
He’s able to keep track of the reading habits of 30 people — mostly homebound seniors, but also a few folks with disabilities.
Most don’t have access to the Internet or are not able to use it. Alberda is their best link to information.
He doesn’t keep a list of what people have read — that would be too big brother-ish, he said.
“Once a book comes back, any record is gone,” he said. “We don’t want people coming in and checking up on what you are reading.”
Instead, he keeps a running list in his head.
“I have people that read 30 books a month and they’ve been on my list eight years,” he said. “I try to keep track and it works, mostly. I keep track of which authors they like, then I may look for similar authors. I might get them interested in a different genre that they may not have thought of.”
One woman went into hospice for a short time.
“She said ‘I want to learn as much about the world as I can,'” he said. “It was really fun to pull her books. She got books about the Hubble telescope. She got books about all the paintings in the Louvre — just all this crazy stuff from every corner of the library. She lived another 14 months, and it was kind of sad to do. But it was neat considering what she might like to read.”
Another part is matching the patrons with the right delivery person. Some patrons are ready to talk. Some delivery drivers have time to sit and chat, and some need to keep moving.
Rick Speer, director of the library, said the program has been around for years and used to be much bigger.
“But we’ve limited it to a part-time position because of budget cuts over the years,” Speer said.
Alberda said he’d love to serve everyone who comes in, but there’s a limit to what he can do in 12 hours every month.
“But we’re at the stage now where we can serve a few more people, because some of our patrons have died,” he said.
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