The first of our ‘Ever Wondered Why…?’ series!
Today we’re going to share the secrets of fiction shelving in our Libraries, so if you’ve Ever Wondered Why Eric Van Lustbader is under ‘L’, but Elizabeth von Armin is under V, what the deal is with Mcs and Macs, or where to find royalty, read on!
A-Z, Easy Peasy?
All our fiction books are shelved alphabetically under the author’s last name. That’s the general rule.
In our Libraries we have separate sections for General Fiction, Crime, Sci-Fi, Large Print, Westerns, Anthologies and Classics but they follow the same shelving rules. They will have stickers on the spines to show you what types of book they are. Some authors, such as Christopher Brookmyre, have books in three separate sections!
Seems easy, right? But some names are not so straightforward….
Smith, Smith and Smith…
There are lots of authors with the same last name! In these cases they are shelved together but in order of the first name so Zadie, Ali and Wilbur will be shelved:
Ali Smith
Wilbur Smith
Zadie Smith
Hyphenation is the key!
Double barrelled names are pretty common, but where to find them? We always use the first letter of the last name, not the first letter of a surname; an important difference!
Names that are hyphenated, such as ‘Harrod-Eagles’ are shelved under ‘H’, because the hyphen joins them together making ‘Harrod-Eagles’ the whole last name.
Names that aren’t joined, like ‘McCall Smith’ might both be surnames, but Smith is the last name so they are shelved under ‘S’.
Mc and Mac and O!
Mc and Mac are considered to be the same thing (for shelving purposes!) and are always placed at the beginning of the ‘M’s. They are then ordered alphabetically by the next part of the last name, so the beginning of the ‘M’ section may look like this:
McCloud
Mackay
MacLeod
MacManus
McSweeney
O’s, such as O’Keefe, are not separated from standard alphabetical shelving, so the ‘O’ section may look like this:
O’Keefe
Ormond
O’Shea
Osmond
Prefix? Middle Name?
Du, Le, de la and von are all prefixes to the last name and are considered the start of the last names. For example, these authors are shelved using the beginning of the prefix:
Daphne Du Maurier is under ‘D’
John Le Carre is under ‘L’
Elizabeth von Armin is under ‘V’ because ‘von’ is a prefix (Eric Van Lustbader is shelved under ‘L’ because the ‘Van’ is part of the surname rather than a prefix- see hyphenation above!)
Princesses, Dames and Misses!
Titles are ignored in shelving and we stick to last names, so Dame Judy Dench is under ‘D’ for Dench and Miss Read is under ‘R’ for Read.
The really tricky ones are royalty! Because we ignore titles and royalty don’t use their last names Princess Michael of Kent is shelved under ‘M’!
‘Princess’ and ‘of Kent’ are both titles and an alternative last name such as Windsor isn’t used, so we’re left with ‘M’ for Michael!
It’s a lot to remember so when in doubt, ask a member of staff!
Test Yourself:
Where would Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes books be shelved?
We’d love to share more behind the scenes information! What have you wondered about our Library Service?
Email your questions to Library_Events@bathnes.gov.uk using the subject line ‘Ever Wondered Why’!
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