Leading Librarians

Introduction

Librarians take the lead in these novels, all in different ways. Solving mysteries, falling in love, and even fighting vampires are the extracurricular activities of these information professionals. Take a look at this list for a story to your liking, or ask your favorite librarian for another librarian-centric title!

The Case of the Missing Books: A Mobile Library Mystery - by Ian Sansom

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Humorous Mystery. To Tumdrum, Northern Ireland comes Israel Armstrong, a Jewish vegetarian librarian from London. Unfortunately, upon arrival at the library where he's been hired to work, he discovers it has shut its doors forever. Now his new job is to drive the mobile library around the rural area. But what's the point when all of the books -- 15,000 of them! -- are missing? Who would take the books, and how can he get them back? That's what Israel, who's not a natural detective, needs to find out. Booklist says this 1st in a series that now numbers four is "a rollicking blend of dry humor, slapstick, and sheer farce."

First Chapter

The camel bookmobile - Masha Hamilton

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Establishing a bookmobile in a destitute Kenyan village, well-intentioned Fiona Sweeney inadvertently renews a decades-old tribal feud involving a camel-powered bookmobile and prior efforts to promote local education.

First Chapter

An angel for Emily - Jude Deveraux

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When a man announces to librarian Emily Todd that he is her guardian angel and he has been sent to earth to protect her, she assumes the man is crazy. But when she discovers he can read her mind and when a bomb is planted in her car, she begins having second thoughts. On the other hand, are real angels permitted to fall in love with mortals? By the author of Legend.

First Chapter

Stones from the River - by Ursula Hegi

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Trudi, a dwarf librarian, tells about the lives of people in the small German town of Burgdorf from World War I and into the 1950s.

Let it sew - Elizabeth Lynn Casey

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While serving on Sweet Briar's Christmas Decorating Committee, Yankee librarian Tori Sinclair finds a clue related to the death of the late sewing circle founder's husband that leads to a shocking discovery--one that involves everyone in this quaint Southern town. Original. 30,000 first printing.

Libriomancer - by Jim C. Hines

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Urban Fantasy. Centuries ago, Johannes Gutenberg founded The Porters, a secret society of "libriomancers" who possess the magical power to extract objects from books. Now, however, Gutenberg has gone missing, vampires (ranging from Dracula to Twilight-esque "sparklers") are attacking, and only former field agent Isaac Vainio, currently assigned to catalog the Copper River Library's entire fantasy and science fiction collection, can save the day. Fortunately, he's got the assistance of his loyal pet fire-spider, Smudge, and voluptuous dryad Lena Greenwood. Unfortunately, his stalwart companions can be as distracting as they are helpful. Libriomancer is the action-packed, humorous, and highly metafictional 1st book in the Magic ex Libris series.

Summer nights - Susan Mallery

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Horse whisperer Shane Stryker is determined to meet someone who will be content with the quiet life of a rancher's wife. And the fiery, pint-size redhead who dazzles him does not fit the bill. Small-town librarian Annabelle Weiss can't understand why Shane keeps pushing her away, but only he can help her with a special event for the next Fool's Gold festival.

First Chapter

Neighborhood watch - Cammie McGovern

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Exonerated by DNA evidence twelve years after being convicted of murdering a neighbor, librarian Betsy Treading returns to her suburban community determined to salvage her life and find the true killer, an effort complicated by dangerous town secrets.

Good girls do - Cathie Linz

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After his father's death, Luke Maguire returns home to Serenity Falls to take care of the family bar and, while trying to liven the town up a little, forms an unlikely alliance with Julia Wright, a sassy librarian who can read him like an open book. Cathie Linz is a local Naperville author.

Murder past due - Miranda James

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A famous author returns to his hometown and is murdered. It's up to Charlie Harris, the town's librarian, and his cat Diesel, to find the killer before the wrong person is arrested for the crime. The trouble is, every last one of Charlie's friends and coworkers had a score to settle with the novelist.

Silver bells - Luanne Rice

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Troubled by haunting memories of the past, a rugged Christmas tree farmer from Nova Scotia and a reclusive young librarian from New York City come together amid the holiday magic of a glittering city.

First Chapter

The grand complication - Allen Kurzweil

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Confronted by both professional and personal crises, reference librarian Alexander Short gains a new lease on life when he meets Henry James Jesson III, who hires him for some research into an enigmatic eighteenth-century inventor.

First Chapter

Trouble in Texas - Katie Lane

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While trying to solve his great-granddaddy's murder, Brant Cates asks the town's prim and proper librarian for help in putting this centuries-old crime to rest and discovers that this buttoned-up beauty is a sexy siren in disguise. Original.

The rover - Mel Odom

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A librarian at a remote, isolated center of learning is kidnapped and sold into slavery in a far-off land, adopted by a thieves' guild, and forced into battle with a powerful dragon that could hold the fate of the entire world in his claw.

First Chapter

Chance of a lifetime - Jodi Thomas

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Librarian Emily must deal with a secret she has kept for many years that threatens to shatter her future, while new lawyer Rick Matheson seeks the aid of a beautiful U.S. Marshal as he tries to discover who is attempting to kill him.

The Borrower - by Rebecca Makkai

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ISBN-13: 9780670022816
ISBN-10: 0670022810

Lucy Hull is an accidental children's librarian who routinely gives her favorite patron, 10-year-old Ian, books that do not conform to the rigid rules his overbearing, fundamentalist mother has set for him. When Ian's parents force him to attend behavior-modification classes that will "cure" his burgeoning homosexuality, Ian determines to run away--and Lucy decides to go with him. Though this set-up may leave you feeling incredulous, it's actually the start of a warm, moving, and frequently funny book full of literary references and paeans to the power of reading. "Smart, literate and refreshingly unsentimental," says Kirkus Reviews of this debut.

First Chapter

Wonderland Creek - by Lynn N. Austin

Publisher: Bethany House
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 10/01/2011

ISBN-13: 9780764204982
ISBN-10: 076420498X

Historical Fiction. Librarian Alice Grace Ripley finds herself without a job in the midst of the Great Depression, and her boyfriend has dumped her. She decides to try something different: delivering books to a rural Kentucky library. After she gets to Acorn with the books, Alice stays to help the librarian there and then settles in as a member of the community. Set in 1936, this novel vividly portrays the Great Depression and the New Deal, as Alice learns to live "a godly life in an ungodly world" (Booklist). Try Elizabeth Musser's The Sweetest Thing for another inspirational coming-of-age story set in the 1930s.

Killer librarian - Mary Lou Kirwin

Publisher: Pocket Books
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 11/01/2012

ISBN-13: 9781451684643
ISBN-10: 1451684649

While on a literary tour in London that pays homage to mysteries, librarian Karen Nash is faced with a real-life mystery when another guest at the B&B where she is staying is murdered and her ex and his new girlfriend turn up.

That night on Thistle Lane - Carla Neggers

Publisher: Harlequin Mira
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 01/01/2013

ISBN-13: 9780778314202
ISBN-10: 0778314200

Librarian Phoebe O'Dunn must summon up the courage to live out her own fairy tale when a threat to the town leads her to Noah Kendrick, who, unbeknownst to her, is the unforgettable man she met at a masquerade ball in Boston.

First Chapter

Miss Zukas and the library murders - Jo Dereske

Publisher: Avon Books
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 12/01/1995

ISBN-13: 9780380770304
ISBN-10: 038077030X

With the help of her not-so-proper best friend, Ruth, a six-foot-tall bohemian artist, Helma Zukas investigates the appearance of a dead body right in the middle of the library's fiction stacks.

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