Friday, March 11, 2011

Dogs and books


This cartoon was in the paper today and I thought it was very timely. We have had a rash of books come back this week that have been chewed by the family dog. I don't think a dog would like to chew a kindle like they do a book, but maybe they'd try if it had a nice plushy leather cover.
It is very hard to decide what to do about a book that has been chewed by someone's pet. You wouldn't believe the damage even someone's pet bird can do to a book if it decides to start pecking at it. In determining a charge for the damage, we have to decide how new the book is, how many times it has been checked out, if we can fix the book so it looks better, is it still usable, and how bad does it really look. Unfortunately, we all tend to judge a book by its cover and many people do not want to check out a book that doesn't look good.
How do you feel about that? Do you avoid a book that has food stains, water stains, pages torn, chewed up covers? Do you wonder where that book has been and do you really want to touch it?
Susan

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Educating people is important. "If a book comes back to us damaged, you may be asked to help pay for a new book." In order for this to be effective, you would have to keep track of the book's condition when it is checked out.