A Word about Series

Submitted by Meredith Causey

Many books are written in series. Some series are written by the same author. Some series are written by multiple authors. Many FCPL patrons want to read each title in a specific series. 

This may present a problem once titles in the series have become old enough and have circulated enough that the copies have become worn and weeded. Library staff might be reluctant to weed a title that is part of a series.

A number of factors make it almost impossible to maintain complete series over time:  

• space constraints of the library shelves (there is no good way to expand shelving capacity)
• many series have been written over years, and publishers no longer publish the older titles
• most book vendors limit their inventory to the most recent publications
• the money that would potentially be spent on replacement of older titles in a series could be spent on new materials that could be enjoyed by a greater number of patrons

In some cases, particularly with certain series in juvenile and teen fiction and graphic novel collections, there could be multiple series within a series. Trying to maintain a presentable, complete series of 50+ titles could quickly become cost and space prohibitive.  

All FCPL materials in bad condition need to be weeded – regardless of whether or not the title is part of a series. Information staff should use Interlibrary Loan (ILL) to fulfill requests for titles from series that are incomplete at FCPL.