Romance novels in american public libraries: A study of collection development practices

In library literature, the collection of romance novels has produced a fairly vociferous debate that has not surrounded other genres. However, there is relatively little in the literature that examines current practices. The authors conducted a national survey, asking libraries how they acquired romance novels for their libraries, what their proportional expenditures were for romance, and the extent of their romance collections. Responses suggested that libraries in general have sizeable romance collections. Some libraries do indeed have smaller collections and spend little or no money on the romance genre. Little is known about public libraries' collection development practices for any genre, and these results help fill that gap in the library literature. Results also suggest that library and information science education, beyond supporting leisure reading, ought to emphasize the roles that leisure reading serves for readers.