Thanks to everyone who filled in our customer satisfaction survey at the end of 2007. We were pleased that you gave the library an 85.5% satisfaction rating overall. Of those expressing an opinion about different aspects of our service, nearly 90% rated these 'good' or 'excellent' overall. The biggest area of dissatisfaction centred round space and layout, and this is an area we are working hard to address. Full survey results.

Shetland Library's most borrowed book of 2007 was Whitethorn Woods by the ever-popular Maeve Binchy. Topping our favourite childrens' reads for the second year running came Garfield the cat, beating the new Harry Potter into second place. Looking at the top 10 most-borrowed books overall, what is most striking is the popularity of local publications. Karen Inkster's book about North Roe - Voices From the Past - is the third most popular - equal with J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows! Altogether there are five local publications is the top 10, including Ann Cleeves' Raven Black and Ethel Hofman's Mackerel at Midnight, which make it for the second year running. Read the full list

November 2007 - at last, what our customers have long been waiting for: a comfortable leather sofa and chairs where you can settle down with your book or magazine. Librarian Morag Nicolson was quick off the mark, grabbing a seat to catch up with Heat magazine.

There is now a coffee machine in the library and you can buy a selection of hot drinks for 80p.

Awarded in recognition of our efforts to maintain our premises to a satisfactory standard of cleanliness and our commitment to waste minimisation, recycling and local community enhancement, we were one of some 16 local businesses or organisations to receive the Gold Standard in December 2007. Particular thanks to Librarian Douglas Garden (left), for his sterling re-cycling efforts, both in terms of our own materials and equipment and the promotion of re-cycling in all our buildings.

Fifty babies and their Mums or Dads came to our Bookstart Christmas party on Friday 14th December 2007. Santa paid a visit and handed out presents to them all. As you can see it was quite a crowded room!

Bookstart sessions are held once a month at the library, and are a fun way for babies to get used to books, and to enjoy songs and rhymes.

On Wednesday 12th December 2007 we ran another successful lunchtime poetry event with readings from Mary Blance and Christian Tait. Thanks to our own library staff Margaret Cheriyan and Milford Georgeson who provided the seasonal music. Later that day, we were delighted to welcome the New Shetlander for their Yule Evening of poetry and music, featuring Laureen Johnson, Jim Mainland, Mary Blance, Donald Murray and Miriam Brett (Young Fiddler of the Year). Non-alcoholic Mulled Wine Recipe

26th October 2007: library staff Wear it Pink for the Breast Cancer Campaign.

Workers at the library embrace opportunites to support charities, and most popular in the staff room seem to be campaigns involving cake: Shetland MS Society's Cake Day and the Macmillan Coffee Morning are enthusiastically supported!

Shetland Library held a jungle party in the Old Library Centre to mark National Bookstart Day on the 5th of October. Children brought along their favourite jungle toy and at the end of the rhyme and story session, everyone received a jungle goody bag.

From the 1st to the 20th of October, the upper mezzanine of the library was turned into a drawing room! This was to celebrate The Big Draw, a campaign run nationally every year to promote the enjoyment of drawing.

Visiting artist Tim Chamberlain showed his sculpture exhibition bound to remember - 'a curious collection of found bound altered and inscribed objects' and paper and pencils were avaiable for anyone who wanted to sit and sketch. Thanks to Tim for a very interesting exhibition, and to everyone who visited.

The Young Writer Award is run every year by Shetland Library. This year's theme was The Forgotten Room. Winners were all presented with their prizes on the 8 September by children's writer Debi Gliori.

We hope you enjoyed our 'poetry salon' at the Wordplay Book Festival (8th and 9th September). We had fun creating a lovely room for folk to relax and browse our poetry books: a huge thank you to Islesburgh Drama Group for the furniture, and the staff at Islesburgh for all their help.

Writers who were at Wordplay 2007: Iain Banks, Denise Mina, Kevin McNeill, Debi Gliori, Fred Normandale, Kieth Gray.

Our Open Mike Poetry Night on 1st August 2007 was a huge success. A happy audience greatly enjoyed the night and almost half of them provided the entertainment by stepping up to read poems or sing songs.

Thanks to: June Ross-Smith, Leslie Butler, Laureen Johnson, James Sinclair, Nat Hall, Barbara Fraser, Laurence of Mar, Lisa Ward, Christian Tait, Caroline Pepper, Susan Laurenson, Milford Georgeson, Margaret Cheriyan, Mary Blance, Doug Forrest and our poet partner Jen Hadfield.

The Goudie Collection has been part of the Library's local collection since 1950 but in 2007 it moved to Hay's Dock to join the Archives. The collection remains in the Library's catalogue but benefits from the superb facilities in the new Museum and Archives. read the Shetland Amentity Trust's press release here...

Thanks to all who attended - and performed at - our evening event with Aberdeen crime writer Stuart MacBride on the 23rd of May 2007. Stuart, delighted the audience with readings of his work and much witty repartee. Local writers Kathy Hubbard and Donald MacDonald also read from their work, and music was provided by our very own in-house team - Margaret Cheriyan, Trevor Jamieson and Milford Georgeson, who were joined by Margaret's daughter Rebecca and Trevor's brother Clive. You can borrow Stuart's novels - Cold Granite, Dying Light and Broken Skin -from the library, or check out his website at www.stuartmacbride.com

In summer 2007 the library invested in a major reference work: the second edition of the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. We are lucky enough to have some very musical staff, so they got first chance to browse our new aquisition. Pirctured with the books are senior library assistant Milford Georgeson who is guitarist with The Peatles; library assistant Margaret Cheriyan, a talented soprano, and our Graduate Placement student Trevor Jamieson, a legendary local singer and musician. Margaret and Trevor have previously combined their musical talents to entertain the BookStart babies and listeners to our talking newspaper. You can browse Grove Music in the library's reference section.

Spring 2007: Now available exclusively at Shetland Library: our eco-friendly re-usable tote bags. The bags have been made specially for us by Baggy Drawers, the local young enterprise company, and are on sale at the library and learning centre. Ably modelled here by library staff Katrina Williamson and Trevor Jamieson, they are just the thing to take your books home in style! Only £3.50 each.

Imagine being stranded on a desert island. No TV, no radios, no computers. All you have are the ten books in your suitcase, the ten books that have shaped your life and character. The ten books you know you could not live without. What books would they be? This is the question World Book Day 2007 put to the nation. We had a local competition at the library to find out the Top Tens of our customers, and Gordon Oliver won the book token for the most interesting list . Have a look at the local lists in the 'Book of Ideas' (reader's recommenations folder') in the library.

In Barcelona, they don’t celebrate St Valentine’s Day but instead Sant Jordi’s day on the 23rd of April. This is the big day for lovers - and they buy each other books. Streets are crowded as booksellers display their wares, and up to 400,000 books will be sold on the day as people seek out the perfect book for their loved one. But of course you don’t have to spend to make your loved one happy: on St Valentine's day we invited customers to borrow the perfect book for their loved one, we hope it impressed them! The winner of our Valentine's competition is John Harmer, who produced a splendidly flattering tribute to librarians, in beautiful calligraphy: he wins a copy of The Foy by Lawrence Tulloch.

There was a local bias to Shetland's most borrowed book of last year: the top-lending adult fiction book was Ann Cleeves' murder mystery Raven Black, which is set in Shetland. There is no end to the The Da Vinci Code phenomenon: Dan Brown's book still came in at number two. Ethel Hofman's memoir Mackerel at Midnight topped the loans for local history. Junior fiction loans, both in the school libraries and main library, were dominated by Jacqueline Wilson, though she did not take the top spots: Garfield the cat topped the list at Lerwick Library, and Roald Dahl's The Twits was the schools' choice. Most Borrowed Book List

Did you know that the Library produces talking newspapers? Every week, The Shetland Times is read onto tape by staff and volunteers, and posted out to customers who want it. This service is free, and we also tape Shetland Life and The New Shetlander. If you or someone you know would like this service, just ask. Customers had an unexpected extra this festive season, as we currently have some very musical people working at the library. Trevor Jamieson and Margarert Cheriyan sang 'Silent Night' at the end of the Christmas tape, and Trevor dragooned a chorus of staff into joining him for a seasonal offering on the New Year tape. Thanks to staff and volunteers who keep the talking newspaper going, and thanks to our customers who always show their appreciation.

Our Shetland Library Calendar 2007 Hidden Corners of Lerwick is now sold out: thanks to all who bought it and we hope you enjoyed it. In connection with the library’s current initiative to arouse increased interest in local history, this calendar illustrates how even in the last two decades there have been considerable alterations to Lerwick’s built environment and surrounding seascape. Why not click on the link below to compare a selection of calendar scenes with thier contemporary counterparts.

Hidden Corners revealed

Left: Gutter's Huts at the North Ness.

Thanks to writers Donald Murray, Laureen Johnson, Christian Tait and Mark Smith, who read their poetry and prose at the New Shetlander Yule Evening on the 6th of December 2006. Music was by Erin Sandison & Brian Nicolson and Alan Mackay & Robert Bennet, and the audience were delighted by another lovely evening of words and music in the library.

The winner of the 2006 Shetland Arts and New Shetlander Writing Prize was announced on National Poetry Day. The theme for this year was placenames. You can read the winning poems here:

Winner: Seein baith sides: Hoofield, Cunningsburgh by Christene de Luca

Runner-up: Living Legends by Tom Childs

And thanks to local poet Donald Murray, who wrote this wonderful library van poem for us!

Shetland Library has been successful in maintaining the Investors in People Standard for a further three years. In his report, the national assessor 'found high levels of encouragement for staff to input and be involved in all aspects of the Library and its planning'. He also found an 'emphasis on the provision of a high quality service to their customers and the recognition that well trained staff are vital to the success of the library'.Commenting on the award, Silvija Crook, Library and Information Manager said 'we are all delighted at the outcome of the assessment. Our priority is to make our libraries as good as they can be, encouraging as many folk as possible to make use of the services available. It's good to have someone come in from the outside, look at what we are achieving and find it to be of a high quality'.

Thanks to all who entered our limerick competition for National Poetry Day 2006. We picked three winners: Barbara Fraser, Persephone Poulton and Kyle Rognaldsen. Read the winning limericks here.

On 26 June 2006 members of the local scrapbooking group, Shetland Scrapbookers, showed off their craft in the library, and Joanne from Shetland Archives also brought along some old scrapbooks of local interest.  It was a rare chance to see these precious collections which are normally stored in the archives.  A lovely contrast between the old and the new, and both activities were really enjoyed by the people who dropped in.  We hope to host similar events.  Just get in touch if you think you would like to demonstrate your craft or interest in the Library.

We hosted some delightful events in May 2006.  There was a drop-in music night when we promoted our music books and DVDs and even had live music from some brave perfomers!  Next came one of the popular poetry nights we host in partnership with Shetland Arts. Writer in residence Jen Hadfield and local writers were launching a new book of poetry postcards, and the audience was treated to readings from the book, music from Donald Anderson, and a thrilling perfomance from Jen, who read new poems, sang and played mandolin.  We ended the month with an Art Night, when Mike Finnie displayed some of his wonderful watercolours, painted and chatted to customers.  Thanks to all the people who made these evenings so enjoyable, please get in touch if you have ideas for events in the library.

In April 2006, the Library was delighted to host a Stitch and Chat Day with members of the Embroiders' Guild. They were in the library all day to talk to people about fabric crafts and demonstrate their skills: folk could also have a go at a starter embroidery pack.  And it was a good chance to browse all the library's craft books.  There was also a music evening, poetry evening and art evening during Adult Learners week.

If you would like to demonstrate your craft or hobby in the library, please get in touch.

Authors Hamish Macdonald and Matthew Fitt delighted the audience at the library on Wednesday 22 March 2006 with readings from their work and other humorous Scottish poetry and prose.  They also introduced many of the Scots language books for kids that are produced by the Itchy Coo collective.  Mary Blance read Shetland poetry and Donald Anderson provided the music, in what was another successful collaboration between Shetland Arts Trust and the library.  Thanks to all who took part.  www.itchy-coo.com

Thanks for all who contributed to our World Book Day 2006 events, including the story-writing exercise and the 'Write a Blurb' competition.  You can read some of the best blurbs here.  The Library at the Edge of the World evolved into two lively tales with some unexpected twists and turns.  Click on the links below to read the stories.

The Library at the Edge of the World - Children's version

The Library at the Edge of the World - Adult's version

Thanks to all who wrote about their favourite love stories for us - all ages entered their suggestions for books, songs, films and poems.  Read the full list here.

In January 2006, Jen Hadfield's poetry project Love's Dog proved a popular and entertaining event in the library.  Based on the poem 'A View of Things' by Edwin Morag, many people contributed individual lines which were formed into a new group poem called 'Love's Dog'.  You can read it here.

Right: Jen and the Chatterbooks book group add to the poem.

Shetland Library hosted the national launch of Raven Black, the latest novel by well known crime writer Ann Cleeves, on 3 February 2006.  The book is a murder mystery set in Shetland, and Ann revealed that she is to write three follow-up novels, each set in Shetland in a different season.  The launch was a big success, with about sixty people attending.

Read a review of Raven Black.