Benchmarking Library, Information and Education Services: New Strategic Choices in Challenging Times provides the foundations of ongoing research in the development of collections and services. The book contributes to practical outputs of general benefit to the sector, including customers, clients or stakeholders, offering ideas for how to identify comparative strengths and weaknesses and improve or enhance present practices regardless of how well institutions currently perform. The centerpiece of the book is a description, report and analysis of a major international QB exercise that culminates in a set of good practice statements. The benefits of the QB methodology are applicable to individual institutions. Because of the current global turbulence, individuals, leaders and whole institutions are keen to learn more about what is happening and how they can develop sustainable solutions to both immediate challenges and longer-term scenarios.  These include an analysis of third sector organizations, e-libraries, marketing information services, vocational training in higher education, the creative arts, and the role of partnerships in organizational openness.

The last decade has seen significant global changes that have impacted the library, information, and learning services and sciences. There is now a mood to find pragmatic information solutions to pressing global challenges. Future Directions in Digital Information presents the latest ideas and approaches to digital information from across the globe, portraying a sense of transition from old to new. This title is a comprehensive, international take on key themes, advances, and trends in digital information, including the impact of developing technologies. The latest volume in the 'Chandos Digital Information Review Series', this book will help practitioners and thinkers looking to keep pace with, and excel among, the digital choices and pathways on offer, to develop new systems and models, and gain information on trends in the educational and industry contexts that make up the information sphere. A group of international contributors has been assembled to give their view on how information professionals and scientists are creating the future along five distinct themes: Strategy and Design; Who are the Users?; Where Formal meets Informal; Applications and Delivery; and finally, New Paradigms. The multinational perspectives contained in this volume acquaint readers with problems, approaches, and achievements in digital information from around the world, with equity of information access emerging as a key challenge.

Is love a price worth paying? Nik's not a Voronov by blood, but he's ferociously protective of his adoptive family. So when he believes single mother Sybella is taking advantage of his grandfather, he ruthlessly strips her of her job! But as unexpected desire threatens to consume them both, sweet Sybella might just be the redemption this brooding billionaire needs... * If black sheep billionaire Deacon marries Callie, his father has promised him legitimacy and acceptance. But Callie isn't the gold-digger Deacon was promised, and now his heart's on the line... * Alessandra has been groomed since birth to assume the joint reins of her father's empire. Now that day has arrived, forcing her to not only abandon her own career goals, but work closely with co-CEO and childhood nemesis Alek. As they battle for control of the company, Alessandra fights her attraction to the international playboy that could sabotage her professional future.

COVID-19 is profoundly affecting the ways in which we live, learn, plan, and develop. What does COVID-19 mean for the future of digital information use and delivery, and for more traditional forms of library provision? Libraries, Digital Information, and COVID gives immediate and long-term solutions for librarians responding to the challenge of COVID-19. The book helps library leaders prepare for a post-COVID-19 world, giving guidance on developing sustainable solutions. The need for sustainable digital access has now become acute, and while offering a physical space will remain important, current events are likely to trigger a shift toward off-site working and study, making online access to information more crucial. Libraries have already been providing access to digital information as a premium service. New forms and use of materials all serve to eliminate the need for direct contact in a physical space. Such spaces will come to be predicated on evolving systems of digital information, as critical needs are met by remote delivery of goods and services. Intensified financial pressure will also shape the future, with a reassessment of information and its commercial value. In response, there will be a massification of provision through increased cooperation and collaboration. These significant transitions are driving professionals to rethink and question their identities, values, and purpose. This book responds to these issues by examining the practicalities of running a library during and after the pandemic, answering questions such as: What do we know so far? How are institutions coping? Where are providers placing themselves on the digital/print and the remote/face-to-face continuums? This edited volume gives analysis and examples from around the globe on how libraries are managing to deliver access and services during COVID-19. This practical and thoughtful book provides a framework within which library directors and their staff can plan sustainable services and collections for an uncertain future.

Introduction By Robert Glass Cleland. Henry Hiram Ellis, 1829-1909, Of Maine Sailed Round The Horn To San Francisco In 1849. From The Kennebec To California, 1959, Contains Various Versions Of His Reminiscences Covering His Adventures As A Gold Miner, Captain Of A Sacramento River Boat And Pacific Merchant Ship, San Francisco Police Officer And Chief Of Police, 1875-1877.

The twelfth volume in the acclaimed paperback series . . . the only county series that can legitimately claim to represent the past and present of a nation.

Contributions by
Graham Busby, Terry Chapman, Ian Clarke, Yolande Collins, Bernard Deacon, Helen Doe, Lucy Ellis, Jonathan Howlett, Alan M. Kent, Sandra Kippen, Adrian Lee, Sharon Lowenna, Kenneth MacKinnon, Kayleigh Milden, Brian Murdoch, Philip Payton and Garry Tregidga

Nicole Kidman is undoubtedly the hottest female star around; her every move makes front-page headlines all over the world. A number of biographies of her former husband, Tom Cruise, have been published, but until now not one on Kidman herself. This biography will trace Nicole Kidman's steady rise from prolific child star through B-list mediocrity to her current status as a critically acclaimed and hugely popular actress. Kidman toiled for years in the Hollywood wilderness, failing auditions for Ghost, Thelma & Louise, Sleepless in Seattle and The Silence of the Lambs; she only landed her breakthrough role in To Die For after Meg Ryan turned it down. Since then, she has worked closely with some of the leading directors and actors of our time, starring with John Malkovich in Jane Campion's Portrait Of A Lady and Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut; she's also made successful forays into action movies (The Peacemaker, alongside George Clooney) and horror (the recent hit film The Others). Having firmly established herself as a successful film actress, Kidman has recently branched out into other areas, demonstrating her great versatility as a performer. Her West End and Broadway stage debu