Book Reviews  893

contain a detailed discussion of the career steps and trajectory of the interviewee, a discus-
sion of their day-to-day work, and the advice that they would give to aspiring librarians and 
library leaders. It also provides context for global librarianship, detailing the work, concerns, 
and goals of librarians outside the United States. 

In the conclusion, the authors distill some of what they have learned through the interview 
process into several frames addressing the role of the library director in leadership and the 
areas of interest discussed by the subjects. The focus on library management in the interviews 
reveals quite a bit of diversity in practice among library leaders. The authors contextualize this 
in the framework of transformational leadership. They also discuss the importance of library 
directors serving as facilitators for collaboration with stakeholders inside and outside their 
libraries, the role of fundraising in the work of directors, and librarians as active participants 
in the research process and global politics. This concluding chapter helps bring the work of 
the interviews into a more cohesive whole. 

Conversations with Leading Academic and Research Library Directors provides inviting glimps-
es into the work and practices taking place in innovative international libraries. Its format 
encourages browsing and reference for particular activities and people. It represents snapshots 
of 30 library directors, not only in its bite-sized interviews but also in the way it captures the 
current moment in academic libraries. This type of work has potential to grow in usefulness 
as it is reproduced in different times and spaces and contextualized through outside work. As 
a monograph, it excels as an index of current leadership and the exciting projects, plans, and 
goals they envision for the future of their libraries. As an artifact, it conveys a perspective on 
contemporary academic librarianship through the voices of library leaders.—Laura Costello, 
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

Carrie Scott Banks and Cindy Mediavilla. Libraries & Gardens: Growing Together. Chicago, IL: 
ALA Editions, 2019. 144p. Paper. $57.99 (ISBN 978-0-8389-1855-5). LC 2018059577. 

In Libraries & Gardens: Growing Together, Carrie Scott Banks and Cindy 
Mediavilla bring librarianship into conversation with gardening. While 
the histories of gardens and libraries are intertwined, there has not 
been much written about library gardens. Banks and Mediavilla’s book 
encourages us to look at how library gardens “extend and enhance the 
library’s role as an information center and community space” (x). Writ-
ing from public library backgrounds, Banks and Mediavilla focus on 
how library gardens can contribute to the inclusiveness and accessibility 
of libraries. The book gives a tour of various kinds of library gardens, 
including many academic and research library gardens. In discussing 
library gardens, Libraries & Gardens: Growing Together contributes to 
a broader conversation about libraries as multisensory, experiential 

places.
The book begins by looking briefly (perhaps too briefly) at the shared cultural history of 

libraries and gardens, how both libraries and gardens have been thought of as places involv-
ing collection and cultivation, education and relaxation, community and escape. The book 
continues by outlining various kinds of library gardens, inside and outside library buildings 
(sometimes both). Some libraries have “demonstration gardens,” “specifically designed and 
maintained to teach gardening principles and practices” (7). Library demonstration gardens 



894  College & Research Libraries September 2019

can become like botanical makerspaces, places for experiential learning through “making.” A 
library can be a place where somebody learns both how to 3D print and how to garden, and 
a place to think about the two processes in relation to each other.

In addition to libraries with demonstration gardens, there are libraries with seed collec-
tions. Patrons can “check out” seeds from the library, plant the seeds at home or in a community 
garden, save seeds from plants after they grow, and then “return” seeds to the library. One 
of the examples in the book, Nahman-Watson Library at Greenfield Community College in 
Massachusetts, has partnered with science faculty to maintain a seed collection in the library. 

Another kind of library garden discussed in the book is the contemplative garden. Met-
ropolitan State University in St. Paul, Minnesota, has installed next to its library a garden 
labyrinth, in which patrons can have a contemplative experience while walking the labyrinth. 
In Waco, Texas, Baylor University’s Armstrong Baylor Library has a Garden of Contentment, 
with walking paths and benches inscribed with the poetry of Elizabeth Barrett Browning and 
Robert Browning. The library has the world’s largest collection of Browning material.

Libraries have also incorporated gardens into library architecture. The book gives the 
example of the Gutman Library at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. During a 2010 
renovation, the library embraced green architecture and installed interior “living walls,” 
ceiling-to-floor panels growing with foliage. “Living walls” and other green architecture can 
add to a library building’s coziness as well as its sustainability.

One of the most vivid examples in Libraries & Gardens of the relationship of the botani-
cal and the bibliographical is the medicinal herb garden at the National Library of Medicine 
(NLM) in Bethesda, Maryland. Based on the herbs listed in Nicholas Culpeper’s The Complete 
Herbal (first published in 1649), the NLM’s garden grows nearly a hundred herbs with me-
dicinal properties (chamomile to yarrow). Libraries & Gardens also mentions the Sam W. Hitt 
Medicinal Plant Garden at the Health Sciences Library of the University of North Carolina in 
Chapel Hill. The work of maintaining the garden is done by students in Biology 217, a course 
that combines botany and human cell biology.

Libraries & Gardens generates a sense of what is possible with library gardens while also 
addressing the challenges involved in starting and maintaining a library garden (or even 
garden-related library programs and collections). The book includes chapters on community 
engagement, garden design, planning and maintenance, partnerships and funding, and garden 
program evaluation. The strength of the book is in its examples, including examples of what 
can go wrong with library gardens, such as the college library that had to deal with insects 
and humidity from its indoor foliage. The book would be even more useful with some of the 
examples developed into more detailed case studies of library gardens. 

There are eight pages of color photographs of library gardens featured in the book, and 
an appendix listing all of the gardens mentioned. Additional appendices include samples 
of garden rules, a garden volunteer application form, and a garden program evaluation (all 
from public libraries). Perhaps there is a need for a digital repository for academic library 
gardeners to share materials.

For any librarian interested in starting a library garden or developing garden-related 
library programs, Banks and Mediavilla’s Libraries & Gardens is a good beginning. The book 
might be of particular interest to librarians concerned with questions of sustainability and 
questions of accessibility in library spaces and programs (the authors discuss how to apply 
the principles of Universal Design for Learning to library gardens and library garden educa-



Book Reviews  895

tion). Libraries & Gardens: Growing Together is an exciting beginning for what will hopefully 
be a growing literature on library gardens. This book will be useful to any academic librarian 
interested in this topic as well as academic librarians who are considering starting an interac-
tive and engaging space, including makerspaces and innovation labs.—Gregory Laynor, Temple 
University

The Complete Guide to RFPs for Libraries. Frances C. Wilkinson and Sever Bordeianu, eds. 
Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited, an Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC, 2018. 299p. Paper 
$60.00 (ISBN: 978-1440859397).

Purchasing resources and services for libraries has never been as 
straightforward as one would hope. An increasing number of neces-
sary resources and services now come in an electronic format over 
networks and software platforms being managed by several different 
players, requiring careful negotiation of responsibilities and levels of 
performance. While vendors can use economies of scale to provide 
these services at a more reasonable price than a purchaser going it 
alone, budgets are ever tighter and being scrutinized more closely by 
governing boards. Thus, libraries face enormous pressure to be very 
deliberate about purchases. The Complete Guide to RFPs for Libraries seeks 
to help library staff successfully navigate some of the issues involved 
in acquiring a new big-ticket product or service. 

The introduction sums up the purpose and layout of the book: “While reading the book 
from cover to cover would be an instructive exercise, each chapter is complete on its own. 
Librarians can quickly turn to the chapter that covers the good or service they are considering 
buying to get a complete guide to how to proceed” (xxiv). However, the first two chapters 
as well as the last four provide important context and perspective that make them a highly 
recommended read before engaging with one of the more focused chapters.

Chapter 1 lays out the basics of preparing the RFP (request for purchase): determining 
need, figuring out how the proposed product will enhance service, timeline for implementa-
tion, and so on. The importance of planning and organization are highlighted. The concepts 
of request for information (RFI) and a request for quote (RFQ) are introduced, as well as 
descriptions of when those processes might be used in gathering information for the formal 
RFP. The chapter also sets aside any ideas that creating an RFP is a quick, simple undertaking, 
while stressing the value many libraries have found in conducting the self-examination that 
creating an RFP for a major service or product requires. 

Chapter 2 offers a view of the process of actually writing the RFP to present to the vendor 
and reviewing the vendor responses. This chapter’s importance lies in pointing out the need 
for careful, deliberate action and near-constant evaluation of the process. Some basic ideas of 
constructing a readable, effective proposal are included. Taken together, these two chapters 
comprising Part I of the book provide essential background and overview of the need for and 
conduct of designing an RFP.

Part II of the work is broken into three subsections dealing with broad categories of 
RFPs: those for collections, integrated library systems (ILSs), and other services. Chapters in 
the first two subsections address more specific situations within the broad category, such as 
creating an RFP for an ILS for an academic library. The third subsection discusses other types