Book Review: Library Licensing: A Manual for Busy Librarians

One of the many challenges librarians face is reviewing and negotiating licensing agreements. Halaychik and Reagan discuss these challenges in Library Licensing: A Manual for Busy Librarians. The scope of this book is much broader than the title seems to indicate, covering not only license-related topics regarding electronic resources in its six chapters, but also information on contract management software, Integrated Library Systems (ILS) and maintenance, and services agreements. For this reason, the book can feel unfocused at times. Chapter 1 briefly introduces basic information about contracts, while chapters 2 through 6 give a broad overview of the mechanics of a contract (including common clauses within contracts) and information concerning organizing, managing, and administering contracts, with examples of checklists and contracts in chapter 5 and subsequent appendixes.