02/11/2021
We've officially made the transition over from One Book to our reading challenge and will be closing down this page soon.
We hope you'll join your friends and neighbors and use these fresh reading prompts to discover authors, genres and books you might not otherwise pick up.
Start your challenge, here: https://www.richlandlibrary.com/broaderbookshelf
📢 Important Update
Since 2011, we've been connecting people through the shared reading experience of One Book, One Community. Residents of the City of Columbia, Richland County, and the Midlands have read the same book at the same time and shared their passion for reading with their friends and family.
Each year, this initiative brought together people from all over the area to expand their literary interests and explore different topics, using literature as a lens through which we can understand important issues, discover meaning, and find common ground. Now we’re taking it a step further to broaden the appeal, make the experience more relevant, and engage as many people as possible.
Instead of reading one specific title, we encourage you to participate in the library's Broader Bookshelf project – a librarian-tailored reading challenge designed to expand your reading repertoire and guide you to enjoyable reading outside of your typical fare. Use the Broader Bookshelf prompts to explore a range of different topics and discover new authors, genres, and books that you might not otherwise pick up or download.
Instead of reading just “One Book,” you can personalize your exploration. Prompted to read a book set in the 1800s? Choose from fiction or nonfiction, pick up a military history, romance novel, comic book, biography, travel memoir, or many other options for children, teens, and adults.
We’ll still bring authors to the library for you to meet, get inspired by, and stimulate meaningful conversations around one or more of the prompts.
In fact, now's the perfect time to follow Richland Library for a big author announcement later in the week.