The Mary and Robyn Campbell Fund for Art Booksexpand_more 2008.7a-c
Scream at the Librarian presents Joel J. Rane's experiences as a reference librarian at the Central Library in downtown Los Angeles. In addition to its intended public purpose as an educational resource, the L.A. public library was a refuge for the unhoused and people with substance addiction or mental health conditions. In a series of humorous character sketches, each about a page long, Rane describes his encounters with some of the more eccentric patrons he met while on the job. He names each of his characters-Mr. Brain Damage, The Angry Grandfather, The Screamer, for example-retelling the real-life accounts of his vivid personal experiences. "…There are thousands of people in the streets, limping through the doors of the Central Library, beating on the pay phones, not begging for help but demanding to pull the rest of us down into their dark hole. The library is their refuge, four stories up, four stories down…. This is the Downtown Los Angeles I knew."
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