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RS 100 - College Skills: Using the Catalog

A guide to familiarize students with locating fiction books in the library.

Using the online catalog

To locate a novel, there are a couple of ways you can search Primo to find an item you will be interested in reading.

If you are looking for a book by, for example, Stephen King, type in their name and click Library Catalog from the dropdown menu. You can narrow the results further. Under Refine Your Results, click Author/Creator. You should see your author's name and the number of results available. Click on the author's name. 

If you're interested in reading a biography or memoir of a particular person, just search for that person's name in quotes, and select Library Catalog from the dropdown menu.

If the search results say a book is available, you can check it out for 30 days. 

You can search for a specific genre (Science Fiction, Historical Fiction, Horror Fiction, etc.) in Primo. To do so, click on the Advanced Search link. Under Any Field, select Subject. Type in your desired genre, and be sure to use "Fiction" as part of the search term. Under Material Type, select Books. Click Search.

Results are displayed by Relevance. Under Refine Your Results you can select Date - Newest or Date - Oldest. 

Primo video tutorial

The following video will teach you how to search for books using Primo, our catalog. 

Catalog notations

Many items listed in Primo have a call number (PZ4 .A13 2007, for example). Others have an all-caps code in front of the call number. Here's what those codes mean.

  • CIRMC - The title is part of our McNaughton Collection, a collection of current popular fiction and nonfiction. This is a great place to find a book for your project. These are located on the library's first floor.
  • JUV - The book is part of our juvenile collection. These are located on the library's first floor.
  • LOCAL - This collection includes local history items and books that librarians have deemed "rare." These are kept in a locked cabinet and are library use only. See a staff member to use.
  • MEDAU - This denotes an audio book (book on CD). These are located on the second floor near the Olana Study Corner.
  • MEDVD - This denotes a DVD. These are located on the first floor across from the juvenile collection.
  • REF - A reference book, used for research. These can only be used in the library and are located on the second floor across from the Olana Study Corner.
  • YABKS - A book in our Young Adult collection. This collection is mostly fiction. This collection is located on the library's second floor next to the stairs.