Resources Anytime, Anywhere: How Interlibrary Loan Becomes Resource Sharing. By Ryan Litsey. Cambridge, MA: Chandos, 2017. 136 p. $80.95 softcover (978-0-08-101989-4).

At the conclusion of Resources Anytime, Anywhere: How Interlibrary Loan Becomes Resource Sharing, the author asks readers to “imagine the future of resource sharing, which is less the sharing of disparate resources between libraries but more of a globally floating library collection” (130). This might seem mere fantasy, but the rapid growth of interlibrary loan (ILL) and progression of technologies used in such services makes the fantasy attainable provided individual libraries, their governing and funding institutions, and the wider public can both adjust to such a situation and find it a desirable vision.

A librarian who finds this desirable is Ryan Litsey, one of the developers of the e-book lending system Occam’s Reader. Litsey serves as a knowledgeable and authoritative guide on the development and history of ILL and its related technologies and workflows in larger academic institutions.

The author’s primary argument is that the changes in the library world’s technology have driven similar changes in expectations on the part of patrons, particularly those concerning levels of access and speed. These changes have strongly affected ILL services, causing responsive libraries to adjust their methodologies and even ontologies, shifting to a resource sharing mindset. The author is correct that patrons are becoming accustomed to and demanding ever faster response times, and are not particularly concerned about who owns what item and where. He is certainly correct in that these changing expectations are married tightly to changes in technology. Any responsive library must adjust its operations accordingly or go unused.

To accomplish the transition from traditional ILL to resource sharing, Litsey details shifting staff toward supply-chain management and leveraging the disconnections of actual items in a transaction and their digital surrogates used in transaction management. Further, resource sharing departments should strive to understand how their operations fit in, not just with their academic library or consortium, but the entire network of lenders and borrowers; should take into consideration all the multiple streams of materials (courier services, technologies for requesting and discovery, etc.); and attempt to diminish inefficiencies as much as possible. Targeted inefficiencies include poor staffing decisions, overreliance on conditionals, choosing incorrect courier services, focusing too much time on individual turnarounds, maximal and undo effort on outliers, and other workflow bottlenecks.

Additionally, Litsey proposes leveraging new technologies such as “big data” to allow large scale performance analyses and scorecards for consortium members. Such scoring could be used to encourage members into better response times and accuracy. Litsey also proposes using machine learning to create predictive algorithms so a library can have material on hand before a patron knows he or she needs it. Regarding this concept, there are myriad logistical problems in borrowing another library’s resources on the chance a patron might need it, but the concept seems valid from a collection development perspective as many libraries tightly connect their acquisitions management and resource sharing operations. To Litsey, the future also holds the sharing of 3D printer materials and research data sets. Many libraries are expanding collections well beyond traditional formats, including circulating tools, musical instruments, cake pans and easy entry science equipment (e.g. telescopes and microscopes), and Wi-Fi hotspots. It is conceivable that these might be lent more broadly in time. If these items can be discovered, a patron from another institution will want them.

The real strength of Resources Anytime, Anywhere is in the case study section following each chapter. Two or three studies, written by individuals involved in resource sharing, library consortia, or technology vending, provide detail and specificity to the author’s generalizations. These case studies function as guideposts for readers interested in greater detail about a specific element of resource sharing, such as Dethloff’s case study on restructuring staff configurations in “Case Study: The Rotation.” Following a holiday break and facing low staffing plus enormous backlogs, Dethloff’s team was forced to work on unfamiliar workflows without typical expertise. After this debacle, staff members performed a resource sharing function each week before rotating to another function the following week. In this way, every staff member would stay fresh on general procedures and workflows, and no one staff member would be overburdened, particularly when absences occur.

There are some weaknesses in Resources Anytime, Anywhere. The author is mostly on point, but tends to digress with broad statements such as that patrons view “the academic library as almost a holy shrine that must be experienced” (xxii). Additionally, there are some structural problems, particularly in the first chapter, as the transition from supply-chain considerations to professional development plans is abrupt and lacking context, making it initially difficult to follow. Further, the entire work would have benefited from another round of editing as occasional sentence fragments, misspellings, and other misconstructions hinder clarity. And yet, such infelicities are not dramatic enough to recommend against this title.

Resources Anywhere, Anytime provides a welcome survey of the present situation for larger academic libraries involved in ILL services. The case studies and the occasional specific tidbits (e.g. such as how to handle conditionals) could also help make this applicable to ILL operations at smaller libraries involved in more traditional practices. This is a good companion to Nyquist’s Resource Sharing Today (Rowman & Littlefield, 2014), as Nyquist helps readers become familiar with current lending and borrowing operations and Litsey helps push those operations into the future.—Evan M. Anderson (evananderson1@gmail.com), Kirkendall Public Library, Ankeny, Iowa