Boole Library

Boole Library

So overall the Boole Library at UCC is good.  It's a beautiful building with lots of books, including some rare ones.  However, there are several things I find annoying with it.  The first thing is that everywhere is a quiet space, except for private study rooms but you have to book those in advance.  I think of libraries as a study space so there should be some areas where people can casually study together or exchange ideas.

The hours are the next sort of annoying thing.  The library is hardly open on the weekends (although this is likely due to the fact that most Irish students go home) and isn't open very late during the week.

Their website also has some issues with typos and with not having books that they claimed to have (it claimed that there were two copies of one book I was looking, but it turns out one was thrown out and one went missing).

Honestly though, the biggest thing that bugs me is that there is a limit (six or something like that) on the number of books you can check out.  I'm not sure if I can remember in the states writing a paper with fewer than six books, and I am often working on more than one paper at a time.

That being said, the staff is (with one exception of a rude man in Special Collections) very nice and very helpful.  I have also found some very interesting books and I look forward to writing my paper comparing the experiences of female orphans and the families of convicts who were sent to Australia during the Irish Famine.