I have a strange, or maybe not so strange, perhaps you can help me with this. I have a tendency to…read morewant to own a book that I read. To keep it on my shelf once I've read it as a trophy of my fierce encounter with those literary pages so thoroughly steeped in ink. Every now and again I'll read a book think 'trash' and palm it off to a friend or relative for them to do with it what they will, but most of the time I like the collection on my bookshelf to read like a list of knowledge that I have sucked from the pages and sewn into my brain. The severed heads of the books I have read on the pinewood shelves as a warning to all books that enter my house. I will read you! With that said, I have from time to time utilised the library situated just up the road in the Italian Forum; for books, magazines and for CD's. While they don't have a gigantic range, I have not failed to find a book that I was after. I put that to good purchasing on the libraries part, but also to savvy book finding skills on my part. Fiction, fact, musical CD's all catalogued as you would expect from a library, and that said, can we assume that it is rare for a library to break the mould and wreak of independent thought and renegade cataloguing? Yes it is rare, and not apparent here. It's a library, it lends books and it provides work space for people to do research and learn. There are author talks and book clubs and even a space that showcases local art. I'm going to give it a four because it is a good library albeit not a very original one.

Love this library - they have a great selection of books, especially nonfiction. The library is…read moremuch bigger than it looks - you could spend hours in there!

Excellent space for children to pick up a book or for a read. Lovely and useful librarians who…read morehelped answer our questions and were keeping tidy.

I recently moved to Marrickville and decided to check out the local library. I was looking forward…read moreto gathering an armful of books, plonking them down on the counter and getting myself a library card. I entered the library and immediately felt some small concern. There was a massive amount of floorspace but very few bookshelves and what bookshelves were present were only five feet high. There was a children's section behind the main desk and an unutilised series of large steps with coloured cushions on the right. There were brightly lit study rooms along the sides and small tables and chairs lining the wall. Lots of people staring at laptops, no one reading books. I headed up the stairs to my right and entered the ground floor to be welcomed by the clanging and banging of a cafe in operation. Traditionally libraries were places of quiet solitude, not places of clanking dishes accompanied by the sound of diesel engines coming from outside. I began perusing what I assumed to be the history section. A bland collection of books on Anzac history in both the first and second world war. I continued walking the aisles looking for anything of interest. There appeared to be no other history books present other than Australia's involvement in war along with some colonial history. I did notice a large section dedicated to cook books though; always important in an age where one can type in what ingredients one has available and have google spit out an endless list of recipes. I perused about half the bookshelves on the ground floor before heading upstairs in dismay. Things were no better up there. The most sorry collection of middle of the road pap one might expect to see being sold out the front of a strip mall newsagency for half price. Plenty of study rooms and a solid collection of foreign language books though. As I walked around I heard someone sharing with their companion that someone thought they were hot. Where was the bespectacled librarian, come to hush these talkative twenty somethings? I headed to the top level to witness an entire floor dedicated to cover displayed art books. Thoroughly uninspiring. By this point I was feeling pretty disgusted with the book selection of this library as well as the racket of the cafe. I headed back to the ground floor and began perusing the shelves on the cafe side. As I drew nearer the cafe, insult was added to injury as I had my ears poisoned by some awful commercial radio oozing out some laboured lyrics of heartbreak and hurt feels. As I was eyeballing the books directly adjacent to the service counter of the cafe I moved around a middle aged couple sitting at a table. The male delivered a sentence to his partner about Foxtel that was met with no reply. Shortly thereafter the couple got up and left. Their visit to the library having done nothing to enliven their stale relationship. As I neared the end of my search for any books of interest I was thinking to myself of everything this library was missing. I had seen no classic literature. No philosophy. Nothing juicy in the science section. Nothing to tickle the mind at all. Nothing but the most bland uninspired dross and badly organised at that. If your idea of a valuable community library is a noisy cafe where one can drink coffee in front of screens whilst chatting to people with no better options than to spend time in your company then this might be the place for you. If on the other hand your idea of a valuable community library is a tranquil sanctuary of knowledge where one can have their mind stimulated to a lust of learning by the finest minds and writers of history; then Marrickville Library can only be described as a paragon of the decay of the western mind and its vision of the future. The head librarian for this 2021 interpretation of an internet cafe should hang their head in shame and ask themselves the question, what is the purpose of a community library?

Strathfield library at Homebush is a new architecturally designed building with glass windows and…read morehigh ceilings. Strathfield being an old suburb, I didn't expect the library to be modern. Clearly the council has recognised libraries being an important part of culture and have upgraded the place to the latest standards. The collection is quite extensive. They offer books, audiobooks (my favourite to take on long drives) movie dvd's, magazines, newspapers, and so much more. They offer books in other foreign languages too, to cater to the growing asian population in Sydney. Justice of Peace (JP) services are also offered in the library on wednesdays. The library offers various community incentives to use and take home. They provided a Car Accident Checksheet long back and more recently are offering a Home Power usage metre to borrow.

This is a small branch of the Marrickville library that doesn't get alot of traffic. It's located…read morewith the St Peter's Town Hall on Unwins Bridge Road. If you are after a bit of peace and quiet, however, this is the library for you. Its head branch Marrickville is quite simply, a circus at the best of times. It is full of people at all times of the day and filled with kids after school as a sort of unofficial (and unsupervised) after school care. St Peters library actually has some great fiction, whoever is doing the book buying and allocation there is doing a fantastic job, because I can walk in and see three or four books I want to read based on well known titles and authors. Park in surrounding streets or on Unwins Bridge Road during the day. Although it is a clearway southbound from 4pm-6pm.

Great little library inside the Balmain Town Hall. It has a few free study desks with power points,…read moreand plenty of computers to use the internet if you are a member. The library is open plan with library staff being very accessible. So accessible that you can hear every word of their phone conversations and it's not the quietest place to study. But it is air conditioned, and the kids books are in a separate section to promote peace and quiet. Parking is on street, while there is metered parking directly outside the library try some side streets like Short Street and Phillip Street on the other side of Darling Street as there is 4P unticketed street parking.

Love the new refurbishments. Such a welcoming and friendly library. Love it how there are modern,…read morecosy chairs to read the newspapers and magazines. The general reference library isn't too bad; however for all of the books I have wanted to borrow; I have had to place them on reserve; and for $2 a pop this is great value; however if you always keep having to reserve books this can really add up quite quickly. Another minor pet hate is that for the books that I do not need to put on reserve; I always (usually without fail) have to approach the librarian to arrange for these books to come from Leichhardt library for me to pick up here at Balmain library for another time. Not to worry; it is two trips; however from the family home it is an extra walk and that is definitely a good thing; especially the walk from Rozelle to Balmain is so peaceful. Love the study area. It is easy to bring a laptop and get some serious work done. Love it. Also the bean bags are fun to lie down and read a book (or two) in. I really love this place.