As you’ll discover if you don’t already know, Robin Bradford is a very kind soul indeed, for she graciously accepted my invitation via DM! We laughed our way through this chat in November 2025. I’ve edited out wonky noises, extraneous repetition (that would be me), and some laugh tags, and kept the content as faithful to our lovely talk as possible.
Show notes are included after this transcript. (If you somehow stumbled across this post without knowing about the podcast episode, hi! Here’s a handy link to find the interview on the web.)
TRANSCRIPT:
[jazzy jumpin’ music]Sandra Wong: Hello and welcome to We Contain Multitudes, the casual interview show with famous and accomplished guests who share the geek-outs, hobbies and interests, which they might not necessarily be known for. I’m your host, Sandra Wong, and today I have the pleasure of being joined by Robin Bradford. Hi, Robin.
Robin Bradford: Hello.
SW: Thank you so much for joining me and agreeing to my wild idea [both laugh] of interviewing lovely people to talk about, you know, geeky, nerd-out kind of stuff.
RB: Thank you so much for asking me. Although…you said ‘accomplished,’ and I’m like, wait, am I supposed to be here? [laughs]
SW: Oh, no no, no. Absolutely. [mock sternly] I refuse to hear that slander. I absolutely refuse. [both laugh] Okay. So for our audience, let me explain who Robin is. I have a little write-up. As a collections development librarian with both library science and law degrees, Robin Bradford has been a respected and beloved champion for genre fiction and indie authors for years. So much so, that she has garnered an American Library Association citation as a capital-M Mover and capital-S Shaker [Robin laughs] and was recognized as Librarian of the Year by RWA [Romance Writers of America]… Back when they were overall a force for good. LOL. If you’re like me, you avidly follow Robin’s posts on social media—and that would be Bluesky for me. Which you can find at the #CollectionDevelopment, where Robin serves up a dizzying array of book covers with a hefty side of humour and an obvious love of books. Okay, so, friends, you know, I think, that I love public libraries. They saved my life when I was a bullied teenager, over and over again. So I love libraries. I love librarians for, you know, they’re people, yes, they’re people. [Not sure what I meant to say here!] I love them all. They do a great job. It’s a hard job. And so I am so, so pleased. I literally just slid into Robin’s DMs [laughing] and said, Hey, I’m starting a podcast, would you like to ummmmm come on it? And she was so lovely.
RB: It was so awesome. [both laugh]
SW: Oh, you’re so kind to say that. I was— Definitely, whenever you, you know, you DM someone, yes, we’re mutuals, but still, it can be a little bit like, Ummmm, is this when I find out, when I discover I’m going to be blocked? Or will this be [laughs] will I get a response? So I am so, so pleased that you said yes, Robin. Okay, so—
RB: I think we, I think we’ve all gotten those DMs that are like, Ye-e-e-ah …that’s weird. [Sandra laughs] And so it’s so nice to get a DM that’s not that.
SW: Yes. Oh thank you. Oh boy. Yeah, I think I’m cornering the market on…weird, but professional. Y’know. [Robin laughs] That’s okay. So, what are we going to talk about today? [laughs]
RB: Well, it’s funny because listening to your intro, it’s, like, ‘things that you may not know them for.’ And I’m like, Ye-e-a-a-ah…I said books. [both crack up]
SW: Yeah, I know, but like—
RB: Books and libraries, those are my, those are my thing.
SW: But how could I say no to books? I cannot say no to books, you know? [Robin laughing] And then we could talk about, like, some things that maybe you don’t normally tell people about. So…
RB: Sure.
SW: Are are you, like me, a book lover from your childhood? Is that where—
RB: Oh, absolutely!
SW: Yeah.
RB: My parents were not necessarily pleasure readers, although my dad never met a newspaper that he did not completely throw himself into. And whenever I would travel anywhere, I would bring back a newspaper for him from that place
SW: Ohhh, oh I love that!
RB: because he just absolutely loved reading newspapers. Reading books? Meh. [both laugh] And my mom was a preschool teacher
SW: Ohhh
RB: and was not really a pleasure reader, either. She—but read to us as kids, so and my dad as well read to us as kids and so. And my sister is older than me. And so, she also got roped into reading to me [laughs] as kids. So yeah, we were all—and she and I are both big readers.
SW: Yeah, yeah. So did your, was there an age at which your dad started reading you newspapers instead of kids books? [chuckles]
RB: No. [both crack up] No, actually, it was, it was always kids books. And then, I went off to read on my own, and I think he was probably very happy [both laugh] because he no longer had to read those kids books. And he could go back to his newspapers where all the important stuff happened.
SW: Aww, well, shout out to you, Robin’s dad, who put in the hard work. [both laugh] That is really sweet. That’s really sweet.
RB: Yeah.
SW: So then, was being a book lover, you know, part of the reason you decided to study Library Science?
RB: Actually, I guess in a roundabout way. I studied Library Science because somebody in the libraries told me that if you keep working in libraries, and by that time, it was my…third library job, because I worked in undergrad. And then, when I got out of college, I didn’t know what I was going to do with my English major. I didn’t want to teach, so that was, like, well, what else can you do? So I went to work for a year in my hometown library, and then I decided, I don’t know what to do with one English major, so I should probably get another.
SW: Oh, yeah, of course, of course. [laughs]
RB: And so, I went to get a Master’s in English, and when I got there, I needed a job, so I went through the library. So at that point, when I was graduating, they’re, like, You should go to library school. I didn’t even know library school was a thing. I did not know that. I had no idea.
SW: Yeah.
RB: So I had already had eight years, seven years of experience in libraries. So I thought, I probably should go to library school.
SW: Right.
RB: And so that’s what I did. [laughs]
SW: Yeah. Okay. So, I know you as a, you know, a librarian in collections development. Is that where you’ve always been?
RB: No. So I have done, the general, the person you see when you come in the library working the desk. I have done that. I did that for all through, so all of my early library work, I did that up until 2001. So, I got my first library job in 1992. 2001 is when I went into collection development.
SW: Right.
RB: And for a while, I did both because that was the job for the place that I was at. You sit on the desk and answer reference questions, and you also build up the collection. And so I did both. And then, when we switched over to just collection, I was like, yeah, I need to be over there because I need to be buying books. [laughs]
SW: Yeah. Yeah. And so why did you feel that? I have an inkling why, but I would love to hear—
RB: I LOVE, I absolutely love spending money on books.
SW: Yesss! [laughs]
RB: It’s even better if it’s not my money. [laughs]
SW: [laughing] Yesss!
RB: It’s even better! But just being immersed in what is coming up…
SW: Right
RB: what we, what we should have that we don’t have, what we need, how we need to…increase the collection. I love it so much.
SW: Yeah.
RB: It is the best job.
SW: I love hearing that! [Robin laughs] I love knowing librarians whom I admire love their work because it’s so important—it’s such important work. No matter what the library is, you know, whether it’s an academic library,
RB: Yep
SW: it’s a public library, it’s a science and research library. I think they’re all such important…bastions—I know that’s so dramatic, but whatever, I’m kind of a drama queen [Robin laughs]—of, you know, of learning, of knowledge.
RB: Well and then, there are people who… I have plenty of friends who are kind of the opposite of me, and so they don’t love picking books and really could do without it. They don’t care.
SW: Really?
RB: They want to help answer the questions.
SW: Right.
RB: So, when you come to them with a, with an inquiry and you don’t know… They want to, they’re like a bloodhound. [Sandra laughs] They want to run that info down and get to the bottom of it. And I love that that also exists.
SW: Yeah, I love it.
RB: And it’s also librarianship. It’s not just buying the materials, it’s the people who do the deep dives to get to the answers that people want.
SW: Right. I, I’ll say, I also know… So, during my years in uni, there was one summer where I worked at the Canadian Circumpolar Institute and their library. So, I was sort of… It was very small [laughs], it was housed in one room. And I got to do a little bit of, like, the data entry and learning how to categorize, you know?
RB: Oh my gosh, yes
SW: books. And, like, that is really important, too. Before that, I had no idea, like, that someone actually had to do that manually. So, so this was in the 90s and, and I, I was, like, astounded, mind-blown to know, Someone has to do this by hand?
RB: Did they do the actual cards?
SW: They…did. They had both. I think they were…yeah. And we had, they had actual newspapers from up north, right? It’s a circumpolar institute—that we just, we filed. That I, I filed. [Robin laughs] And anyway, that was my first, you know, experience, on the back end of what a library does. So, I learned so much about what’s necessary and the expertise. So, that’s also why I’m so admiring and respectful of the work that you do, you and your colleagues. Okay. Before we get too far into the weeds about other librarians, [Robin quietly chuckles] whom I’m sure are lovely, but I’m not that interested in them right now, [both laugh] I want to bring it back to you, Robin. By the way, friends listening, today is Robin’s birthday, and I am so, so pleased and thrilled that she chose to spend some of her birthday time with me. So thank you so much, Robin, for
RB: Oh, thank you!
SW: celebrating with us a little bit.
RB: It’s so fun. It’s, it’s a very good way to spend your birthday.
SW: Oh awesome. So, speaking of birthdays and, like, you know, blasts from the past… In my research, I did discover that you have written a reference guide for librarians about romance books.
RB: Yes. The readers, Readers Advisory Guide to Romance.
SW: Yes, so can you tell me a little bit about, like, what was the impetus for you to, to write that? Was it just you deciding, you know, people, librarians need this, and then you just went and did it?
RB: No. [both crack up] I was asked to do it because this is a series, with different subjects. So, there’s one for horror that my friend Becky Spratford did.
SW: Oh, okay.
RB: And then, there’s one for Young Adult, and there’s one for historical fiction. And so, it’s a series that they are doing, and someone from ALA [American Library Association] asked if I would be interested in doing it. And my first thought was, I’m not an author, I don’t write books. And then I remembered, I do have two English degrees, so [laughs]
SW: Oh. Yeah. [laughs]
RB: I can actually write a book. And this came about around the time of the pandemic. And so, it was a little fortuitous that I had lots of time in the house, at the time, so I could do a lot of the research and the writing while…we were all stuck at home.
SW: Right. Okay. And so, what was it that had ALA approach you with romance as the genre that you could handle?
RB: That’s a good question. [laughs] I wish I knew.
SW: Yeah.
RB: I don’t know. I think it was because I talked a lot about romance, on social media.
SW: Right.
RB: And because I had been the Librarian of the Year with RWA. I think those two things. Also, I gave a lot of presentations about romance
SW: Okay
RB: to different library groups. Like, what you should buy and how you should classify it, and what are the different subgenres and tropes and things of that nature, to library staff who want to know, how do I help people that— And so, I think that’s why.
SW: Right. And, like, is it true in your experience and, and your vast store of knowledge, that romance is the most popular fiction category for library borrowers?
RB: I don’t know. And I think that depends on the library. And also, strangely enough, it depends on the format.
SW: Oh?
RB: And so, I would say, probably for us in my library, in print, it’s probably mysteries and thrillers.
SW: Yay. [both laugh]
RB: I thought you might like that.
SW: Says the crime writer.
RB: And then, in digital though, it’s definitely romance by…quite a large margin.
SW: Yeah, yeah. And I have to admit, I mean, I do love my e-reader. I love the ease with which I can just…go through books. So, I’m sure that’s part of it, you know, as well.
RB: It, it is part of it, but it’s also people [ie., librarians] get overwhelmed with romance. And so, they don’t necessarily buy all of it that’s available in print.
SW: Right
RB: Which makes it difficult for people to check out.
SW: Okay. That makes sense. So then, did you come to your knowledge of romance just on a personal level? It’s just something you’ve been reading for a very, very long time? Like, for example, I’ve been reading romance since I was at, like, 13. So, it’s been decades and decades and decades for me. [laughs]
RB: Yep. Yep. My little hometown library had the spinner rack with the
SW: [delighted] Oh yes!
RB: Silhouette special editions, and the…the Harlequins, back when they were two separate companies.
SW: Yeah
RB: So yeah, I read a ton of those, but also, I think a lot of my knowledge of it on a deeper level came from social media, and following people like Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and just getting engaged with the community.
SW: Yeah
RB: There are people there who have a very, very deep knowledge. And so learning from them and then applying the library filter to it, so that, instead of how I interact with it as a, just a reader, how I can get other people to interact with it and how to make it, you know, ease of searching and things like that. So, it’s partly my background, partly listening to others.
SW: Right. Okay. So then, I have to know— Actually, before I forget, can you tell people which social media you’re on and also what your handle is? I actually don’t know how to pronounce it. [both laugh] I just know how to spell it out.
RB: That’s okay. So, it’s tuphlos. T-u-p-h-l-o-s. And it means “blind.” Actually, it means “blind boy.” There’s a different word for girl, but it means “blind” in Greek. I was a Classics minor, and so I took Greek. I remember very few words, but that’s one. I remembered. And back when everybody was signing up for AOL and all the things [Sandra laughs]… trying to get, like, Robin B or Robin, even Robin Bradford… There are lots of Robin Bradfords in the world.
SW: Right
RB: It was very difficult because I was not first to get my name as something. And so. But I could always get tuphlos. [Sandra laughs] Like, nobody else was looking for that. So that’s where I am. Instagram and Bluesky.
SW: Right. Well, I have never seen another tuphlos, so there is [chuckles]
RB: See? Exactly. [laughs]
SW: the one, the only. [laughs] Okay, so—and also a great shout out to Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. They…she does have a podcast..? or only a blog?
RB: She does. She has a podcast and she also has a book which helped me a lot with my book. So.
SW: Oh, wonderful. What’s that book?
RB: Ahhh my gosh…is it—The Smart Bitches Guide to Romance, I think.
SW: Yeah, that sounds like a likely title. [laughs]
RB: I think…that is what…it is. [faint sounds of typing] I have to, quick, look it up so I can give her…
SW: [laughs] I was just going to say, okay, people—
RB: Ah! It’s Beyond Heaving Bosoms, the Smart Bitches Guide to Romance Novels.
SW: Lovely. So this, listeners, is how we know Robin is a professional. Because she immediately had to look that up for us. [Robin laughs] And, and we thank you for it, Robin. [both crack up] My goodness. So, I do have a burning question, which is, when you work in collections development, like, how many books do you have to read? Do you read every single book all the way through before you decide to, you know,
RB: Absolutely not [laughs]
SW: include it? [laughs]
RB: We do not.
SW: Okay.
RB: Because a lot of, a lot of times, we’re ordering books months and months in advance.
SW: Yeah.
RB: So, we do not read every single book. I would never get anything done. [Sandra laughs] And I don’t read quite that fast because we order a lot of books. We do try to get, you know, as much info as we can about certain books
SW: Right
RB: usually books that we don’t know anything about. I don’t necessarily need to get any information about a James Patterson book. I just need to know that people want it and then we buy it. A lot of times, libraries will have those on automatic orders. So, I don’t even have to think about it. Just send it. You know, I don’t, I don’t need to know anything about it. Just send the next one. [laughs]
SW: Right. But, I mean, I get the sense, like, the, the real value of work by someone like you, who champions indie authors and genre fiction, is that you—Okay, you can set those on automatic, the big names, right?
RB: Right.
SW: But it’s the small quote-unquote
RB: Yes
SW: small, niche, marginalized authors that don’t have the big
RB: Right
SW: you know, they’re not in the automated—
RB: And that’s why we, that’s why we set those big names on automatic.
SW: Yeah.
RB: So that we can spend our time, then, looking, you know, over here at the smaller authors, the emerging subgenres, or genres, or, you know… When climate fiction was new
SW: Mm
RB: like, no one had really heard of it before. There were people who were writing, like, science fiction with the climate focus. And then publishers decided to market it as climate fiction. And then, we’re looking at that and trying to see if that’s going to be a fit for where we are. And a lot of the authors were not traditionally published.
SW: Right.
RB: But that didn’t mean people didn’t want to read them. They wanted to read as much as they possibly could. It’s their genre. And so, looking for those and seeing where we can get them, that’s something we can do when we put all the…other stuff on standing order.
SW: Right. Okay. I mean, I’ll, I will take this opportunity to shout out my public library, which is Edmonton Public Library. [Robin gives a small cheer] And I know that they do a lot of work for local authors. You know, that they have a specific way for you as a local author—especially if you’re local and an indie author [as in] self-published—that you can let them know you have books available, and you’d be more than happy for them to carry your books. So, do you have that at your library, too?
RB: We do. And we get emails from people… Sometimes it’s the author themselves, sometimes it’s someone connected to the author. And we have a special collection page that we send them, telling them, you know, what we need.
SW: Nice.
RB: And sometimes we’ll get a lot of unsolicited things and we’ll be, like, you know, that’s great. I personally would rather purchase it. One, because it goes through our process. And so, then we get it covered in mylar, the, the plastic cover
SW: Right
RB: and we get, you know, it goes through the process like any other book. But also, then we’re supporting authors. If, I mean, it’s, it’s great that you’re giving it to us, but it’s, it’s actually easier for us if you just tell us what it is and where we can find it, and for us to go purchase it.
SW: Yeah.
RB: Not every library may feel that way. Some people may be like, oh, don’t tell people not to send us free books. [Sandra cracks up] But I’m only speaking for myself. [laughs]
SW: That’s right.
RB: If you want to send free books, or if you take free books, that’s great, but it’s easier for us,
SW: Yeah
RB: just because we have so many different processes, for us to just let it go through the process like any other book.
SW: Yeah. Oh, I love—okay, I am a nerd for a lot of different things. I love knowing how libraries work. [laughs]
RB: Sure! [laughs]
SW: So, thank you so much! Is there, is there anything about what you do as a collections librarian? Can I say that? Is it collect—do I have to say “collections development librarian”? Is that the technical term? [laughs]
RB: [kindly] Noooo, you can even just say selector.
SW: A selector. Okay. Is there any, like, you know, little tip and trick, that inside-baseball kind of knowledge, about being a selector that you can share with us?
RB: I would say I…
SW: Yeah.
RB: I would think that we’re the most transparent ’cause…
SW: Right.
RB: We, we don’t really have any specialized knowledge that we do, like the people who do the catalog or things like that. We… Let me, let me think about that. [Sandra laughs] I don’t, I don’t know that we have any insider tips. I would say we spend a lot of time searching for stuff.
SW: Okay.
RB: So the easier that you can make it for us to find…the, the happier everyone will be.
SW: Okay…okay. I love this. [Robin laughs softly] I could go on and, like, ask you for more and more details. But thank you so much for sharing your love of books and giving us a little inside peek into what you do. I know that, that you were saying it doesn’t really count as a thing you’re not famous for, but I don’t think a lot of people know how libraries work and how selectors like you…
RB: That’s fair.
SW: you know, approach the work. So, I really appreciate it. Okay. We’re going to move into a little something I call Small Joys, which Robin has been warned about. So [both laugh] I’m going to ask you, Robin… Okay. What’s something that you do or you have that lifts your spirits when you need it? A little small joy.
RB: [thoughtfully] Lifts my spirits… The lights on my Christmas tree. And I think about this because I just got it out of storage, [Sandra laughs] maybe an hour or two ago. So I store it, you know, when it’s not Christmas time
SW: Right.
RB: And then I just got it out, and I usually put it up around my birthday.
SW: Yes.
RB: I don’t decorate it yet. I don’t, I usually wait until after [American] Thanksgiving to put the ornaments on and all of that, but it has these lights that are programmable.
SW: Yeah.
RB: And so they have, like, sometimes they can be all one color. And that color could be one of seven colors.
SW: Right.
RB: Or they have, you know, different patterns and, and whatnot. And it just makes me so happy to see those lights.
SW: I love it. I could—Okay, I’m so sorry, listeners, you cannot see the smile on Robin’s face, [Robin laughs, delighted] but it is so lovely. And she’s talking about this tiny little small joy… That’s just so perfect. Thank you so much for sharing that. I wish I had a—
RB: That’s perfect timing!
SW: I wish I had a fancy, fancy tree like that. My tree is very old. [laughs] It’s so old that the, you know, the light set, that came with the— The tree came with the lights. Those lights burned out.
RB: Oh no.
SW: That’s how old this tree is. So yeah, I painstakingly had to unwind the set of lights on that, so they weren’t just there looking sad and dead. [laughs, rueful]
RB: Right.
SW: Anyway, let’s not talk about that right now. [both crack up] Okay. We’re going to end today on something I call Speed Round. [Robin gives a small cheer] So, Robin, this is where I give you a choice of two options, and you just answer off the top of your head.
RB: Okay, sure!
SW: There’s no judgments, no judgments, no second guessing. There’s no right or wrong answers. We’re just going to be silly. So, are you ready?
RB: I’m ready.
SW: Okay. Popcorn or potato chips?
RB: Potato chips.
SW: Mm-hm. Jelly beans or jujubes?
RB: Oh. Jelly beans.
SW: Well. Sweet or savoury?
RB: Ooh… Sweet.
SW: Mm. Okay. Night owl or early bird?
RB: Early bird.
SW: [laughs] Okay. Socks or bare feet?
RB: [pause] Socks.
SW: Mhm. Okay. Right. Ocean voyage or mountain cabin? [long pause]
RB: Oh
SW: I stumped you…stumped you.
RB: You have stumped me.
SW: Any answer, remember, any answer.
RB: Mountain cabin.
SW: Okay. Fine dining or drive-thru?
RB: [cracks up] Who’s paying?
SW: [laughing] Excellent! Excellent, excellent. The other person. [both laugh]
RB: Fine dining!
SW: Absolutely. Okay, the last one, the last one is mild or spicy?
RB: Spicy.
SW: Okay! A girl after my own heart. [Robin laughs] This has been so much fun, Robin, thank you so much
RB: Yes, it has!
SW: for joining me.
RB: And thank you for asking me. This is great.
SW: I’m so pleased that you could share your joy and your birthday with me and us. [Robin chuckles] So, I’m gonna definitely put your…social media handle—tuphlos. I remembered!—in the show notes. Is there anywhere else anyone can, you know, try and catch up with you? Do you have a website?
RB: I don’t have a website.
SW: Okay.
RB: I have a blog that is long defunct. [Sandra laughs] But I…yeah, I don’t really…
SW: Okay, well, we’ll put up your Bluesky and Instagram handles for anyone to come find you.
RB: Awesome.
SW: Yeah, okay. So, friends, thank you for joining us. As always, until next time, please create joy for yourself and others, however, works for you because…we contain multitudes.
[jazzy jumpin’ music]SW: We Contain Multitudes is on The Incomparable network of smart and funny pop culture podcasts where members can access exclusive podcasts and a wonderful community. Find out more at theincomparable.com.
Special thanks, as always, to Erika Ensign, our editrix extraordinaire of Castria Communications. Award-winning excellence in podcast production and media solutions. Check them out at wearecastria.com.
[music fades]Robotic voice: The incomparable podcast network. Become a member and support this show today. theincomparable.com/members
[digital blip sound]SHOW NOTES:
Robin on Instagram
Robin on Bluesky
Robin’s The Reader’s Advisory Guide to Romance (2023, ALA)
Becky Spratford, The Readers’ Advisory Guide to Horror (2021, ALA)
Smart Bitches, Trashy Books – Heaving Bosoms: The Smart Bitches’ Guide to Romance (2009)
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