James Lee Burke on Reference Librarians

A patron who comes to the desk every week for a copy of the NYT crossword brought us this quote from Burke's The Tin Roof Blowdown, (Robicheaux meets Katrina), p. 354. I have to give our library credit here. We have a reference desk that anyone would be proud of. It is prominent and well-equipped, the hub of activity on the second floor. All the rest is true. Thanks, JLB! :

"Then I used the most valuable and unlauded investigative resource in the United States, the lowly reference librarian. Their salaries are wretched and they receive credit for nothing. Their desks are usually stuck away in the stacks or in a remote corner where they have to shush noisy high school students or put up with street people blowing wine in their faces or snoring in the stuffed chairs. But their ability to find obscure information is remarkable and they persevere like Spartans"