Bradley, Carol W. Miss Pinn: the Case of the Missing Librarian (San Francisco: Bird in Hand Press, 1975.) Linoleum cut illustrations by Bruce Wm. Bradley. [22] p. No. 190 of a 200-copy edition.

"Miss Elvira Pinn was an efficient, but slightly absent-minded librarian." When she disappears Mr. Broome the janitor and Mrs. Pagge the Head Librarian (who knows exactly where every book is located) go looking for her. 

Bradbury, Ray. Something Wicked This Way Comes (New York: Bantam, 1963, c1962) 215 p.

Charles Halloway is the Janitor of the Green Town, Illinois Town Library. His son Will and Will's friend Jim discover an evil force in a traveling carnival. Charles finds information about the carnival in the library (p. 135-38). The librarian is Miss Watriss, "the nice old lady [who] purple stamped your books" (p. 11). A Miss Wills is mentioned as the other librarian, but neither of them enter into the story. The evil Mr. Dark comes searching for Halloway and the boys in the darkened and labyrinthine library (p. 154-66).

Bracken, C.P. Roman Ring ([London: Cassell, 1968]) 169 p. Cassell Crime.

My copy lacks a title page so the publication information above comes from the Library of Congress online catalog.

A criminal organization in Italy steals rare books from libraries. One of them is a former librarian named Mario Signarelli. He steals books from a library in Rome called the Cantal. I can't find any evidence that such a place exists. Another theft takes place at St. Paul's College, where the book catalog is altered to reflect the worthless books that were substituted for the rare ones taken.

Bowes, Barry. Between the Stacks (London: Jay Landesman, 1979) 192 p.

Everyday life at the Pike Lane (North London) Branch Library is the subject of this amusing novel. The staff includes librarian Andy Egge, children's librarian Gail Marsden, and music librarian Phil Fellowes

Gay by inclination, and morose by nature. If Gail is the penguin, Phil, with his sharp features, pale skin, spectacles and black Van Dyck beard, is the stork. When they happen to be walking side-by-side you can't help wondering if they will embark on some strange dance like something from the world of Edward Lear. (p. 9).

The library assistants are Mick Inkerman, Liz Lamble, Marianne, Mr. Knox, Gary Clee, and Rina O'Rourke ("Non-professional staff can also be shunted from branch to branch, but it doesn't affect their career prospects; they don't have any." p. 104). The narrator, who fails to tell us his name, is the senior assistant librarian. The staff must endure every imaginable library ordeal: book thieves, vandals, a leaky roof, would-be censors, would-be book donors, drunks, teeth grinders, "nutters," The Smeller, The Surveyor (so named because all he does is sit and look around), and the Phantom Farter, to name but a few. The narrator writes an article analyzing different types of book browsers: "Selection from the lower shelves necessitates much crouching. Readers who spot something a little further on, at the same level, will perform a duck waddle, with a book clamped between the knees or resting on one thigh." (p. 139). The book is full of wry observations on the life of librarians, as, "For years we librarians have hovered in the background, casting short shadows and envious eyes towards civil servants. Status is a problem. At one time we may have just crept into the same category of respectability as teachers, bank managers, doctors and solicitors. This was to say, a librarian was beyond reproach because he was in no position to indulge in graft, corruption, immorality or smoking. There aren't many of us ruined by the fruits of affluence." (p. 5-6).

Bosse, Malcolm. The Man Who Loved Zoos (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1974) 184 p.

Warren Shore, a disturbed Vietnam veteran, robs a busload of dead people. His Aunt Victoria, a librarian, solves the mystery.

Borthwick, J.S. The Student Body (New York: St. Martin's, 1986) 293 p.

The Starbox Library at Bowmouth College plays a tangential role in this mystery. We briefly meet the director Dr. Threadgill, an assistant librarian named Miss Pierre who mentions that she was "working late on returns" (p. 272), and someone described as "an elderly Miss Murstone type" (p. 245).

Bonnamy, Francis. Dead Reckoning (New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1943) 248 p.

The Map Division of the Library of Congress is the scene of murder and a search for a pirate's treasure map. Miss Arabella Fly, aged forty-something, tries to attract the attention of single men as she does her work in the Map Division.

The familiar stacks in the cellar of the Library of Congress stood sinister in their dusty quiet. Horrors seemed to lurk behind each wall of books as she made her way toward the little circular iron stairway that led up two flights to the Map Division. The bare light bulbs gleamed far apart; each meager pool of light thinned at the edges to a dirty gray. Only her heel taps echoed in the silence. If anyone were waiting for her behind that farthest stack, he'd be all set with her heels beating a warning. Like belling a cat.

It was terribly lonely down here, really. That Mr. Rivers in the Semantics Division said once there were corners in this pile where a body could lie undisturbed for months. Her body, maybe. (p. 3-4).