Fine Arts/Studio Arts Subject Guide: Books & E-books

To search for a book by subject in the catalog, you need to develop a list of KEYWORDS (see Developing Keywords) that you will use in the search. Do not use full sentences, the extra words in a sentence will muddy your results.

Sample correct search: Cloning and Ethics and Human*

Sample incorrect search: Is it ethical to clone humans? 

After you search your keywords you can then narrow your results down to books and eBooks using the format filter. You can also limit your search results to books that are on your local campus if you want a book you can pick up today. You can borrow books from any campus library but it may take a few days for it to get to your location.

Important note: If you want to see ebook results you can only limit your search to "Libraries Worldwide" or "Fairleigh Dickinson Libraries". If you limit your results to one campus library, ebooks will no longer show up in your results.

 Selecting a Search Result

Once you have narrowed your search you can then look at the results. You will notice eBooks list a "View eBook" button below the book's title while print books state the book is held by FDU libraries. To find out more information about the book or to find the book's call number and location, click on the book's title. 

When trying to locate a book in the collection, you will need to write down the entire call number. A partial call number will get you in the general area where the book is shelved, but there may be hundreds of other books that start with the same number.

To search for a book by author click on the Advanced Search link at the right of the search box. 

From here select Author from the drop down menu. Enter your author's name as last name, first name. For instance if you were looking for books written by Thomas Jefferson you will get better results searching Jefferson, Thomas. If you are only interested in books or eBooks you will still need to select it under the format options in the left hand menu.

In the search results, you should see your author listed under the title of each entry. To view more information about the book click on the title. 

Advanced searching allows you to perform more specific searches than the Basic Search by using limiters. Limiters can reduce your number of results by various criteria, including date of publication, location, and type of resource. To perform an Advanced Search, click the Advanced Search link to the right of the main search box. Here you will be able to choose different fields to search such as title, keyword, author, publisher etc. 

Enter your search terms in the boxes provided using the AND, OR, or NOT operators as appropriate. *For more information on the use of AND, OR, and NOT, see Search Strategies: AND, OR, NOT.

Below the search boxes you can also choose to limit your search to a particular format, i.e. books, articles, videos, etc., choose a date range, or select a library to  search. If you're searching for articles you also have the option to limit them to peer-reviewed or scholarly articles. 

To view the course reserves, click on the Course Reserves link in the upper right corner of the catalog. From here you will be able to browse the courses with reserves available or search by course  or instructor. 

The results list will give you a list of the courses that match your search. Clicking on a course will show you what items are available and where you can find it.