The People Powering the Abdus Salam Library

Last year, a certain summer term insanity came over me. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t read, and I certainly couldn’t work. I lay in bed, drowning in  ennui. Jolted up by a fire alarm at three in morning – a quintessential university experience – I deliriously found myself wandering over to the Abdus Salam Library instead of the fire safety zone. 

I had goosebumps on my arms, but the air was biting, and I enjoyed watching my breath. 

The library, naturally, wasn’t as empty as I hoped. That was until I made my way up to Section 800 on the fifth floor: the literature section. 

The Abdus Salam Library is not like a traditional library. Although it packs a flurry of activity (and you will be lucky to find a seat at 4pm on any given day), the shelves are saturated with specialised STEM and medical texts – as are the librarians, for whom helping you is only a fraction of the role that they play in the wider community.  

Spanning a meagre three shelves, the literature section is not particularly expansive. Still, I enjoyed perusing through the shelves, brushing my fingers over the spine of each book as I walked by.

Initially, I was a bit miffed with the lack of literature that I was under the impression library had available. But upon further digging, I discovered two key things that enable me to continually enrich my breadth of reading. One, Libby, an online platform through Imperial that gives you access to thousands of books for free. And another, that I can request the library to acquire a book I want to read. 

That night, I left the library about an hour after the fire alarm had gone off. My tiredness was catching up to me, but equally, my listlessness had been replaced with satiation. I walked out with three books in hand: A Room with a View by E.M. Forster, The Lincoln Highway by Amol Towles, and Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. 

I’ve since grown more curious about the people behind Abdus Salam, who work tirelessly to make the library such a conducive place, and offer services we certainly take for granted. 

So, here are merely a handful of the people who work at the Imperial Library Services. Of course, accompanied by their book recommendation, because it would go against my morals to not ask a librarian for a suggestion of what to read.

Ella Burrows

I’m Ella, and I work as an Acquisitions and Metadata Officer, part of the Content and Discovery team at the Abdus Salam Library. I joined the Library in September 2023, and have loved working here so far – my role is varied, I’ve learnt a lot, and working with rare material in our Special Collection brings lots of surprises.

I tend to read books from a variety of genres, mostly fiction. One great aspect of my role is that I get to see almost every print book we order for the Abdus Salam Library as it arrives, and as we’ve been developing our fiction collection I now have a very long reading list! Having said that, one book I read recently and loved was Stay True by Hua Hsu. It’s a memoir that’s funny, sad, moving, and captures the specificity of young adulthood beautifully. I don’t believe in all-time favourites – my favourites are subject to change – but a fiction book I can definitely recommend, and one we have in the Library, is Monstrilio by Gerardo Sámano
Córdova. It’s about loss, expectations, and the intensity of parental love, and it also has elements of horror and humour.

Dan Whittaker

I’m Dan Whittaker, a Senior Library Assistant at the Abdus Salam Library. I work in the liaison librarian team supporting Business, Engineering, and Natural Sciences. 

I’ve spent my entire career in academic libraries and have been at Imperial since 2017. I love working with bright, motivated students every day and as you might expect from a lifelong librarian, I also love books. So, I have found it difficult to recommend only one. I find myself drawn to a genre sometimes known as The Great Twentieth Century American Novel. Books by authors like John Steinbeck or Ernest Hemingway. One of my all-time favourites is Stoner by John Williams, a hidden gem. For something a little more 21st Century, I recommend Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

Yusuf Ozkan

I’m Yusuf Ozkan. I joined Imperial in 2019 and currently work as a Research Outputs Analyst working in the Scholarly Communications Management Team, which helps Imperial staff and students to communicate and disseminate their research. 

I’m doing my PhD on war studies. Therefore, my favourite genre is military and intelligence history. It has been long time since I read a book not related to my research. So, I can only advise a research related book. My favourite book is Churchill and the Dardanelles, authored by Christopher Bell. It’s an academic history book, but excellently written, that covers all aspects of the Dardanelles Campaign in 1915.

Monika Koziel

I’ve been working at the Abdus Salam Library at South Kensington for the past three years, following ten years at City University of London. As the User Service and Stock Management Coordinator, I line manage two wonderful teams—stock management assistants and library assistants. Together with User Services Team, we ensure that our library is a welcoming, resourceful space for students, staff, and visitors. 

I love fiction as much as I do non-fiction, and authors like Margaret Atwood and Paulo Coelho never fail to draw me in.