Liaison Librarian

McGill University

Montreal, Quebec

Describe your early background:

I grew up in Montreal, in NDG (NotreDame-de-Grâce) to be specific. I went to a private French school for girls in one of the posher areas of the island and always felt like an underdog there. Thankfully, my family helped me develop a good sense of humour, and that has allowed me to deal with just about anything.

What (or who) influenced you to pursue a career in libraries?

I must have been impressed with libraries from an early age. When I was little, I collected all the kids' books in our house, stuck call numbers on them (my own classification system-I can't figure it out now), and loaned them to my siblings. I don't know if I fined them late fees or not.

I considered librarianship when I was an undergrad but dropped the idea because I thought I'd be poor. I was a research assistant in a paediatric hospital for a little while and really enjoyed the searching part of the job (in fact, I wanted to "fix" MEDLINE, mostly because I didn't understand how it worked). My Mom suggested librarianship to me in my late 20s, and it seemed like fate although I was really sold on the idea after chatting with the Director of Libraries at McGill, Frances Groen. In retrospect, I really appreciate that Fran took the time to sit down with me like that. …