Talking Book and Braille Service
Book and Magazine Collection
Books and magazines circulated from the Talking Book and Braille Service (TBBS) are similar to
the ones you would find at most public libraries. The difference is our library materials are available in either audio or braille formats, and are sent through the mail or can be downloaded from our download website: Nebraska BARD.
Our audiobook collection contains a wide selection of fiction and
nonfiction, including bestsellers, for both adults and children in genres and subjects like biography, history, mystery, romance, and westerns. Most of these books come to us through the National Library
Service (NLS), a division of Library of Congress. We also have a Nebraska Collection,
written by Nebraska and regional authors or written about Nebraska or the Great Plains.
Free audio magazines subscriptions are distributed by NLS, including such popular titles as,
National Geographic, People, Money, and Sports Illustrated. TBBS also distributes free audio magazines of
regional interest, including Grit, Nebraskaland, Reader's Digest, Hail Varsity, and Guideposts.
The complete list of all available magazines subscriptions can be found online through the catalogs page; subscription requests can be submitted electronically from the catalog list.
Braille readers can borrow juvenile materials from our local braille collection, or can access adult-reading-level titles through a contract with the Utah State Library.
Also, braille readers can access newer braille titles on the internet by downloading from the Nebraska BARD website.
NLS also distributes braille magazines both on BARD and via the mail; contact us for details on which braille magazine subscriptions are available.
Visit our library's juvenile braille browsing collection onsite during our operating hours or browse online. Many of the children's books are "print-braille,"
which means the words appear in regular print as well as in braille. This arrangement enables a parent and child to share a book, even if one is blind and the other is sighted.
Catalogs in large print or recorded formats describe parts of the collection. The
complete collection of Library of Congress recordings is cataloged (and
searchable) at the NLS website. Nebraska Talking Books also provides access to an
online catalog so you can search our holdings and send in request lists automatically.
Direct links to all our catalogs can be found online on the catalogs page.