The list includes a lengthy selection of new titles exploring career options, some —such as 100 Best Careers for the 21^st Century by Shelly Field— with an eye to future industry trends, others—like these—directed at a variety of individual strengths, interests, and life goals:

Breaking into Film: Making Your Career Search a Blockbuster by Kenna McHugh

Careers for Culture Lovers & Other Artsy Types by Marjorie Eberts and Margaret Gisler

Careers in Government by Mary Elisabeth Pitz

High-Tech Careers for Low-Tech People by William A. Schaffer

Love Your Work and Success Will Follow: A Practical Guide to Achieving Total Career Satisfaction by Arlene S. Hirsch

The Off-The-Beaten Path Job Book: You Can Make a Living and Have a Life! by Sandra Gurvis

There's lots of good advice in Joyce Lain Kennedy’s Career Book and guidelines for parental intervention in The Parent’s Crash Course in Career Planning: Helping Your College Student Succeed by Marcia B. Harris.

How to tailor a resume? Sell yourself at a job interview? Turn a first job into a savvy career move? Strategies are outlined in The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Perfect Interview by Marc Dorio; in Resumes for Health and Medical Careers, for Sales and Marketing Careers, [and others] by the editors of VGM Career Horizons; and in Rules for the Road: Surviving Your First Job Out of School by Eve Luppert.

Finally, there is a useful list of the best Internet sites for career information and job listings: local jobs, openings in federal government agencies, state and nation-wide job banks. For people just getting comfortable with online searching, Richard Nelson Bolles' book, Job Hunting on the Internet, points the way. On networked PCs in the library, you can conduct your own online job hunt or use CHOICES, a computer program that matches your personal skills and interests with career planning and job opportunities.

I'm tying a blue and orange ribbon around a copy of this essential resource guide and handing it to my daughter on the lawn in Charlottesville this afternoon. And I've already checked out a copy of How to Help Your Child Land the Right Job (Without Being a Pain in the Neck) by Nella Barkley.

Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work . . ..