New Feature When Searching JMU Libraries Books on Google

Posted February 19, 2025 in General Collections News, JMU Libraries News

Good news: When you use Google to search for book titles, you can now see whether JMU Libraries has a copy of the book! Our Metadata Strategies team recently completed a lot of behind-the-scenes work to make this possible. 

How does it work? When you search for the title of a book on Google, you may see a “Read now” section on the search results page. It will list local libraries that own the book. If JMU owns a copy of it, a “James Madison University Libraries” option appears. Selecting “Borrow” will open a JMU Libraries search screen, displaying our page about the book, including its library location, whether the book is currently available for checkout, and more. 

This Google feature currently displays only physical books (not journals, DVDs, or online resources), but we expect it will soon include ebooks.