2. - So if I can't just use Google and Wikipedia, where can I find the right sort of information?

2.1. Books

An image of a slip of paper containing the quote by Ray Bradbury. "There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them."

Familiarising yourself with the Library Search tool from the Queen Mary Library website will be an excellent start. It searches a wide range of print and electronic content held or subscribed by the Library, as well as freely available open resources.

If you are looking for a specific title, you can enter some keywords from the title and the surname of the author.

The short tutorial below takes you through a simple search for the book Critical Thinking Skills by Stella Cottrell.


For print books, don't forget to get into the habit of noting down the shelfmarks of books that you would like to consult. BF441 COT is the shelfmark in the example used in the tutorial. 

For downloading from ebooks, remember there are different publishers with different requirements for downloading their content. Please check the library’s E-books section for more details on this as well as the different platforms.



Try this quiz to practice searching for books and ebooks using the Library Search 


Need help or advice about anything on this page?  Contact the LLSE Team