<b>Eric J. Forte, Cassandra J. Hartnett, and Andrea L. Sevetson.</b> <i>Fundamentals of Government Information: Mining, Finding, Evaluating, and Using Government Resources</i>. New York: Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc., 2011. 396p. $80 (ISBN 9781555707378). LC 2011-009275.

Eric J. Forte, Cassandra J. Hartnett, and Andrea L. Sevetson. Fundamentals of Government Information: Mining, Finding, Evaluating, and Using Government Resources. New York: Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc., 2011. 396p. $80 (ISBN 9781555707378). LC 2011-009275. Today, the concept of government information brings to mind more than just law and politics. Governmental entities, for example, are responsible for developing and setting standards on basic needs like the air we breathe and water we drink. In this book, the authors state that their “... ardent belief is that greater knowledge of government resources can strengthen the skills of any librarian.” The authors also note that this book is “...the first government information text to be conceived, written, and published in the twenty-first century.” As such, the importance and uniqueness of this resource makes it an essential part of any library’s reference collection. Readers will find that this is an expertly compiled guide on how to find and use various resources to search for government information. This book is comprehensive and wellorganized, consisting of 15 chapters divided into two parts. Part 1 includes chapters 1 to 6 and covers such topics as the history of government information, reference interview and research strategies, electronic and print tools, legislative publications, guides and indexes, legal resources, and presidential documents. Part 2 includes chapters 7 to 15 and covers government publications, statistical information and resources, health and educational information, scientific and technical information, environment and energy information, government finance, consumer and census information, and historical and archival information. Chapter 9, which discusses health information, is particularly interesting and provides a brief history and background of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health, and the National Library of Medicine. It mentions PubMed, MEDLINE and MeSH, as well as different types of health information and statistics including vital statistics, survey data, and research and clinical trial data. There is also a section on federal resources and organizations, agencies, and a mention of print resources such as the MMWR, National Center for Health Statistics of the CDC, and the Healthy People series. Each chapter has an introduction and conclusion, a set of exercises, a list of sources mentioned in the chapter, and a reference section complete with citations and Web links. There is also a list of figures provided and an index. Over 50 challenging exercises are included, and they require one to have the knowledge to determine which databases to use and how to search them regarding various possible scenarios. One small suggestion would have been for the authors to include examples of a few possible answers to the exercises, so readers can assess whether they responded correctly. This book would be useful to academic and public librarians who, for example, get reference questions about health information and statistical data. It would also be useful to library school students to develop their knowledge and skills in the subject of government information.—Judy P. Bolstad, University of California, Berkeley.