Bibliotheek Haarlem Centrum

A nice little humble environment where you can typically check out books, music and films. They have a small little café to relax and sip a cup of hot tea. I was surprised that you can use the wifi without having to subscribe for a library card. As you know that is not the case at the Central Library in Amsterdam. Customer service was great. The librarians are very attentive. My observation is that this library is nice, but not so impressive.

Ah, the Haarlem library. Being an American, I still can’t get used to the fact that you have to pay to be a member of the library, but I guess I can understand it. Anyway, it is not expensive, something like € 30 per year or something like that.
The place is not too bad. There is a lot of bike parking and there is a nice variety of things to check out. They have a few special sections too like a health oriented area, a learning Dutch area (great resource by the way for learning Dutch), a music playing areas (for testing out sheet music, and a computer area. In addition to the computers, they also offer free WiFi.
Not all items are «free» (after paying your yearly membership) to checkout. Some items like DVD, CDs, and very recent books (they call them «sprinters») require a minimal fee.
Mostly everything is self service from checking out items, returning items, and paying fines. There are of course friendly librarians on hand if you need them.
They also have a café right inside as well. I haven’t checked it out yet but plan to do so soon.
If they don’t have something you want, you can order it from another library, you can even do this from home when you login to the website and search for items in the catalog. When the item arrives to be picked up, you get an email. They usually have (either at the library or able to be ordered from another library) pretty much anything that I am looking for.
For those of you that don’t know Dutch, there is an English section and also some sections with different language books as well, I think French is one of them but I’m not sure.
In summary, I good resource here in Haarlem for books and more.