Middle school librarian Susan Grigsby believes strongly in teaching independence in book selection, and has been able to back up her belief by putting programs in place that provide evidence to show her administrators how fostering independence works. She spends time creating personal bibliographies for her students based on an interest survey. She teaches her students how to create resource lists in the library's online catalog so they have a handy list of likely titles when they are ready to read something new. She works with her language arts teachers to set aside time for monthly book talks to share stories that might fly under students' radar or exist outside their comfort zones. When all of this is combined with a commitment to know her students, know the literature, and keep current on titles and authors for middle school, she is able to provide a program that not only encourages independent self-selection but helps middle readers broaden their scope in preparation for high school. In this article, she describes the steps she took to teach and support student independence in book selection and to teach her school community the importance of independent self-selection.