Compiling a useful volume of previously published articles is never an easy task. Should the works be a representative sample of writings or should they simply be the best? In American Archival Studies: Readings in Theory and Practice, Randall C. Jimerson, associate professor of history and director of the Graduate Program in Archives and Records Management at Western Washington University, took the middle ground, making quite personal choices of articles representing some of the best writing by U.S. archivists, but aiming for comprehensive coverage. There has been no such compilation of articles directed at archivists in this country since the publication in 1984 of A Modern Archives Reader, edited by Maygene F. Daniels and Timothy Walch. The 1992 publication Canadian Archival Studies and the Rediscovery of Provenance, edited by Tom Nesmith, is a presentation of some of the best articles written by Canadian archivists and served as a model for Jimerson.