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Horror @ Your Library

The American Library Association has a marketing initiative called “@ your library”. Their conference is rolling around (it’s in New Orleans this year) and ALTAFF (Association of Library Trustees, Advocates, Friends and Foundations) is holding a session called “Mystery and Horror @ Your Library”. When I saw that I thought “How cool! My professional association is actually shining a light on horror fiction and highlighting horror authors”!

Library Journal’s description of the event gives you an idea of how a lot of the profession thinks of the genre.

Mystery and Horror @ Your Library. Mystery, of course. But horror? Horrors! Best-selling authors in both genres will make your spines tingle.

So, very cool of ALTAFF to buck the trend, right? Except that not a single one of the authors writes horror. Cammie McGovern is on the panel. She’s written a fantastic literary mystery called Eye Contact. Erica Spindler writes romantic suspense. C.S. Harris writes the Sebastian St. Cyr books- historical mysteries. Bill Loehfelm is a crime novelist. S.J. Watson is the only one who might qualify, as a writer of psychological thrillers, but he appears to be a first time author whose first book, Before I Go To Sleep, came out on June 14 of this year.

It sounds like a great book, and I am sure someone on our staff would love to review it (hint, hint), but I don’t think he’s necessarily the best candidate to represent an entire genre. There are so many horror writers out there who would be articulate and passionate, and happy to promote the genre and talk about their books and their “writing life”. How about Brian Keene, Scott Nicholson, Alexandra Sokoloff, Lisa Morton, or, for a librarian’s perspective, Becky Siegel Spratford?

I think this is why we have such a problem with recognition of the genre. Librarians can’t even identify what belongs in it, or who writes it (except for Stephen King). This week I sent out a list of potential review titles- probably 20 books were on the list, at least. One reviewer wrote me back to tell me that she had searched her library system to find if there were any copies of the books available there. Her library system has 58 libraries. Yep, that’s right. How many of the books was she able to find? One. One horror novel off a list of 20, in a library system with 58 libraries.

I appreciate that ALTAFF is trying to promote the genre, even if they can’t exactly identify what it is or who writes it. But what’s the reality? For all the librarians out there, let me ask… where’s the horror @ your library?

Posted on June 21, 2011 by , 2 comments

Moms vs. Zombies

Ah, motherhood. It’s a crazy time. Under all the chaos, and even when you’re trying desperately to escape them, there’s a part of you that loves those kids no matter what, and wants to protect your children from anything that might possibly ever harm them.

So what happens at the end of the world? What does a mom do in the event of a zombie apocalypse? Do they have plans in place, just in case? I asked a whole bunch of them.

One practical mom said her plan is to head to Sam’s Club, and pick up a survivalist friend along the way. I guess it would be awhile before they ran out of supplies!

After one smart mom suggested heading to Palm Springs, several more started to plan to caravan there. In their minivans, maybe? Apparently Palm Springs only has two exits/entrances, is easily defensible, and wind powered. Only problem is, that since almost all of us live in the Midwest, those gas guzzlers would probably run out of fuel before we got there.

A surprising number(at least, surprising to me since I don’t think I’ve seen a movie in three years) had seen Zombieland and said they’d prepare with cardio. Since it’s the Midwest, it’s probably not that much of a surprise that many of them chimed in “Double Tap”!

One realistic mom said “I just stubbed my toe getting out of the shower”. She was pretty resigned to being zombie food! Another said “I am very, very smart”- meaning she’d quickly become brain food”!

One movie-watching mom said “As slow as they are in the movies, I think we could probably outrun them”! I must say, it’s not the first time I’ve heard that one!

A couple of them tracked down the zombie vaccine. Children must be immunized, you know! And several uninitiated ones headed off to track down the Zombie Survival Guide and Zombieland. And ammo. Knowledge is power, you know, and you’ve got to protect the children!

A few of them noted that their four year olds have already educated them about zombies. Add my obsessed five year old to that group. Although he seems to be moving on to cryptids, the zombies keep shuffling in.

Are moms going to survive the zombie apocalypse with their children intact? Some will… and maybe now a few more than before. Unless, as one mom who reads a lot noted, they’re Brian Keene’s zombies. In which case, when the birds get infected, we’re all doomed.

My thanks to the moms from IMLM who contributed their musings. I probably won’t survive the zombie apocalypse, but I sure hope they do!

Posted on April 3, 2011 by , 2 comments

The Walking Dead and Your Zombie Collection

In case you might have missed it, zombies have been the monster du jour for the past several years. They have been shambling their way through horror movies, video games, books, and graphic novels. They have even can be found in other genres such as paranormal romance (who knew!). The TV station American Movie Classics (AMC) has brought the graphic novel The Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman to the little screen. With high production values, the show has become popular. What does this mean for libraries? We here at Monster Librarian feel that the different media that horror that the genre is found in provides an excellent opportunity to promote leisure reading by tying books to other media, like tv shows, movies, and video games, being promoted in mass media. There have been a plethora of zombie titles that have come out in the past few years, and this is a great time to put some on display!

Some notable titles we suggest for library collections:

Zombies: Encounters with the Hungry Dead edited by John Skipp

Dying to Live and Dying to Live: Life Sentence by Kim Paffenroth

Dead Sea by Brian Keene

Day by Day Armageddon by J.L. Bourne

World War Z; An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brook

Bits of the Dead by Keith Gouveia

History is Dead by Kim Paffenroth

The World is Dead edited by Kim Paffernoth

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance – Now With Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem! by Seth Grahame-Smith and Jane Austen

The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks

Happy reading!

Posted on December 13, 2010 by , Reply
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