October! or while it's Spooky Month don't limit horror to just one month

 I do have suggestions for a variety of horror oriented book displays for this month. However, I want to emphasize that horror, like any other genre, should not be promoted for just one month a year. Readers will pick up horror all year; this is especially true now as the popularity of horror continues to increase. Authors like Stephen King and Grady Hendrix have fans who don't read much other horror but might enjoy read alikes for the works of either of these authors. 

The borderlines between genres continue to be blurred. There are horror novels blended with any genre you can think of including romance and comedy fiction. There are horror novels being published now that include elements familiar to mystery readers including police procedurals. As I have mentioned before, many novels have subject headings of suspense/thriller/mystery in addition to horror. Take this as an indication to include horror with your displays of crime books throughout the year. Many readers will be open to trying out a horror novel that includes themes or elements that they enjoy in the thrillers or suspense novels they read. 

Crime fiction varies as far as levels of terror and violence explicitly described on the page, just as horror does. Most library workers are familiar with asking mystery fans if they lean towards cozy mysteries or something with more sex and violence like a noir. We also ask readers how spicy a romance they are seeking. The same sort of questions can be asked of a reader to determine what sort of horror novel they would enjoy. 

Don't predetermine that a reader will not enjoy horror because they haven't regularly picked up any. Mix it in with your displays all year and allow your patrons to discover new authors and books. Any book is a beach read. My experience is that people love to take suspenseful novels to the beach with them (partially based upon what comes back with sand in the covers.)

 Included below are some lists to get you started:

20 Essential Crime and Horror Crossovers - Crime Reads

Scares of Every Kind: Two of the Best Genre-Blending Horror Novels - Book Riot

More Genre Blending Horror Books You Should Be Reading - Book Riot

Nefarious Bedfellows: These Twisted Books Blend Crime and Horror - The Line-Up

10 Books That Perfectly Blend Sci-Fi & Horror - Screen Rant

Book Display Idea - Beachy/Sea Side/Coast Horror and Suspense

One of the things I repeat over and over is that people love to sit at the beach and read about about the pain and suffering of others. The Horror Writers Association along with United for Libraries, Book Riot, and Booklist has created an entire program for libraries called Summer Scares. There are titles picked for adults, young adults, and middle grade readers. Click here for more information from Becky Spratford on her blog, RA for All Horror. 

In that vein, I would like to show how you can use horror tied with beachy themes for a fun summer book display that will draw patrons in. The two titles I'm using are forthcoming releases but you can use the idea with whatever your library's collection holds. Don't forget to add titles from suspense, thrillers, and non-fiction to create a display; never get hung up on genre. 

I've made summer displays like this with all kinds of horror, suspense, and thrillers. 

In September, Quirk will release What Kind of Mother by Clay McLeod Chapman. From the publisher's website: 

After striking out on her own as a teen mom, Madi Price is forced to return to her hometown of Brandywine, Virginia, with her seventeen-year-old daughter. With nothing to her name, she scrapes together a living as a palm reader at the local farmers market.

It’s at the market that she reconnects with her high school boyfriend Henry McCabe, now a reclusive local fisherman whose infant son, Skyler, went missing five years ago. Everyone in town is sure Skyler is dead, but when Madi reads Henry’s palm, she’s haunted by strange and disturbing visions that suggest otherwise. As she follows the thread of these visions, Madi discovers a terrifying monster waiting at the center of the labyrinth—and it’s coming for everyone she holds dear.

Combining supernatural horror with domestic suspense into a visceral exploration of parental grief, What Kind of Mother cements Clay McLeod Chapman’s reputation as a “star” (Vulture) and “the 21st century’s Richard Matheson” (Richard Chizmar, Chasing the Boogeyman.)

This book also contains elements of body horror and psychological horror which would be an alternative display. Another option would be to create one mixed with suspense and to focus on family relationships because parents and children are part of both novels. I will give suggestions for this in a future post. 

Daniel Kraus's Whalefall will be released in August. From the publisher's website: 

The Martian meets 127 Hours in this “powerfully humane” (Owen King, New York Times bestselling author) and scientifically accurate thriller about a scuba diver who’s been swallowed by an eighty-foot, sixty-ton sperm whale and has only one hour to escape before his oxygen runs out.

Jay Gardiner has given himself a fool’s errand—to find the remains of his deceased father in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Monastery Beach. He knows it’s a long shot, but Jay feels it’s the only way for him to lift the weight of guilt he has carried since his dad’s death by suicide the previous year.

The dive begins well enough, but the sudden appearance of a giant squid puts Jay in very real jeopardy, made infinitely worse by the arrival of a sperm whale looking to feed. Suddenly, Jay is caught in the squid’s tentacles and drawn into the whale’s mouth where he is pulled into the first of its four stomachs. He quickly realizes he has only one hour before his oxygen tanks run out—one hour to defeat his demons and escape the belly of a whale.

Suspenseful and cinematic, Whalefall is an “astoundingly great” (Gillian Flynn, New York Times bestselling author) thriller about a young man who has given up on life…only to find a reason to live in the most dangerous and unlikely of places.

I've included several options for signage here. They were all made on Canva using images I found by searching Creative Commons. I am not a graphic designer, clearly, but these fit the theme and would catch someone's eye. The focus should be on the books. 

To help get you started, below are some lists from a variety of websites. Use your library's collection and remember to look at non-fiction and DVDs as well. You can add QR codes that link to titles in your eBook collection. Don't get hung up on how exactly the books fit the message on your sign. Book displays are primarily marketing tools for your collection rather than something like an art project for school.  

The Devil and the Deep: Horror Stories of the Deep Edited by Ellen Datlow 

Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant 
16 Aquatic Horror Books to Dive Into From the Line Up 
16 Horror Books Perfect for Summer Scares from Spooky Little Halloween
Eight Horror Novels That Will Make You Glad Summer is Over from Book Riot
Best Summer Horror Books from Goodreads
Aquatic Horror Books from Goodreads
8 Books That Will Make You Scared to Go Into the Water from Barnes and Noble

Theme to Explore - Blending Genre in Book Displays

 Setting aside any libraryland debates about genre spine labels, genre filing on the shelf versus interfiling and so forth, I thought I would talk about how to use books which cross several genres or are genre blended as a theme for an online list or book display. Many books have crossover appeal. You can use this to gently suggest to your readers that there are books outside their usual lanes that they will enjoy and perhaps create another entire world of books for that patron to explore. 

The easiest option is to do a "If you liked this... Try this" book display/list. You can go outside of the usual similar titles in the same genre and instead match up a memoir or biography with a fiction title. Pick someone who lived in the same era or a biography with a fictional depiction of that person. A recent idea from the news and popular culture would be a novel about the British royal family with a biography of a British royal. Pair a book like Children of Chicago by Cynthia Pelayo with non-fiction books about Chicago, Chicago travel books, and DVDs about Chicago. 

The Chicago Public Library has a convenient list of fiction set in Chicago. 

This is a simple version of blending genres in a book display - pick a setting or character and grab materials from your location, regardless of genre of type. 

Another option using Children of Chicago?  It's also a police procedural so look for romantic suspense, mysteries, thrillers, historical fiction which are also police procedurals in part. There are plenty of titles in other genres which focus on a single police detective. Try adding them to a display. The fact that some are romantic suspense while others are historical mysteries shouldn't matter. Let your patrons explore and trust their curiosity. 

The truth is that while it was nominated for a Bram Stoker Award for best novel, Children of Chicago is not only a horror novel. As was mentioned before it's a police procedural, urban fantasy, modern fairy tale, and serial killer thriller. There are plenty of books in your collection which share these descriptions. Gather them up and put them on a display. 

You can use this sort of display to introduce patrons to the idea of genre blending in novels. Use a picture of a blender on a sign and put up materials from your collection that cross genres. Romance fans are already familiar with this idea due to the proliferation of subgenres in romance  - romantic suspense, historical romance, inspirational romance and so forth. There are also mysteries which are also historical fiction, horror which is also comedic, and science fiction which has elements from thrillers blended in. 

One theme you can use is literary fiction/genre fiction. There are plenty of titles which combine aspects of literary fiction including complex language and a character driven plot. Literary fiction giants like Colson Whitehead (Zone One) have written horror while horror authors like Stephen Graham Jones and Andy Davidson would definitely appeal to literary fiction lovers.
 
While examples of literary genre fiction in all genres can be found, I would caution you that romance readers do expect a central love story and a happy (at least for now) ending. Books that have romantic elements could be called love stories on a display or list. 

Below I have some lists and articles that should help you in your exploration of genre blending and blended genres. Use them as a start to introduce your patrons to books outside their usual reads!

More resources: 

Goodreads has a list of genre blending fiction. 
Books shelfed on Goodreads as Literary Romance.
More from Goodreads with Best Literary Mysteries
Bookriot has several lists: genre-blending literary fiction, genre-blending historical fiction,      redefining romance in literary fiction, best literary mystery
ALA Publishing published The Readers' Advisory Guide to Genre Blends. 
This article from Writer's Digest talks about cross pollination which would be a cute theme for a genre blending display. 
Tor.com has Five Genre-Blending Young Adult Books. 
Five Books in Which Unexpected Romance Sneaks Up On You from The Atlantic
The Millions has The Case for Genre Fiction: A Guide to Literary Science Fiction and Fantasy