Unshelve With Help from the New York Times Again - Best Thrillers Edition

The New York Times has a list of the 50 Best Thriller Books up on their website. (Should be a gift link) The list was compiled with the help of authors, librarians, editors, critics and Bookstagrammers. The list is helpful for collection development but I would suggest that you look at the read-alikes for each book that are listed below the description. You can use the list and the read-alikes to set up a generic thriller display. They are very popular now and some time on a display will help any titles that are lacking checkouts to find their reader. 

Another way you can use them is to pick one of the titles and use it for a more focused display around setting, theme, or plot. There are books like Jar of Hearts with complicated, messy women or Tell No One with its story of a spouse who died (or did she?) You can search for similar books as the read-alikes in the description to come up with a full display. 

A final idea for a display based upon this list is to look at how the authors and other book people voted and use their choices to create a display. Readers love recommendations from celebrities. Note the celebrities on the sign if you would like and update it if you have to change out the books. This sort of display would be a great idea for a small display on a service desk or near a catalog computer. 

Using the NYT Book Review Book Club To Unshelve

 It seems as if every celebrity and news organization has their own book club. It is certainly possible to use them to create a book display - read alikes for the current pick and for past picks. If circulation has dropped off on the backlist of picks, you can display them as well. Today, I am going to focus on the New York Times Book Review Book Club that airs on their podcast with reader comments on an online post. 

For July, they read John of John by Douglas Stuart. The book club post is here and the podcast post is here. You can use the book club picks as a way to create a book club, even if you don't have the staff time. Patrons could gather to discuss the book and even listen to the podcast together. The most useful part of the podcast for me is the read-alikes that the participants suggest. For John of John, the books mentioned were: 

• “Shuggie Bain” and “Young Mungo,” by Douglas Stuart
• “What We Can Know,” by Ian McEwan
• “The Banshees of Inisherin,” directed by Martin McDonagh
• “The Keeper,” by Tana French
• “A Natural,” by Ross Raisin
• “The Spell,” by Alan Hollinghurst
• “Seascraper,” by Benjamin Wood
• “Whale Fall,” by Elizabeth O’Connor
• “Clear,” by Carys Davies
• “Wuthering Heights,” by Emily Brontë
• “Persuasion,” by Jane Austen
• “Washington Square,” by Henry James
• “The Town of Babylon,” by Alejandro Varela
• “Memorial,” by Bryan Washington

Look beyond these specific titles by looking at read-alikes for them that could have a connection to the title they are reading. This will give you enough titles for a full display, especially if you add past book club picks. 

The next title they are reading is London Falling by Patrick Radden Keefe. They have suggested resources on the announcement page. I've tried to include gift links here, by the way. 

Unshelve your collection with help from RA for All and the New York Times

 Don't be afraid to grab ideas for promoting your collection from anywhere and anyone. Recently, readers advisory expert Becky Spratford featured the New York Times's Summer Reading Bucket List on her blog. She does include a gift link in her post so go there first to read it. Becky explains why this recent shift in the Times's book coverage is so welcome. I recommend that you read her blog every day for news, commentary and great readers advisory ideas. 

This bucket list is a great summer book display or online post for your library. You can do a ten week series and feature one idea a week with recommendations. Another idea would be to feature staff suggestions for the various entries and to mix up the entries since they are not in a particular order. 

Adult summer reading programs are sometimes overshadowed by youth programs and this list from the Times is an easy way to up your collection promotion while giving adults something fun to do!

Using the NYT Best Books of the 21st Century List

The New York Times Book Review staff along with 503 novelists, nonfiction writers, poets, critics and others created a list of the 100 best books of the 21st century (so far). As you can imagine, this this is very heavily weighted towards "literary" fiction. The most simple way to use it is to simply take the list, see what is in your collection but could use some more attention to boost circulation and put those on a display. You can print out the information for the title that the NYT has online. Include information about where patrons can find the whole list as well as details about which of the titles are in your eBook collection. 

Another way would be to also look at the read alikes they provide and to promote those titles which are in your collection, physical or digital. You can also find your own read alikes for the books. Focus on the titles which could use some help with circulation. If a title is being checked out regularly, you can skip it and move on to those which could use the spotlight. 

Finally, don't forget the lists that were posted from authors' ballots. My experience is that patrons love to get recommendations from famous people. Review the lists and put them on a display with something that indicates which author made the recommendation. Include information about where patrons can find the information online. 

Obviously, NYT does have a paywall which limits the number of articles that one can read without a subscription which does complicate this but if your library provides NYT access to patrons, this is a great way to highlight that access. Promoting databases and eResources is challenging but this is a fun way to do it while promoting your collection.