Friday, December 09, 2011

Five Things on a Friday - Holiday Displays

I love book displays! I love making them, I love browsing them, love them in general. However this time of year, they can get fairly repetitive. There are a ton of books (for kids and adults) specifically geared to the holidays (yes I'm looking at our display) and those should be put on display. After all those mystery writers wrote a special holiday version of their normal cat/dog/antique store owner/antique store owner with a pet cat solves a mystery series and it deserves to be read* (because your library spent money on it and you would like return on investment). Beyond that obvious display, here are five other options. Some obvious, some less so.

FYI - I'm assuming you're already doing your best to put up world holiday traditions, especially those that are celebrated by different ethnic groups within your area of service. These are more Western/Judeo-Christian related ideas, but you should stick up all holidays as you can (we have like 3 books on Diwali but I'm working on it).

  1. Entertaining
    Here is where you put those cooking books (and yes this time of year a display on just cookbooks wouldn't be amiss, even a display on just cookie cookbooks), but you can also put all those decorate/make gifts/all sorts of stuff for the holiday books in the 745s. (Better Homes and Gardens puts one out almost every year as does Martha Stewart, Debbie Mumm, Mary Engelbreit and others of that ilk). But also put up books on general entertaining tips, cocktail recipes, even fashion so people can look fantastic at those holiday parties. Then checkout a cocktail recipe and cookie cookbook for yourself. You need it.

  2. Classics
    There is something about this time of year that puts people in the mood for a classic. Of course definitions of classic may vary. For many the holidays are about nostalgia and they can convince themselves that this is the year they will finally read a Charles Dickens novel. I'm not saying they're actually going to read Great Expectations, but they'll probably check it out, leave on the bedside table for 2.5 weeks, realize they're way too busy this time of year and just rewatch The Muppets' A Christmas Carol instead. Or you can save this for after the new year and try "Start the New Year with an Old Favorite" as a display.

  3. Zombies and True-Crime
    Even Carol Christmas gets a little overwhelmed with all the music, store displays, holiday specials, preparations, and sugar cookie highs until all she really wants is to murder that chick at Wal-Mart who stole the last 3-pack of double-sided tape. So this year, consider an anti-Christmas display. You'll appeal to both the Scrooges and the burntout Pollyannas.

  4. Colors
    Grab all the books you can with a red cover (or mostly red), or green, or blue. It's fun. Don't make a sign, just line them on the shelf and watch the people react. Pure magic. Super easy. And pretty!

  5. "Cold" books
    Here are cool books to read by a warm fire! Anything with the word "cold", "chilly", "winter", "snow", etc in the title, bonus points if it has snow on the cover. A few sample titles: Cold Mountain, Snow Falling on Cedars, The Snow Angel, A Breath of Snow and Ashes, Chill Factor, and so forth.

Any other slightly off the wall suggestions for December/Holiday book displays?

*but not read by me because I still don't like mysteries

1 comment:

Charmaine Ng said...

I loooove the idea of lining up red books! You could even make a horizontal Christmas tree, maybe...