Speed Dating With Books

The romance fiction genre is a billion-dollar industry full of powerhouse female writers and readers. Despite this, the romance genre often gets a bad rap as ‘trashy’ or not worthy of literary merit. Women, who write them, are not taken seriously, and women, who read them, are often conscious of purchasing or checking them out, let alone being seen reading them. I would like to change this stigma against a genre that is just as valid as any other.

For the month of February, I propose that APLS hosts an ongoing program titled ‘Speed Dating with Books’. Popular, new, and frequently checked out romance books will be selected from the APLS collection and displayed strategically across a set of tables that are visible upon entering the library. In front of each book, forms will be available that allow the reader and patron to write down their first impressions with ‘flirting’ with the book. They can rate their first impressions, thoughts on the author blurb, what they thought after reading the first few pages, etc. With this program, it is the hope that the romance genre will be less stigmatized and that APLS patrons, who are unfamiliar with romance books, will be introduced to the genre.

For those that are not readers, the same can be done with ‘chick flick’ films, romcoms, and romance movies in the APLS collection that are less stigmatized, but still considered to contain less merit. APLS staff simply have to change wording slightly on advertising to reflect movies rather than books. This will allow the program to reach a wider audience and perhaps have cross over with readers and movie watchers. It is also a possibility to pair movies with books on the display, so that APLS patrons have suggestions as to movies they might enjoy if they are intrigued by or liked a particular romance novel.  

Both of these versions of the program are more passive, and allow the patrons to approach the displays on their own, at their own comfort level. However, the displays placement will ensure that patrons do see it upon entering the library.