Welcome to Season Ten of Linking Our Libraries! We are so happy to have you join us again! This is the Central Minnesota Libraries Exchange, and our members are all types of libraries and their staff. I’m Mary, the director. It’s so good to have you here also. In this podcast, we talk about the skills library staff need to be successful and to help them to serve their communities.

This season we are talking about library programs – giving you some ideas about different ideas you can try in your own library. It is always good to share ideas across libraries, and we are all better! Each week we will look at a different theme of programs.

This week we are talking about different programs for your patrons to do some writing and some publishing work. Of course, we are known for books and reading material; so this kind of programing fits in perfectly with our mission. Encouraging people to not just be consumers of books but to also use their ideas and creativity to create books, to write, and to share their thoughts and experiences with the world is a great program for the library.

Poetry Open Mics and Slams

These are not quite the same things. And you can choose to pair both of them with sessions on writing poetry, to give patrons the time to focus and work on their expression with other people who have similar interests.

From the ALA and YALSA’s post on this:

“Simply put, poetry slam is the competitive art of performance poetry. It puts a dual emphasis on writing and performance, encouraging poets to focus on what they’re saying and how they’re saying it.

A poetry slam is an event in which poets perform their work and are judged by members of the audience. Typically, the host or another organizer select the judges, who are instructed to give numerical scores (on a zero to 10 or one to 10 scale) based on the poet’s content and performance.

What are the rules?

Though rules vary from slam to slam, the basic rules are:

• Each poem must be of the poet’s own construction;
• Each poet gets three minutes (plus a ten-second grace period) to read one poem, if the poet goes over, points will be deducted from the total score;
• The poet may not use props, costumes, or musical instruments;
• Of the scores the poet received from the five judges, the high and low scores are dropped, and the middle three are added together, giving the poet a total score of 0–30.

How does it differ from an open mic reading?

Slam is engineered for the audience, whereas a number of open-mic readings are engineered as a support network for poets. Slam is designed for the audience to react vocally and openly to all aspects of the show, including the poet’s performance, the judges’ scores, and the host’s banter.

An open mic is an open space in which all kinds of poetry can be heard. It provides a venue for new poets to read, gives poets a chance to try out new work and get feedback, and creates community. A slam is an inherently competitive event, in which performance is valued equally to literary skill. It is also a participatory event, with the audience serving as judges and sometimes giving instant feedback in the form of boos or cheers.”

I’ll add that these are typically marketed to young adults/teens – but it doesn’t have to be. Adults like programs too! And this could be fun for kids to try

“The key to any open-mic event is the host. The host sets the tone, defines the parameters of the event and, in the best of circumstances, creates a sense of community and respect among the readers. The open mic is an environment for people to read brand-new work to hear how it sounds, to get feedback, or to connect with other writers, sometimes for the first time. It’s also usually the port of entry for people who have never read their work aloud before. For most, it’s a nerve-wracking experience. A gracious host will create a comfortable, encouraging environment for readers. A good host will handle the unexpected with aplomb and keep the event on time and on track.

Individual introductions can be tremendously helpful. When your participants sign up, you might ask them if there is anything they’d like you to say about them when they are introduced, and if they’ve ever read on an open mic before. You’re not obligated to read a whole bio, but a sentence or two can personalize the reading. If someone is reading for the first time, you might encourage the audience to be extra-supportive. If you develop a set of “regulars” at your open mic, you might acknowledge that when you introduce them. At minimum, make sure you can pronounce the names of all your readers correctly. This also gives you an opportunity to get up after every reader and remind people of time limits, or just continue to set the tone for the event.”

You can google to find tons of libraries, of all sorts, doing open mics and slams. You can make it as friendly or as big-stakes as you, and your patrons, want it to be. Some libraries give away cash prizes. Probably a few have stray McDonald’s coupons for ice cream. You could print up a certificate of achievement, for all kinds of different prizes: shortest, best rhyme, made us laugh the most, etc.

Local Author Day

This is a natural fit for all kinds of libraries and archives! It’s always surprising to me, when you look around your community, how many people there are published authors. You don’t need NYT best sellers, or even conventionally published books – just getting any type of book published is an achievement. And people will want to hear about it! Most people feel like they could write a book, and it’s fun – maybe inspiring – to hear about people who managed to make that happen. Plus, local authors may be writing about some local places; and it’s always cool to read a book that took place just down the street from you, or at your school, or in your park.

Think about what you want the focus to be for the event. Maybe it’s a series, and you invite a single author in to talk about their books and the writing process. Maybe it’s a panel of people who give short presentations, and then do a Q&A with the audience. Maybe it’s an author fair, with lots of authors, each at their own table – talking and selling books.

Then, look around your community. Sure, if you live in NYC or LA you probably can’t walk to the coffee shop without tripping over some authors. Cool. But all of us have authors we can connect to in our region, at least. If you are struggling in this, reach out to your state library, or to a state arts organization and they can help you to find authors in your area. Put up a notice on your website that you are looking for local authors, and share it on any of your social media. Someone’s grandmother/aunt/nephew will mention they have an author to share.

And this is definitely an event that could be done on Zoom! (Remember that you still want your programs to be inclusive and available to everyone – and one good thing that came from the pandemic is our familiarity with online events.)   

There may be some costs involved in this, so prepare a budget. And if some authors are not able to attend on your budget – that’s okay! They have their own costs in time, travel, and work; so be respectful of that.

• The Princeton PL hosted a local author fair: “Princeton Public Library’s Local Author Day celebrates the creativity and skill of authors working in the region. This year, our 11th Local Author Day author fair returns to the library and gives readers a chance to connect with authors from the area.”
  
  Before the in-person event started, they hosted authors on Zoom, to talk about their work. This also gave them the opportunity to put the recordings of these events on the YouTube channel, so more patrons could enjoy them! Be sure you put that in the contract for the authors, so they know what to expect and that they consent.
• The Irondequoit Public Library recently hosted an author event: “More than 40 authors local to the Rochester area will meet with the public to share their work with the library community. Whether you’re looking for fiction, non-fiction, poetry, or something else, you’ll find it at Local Author Day!”
• The website We Are Teachers has a big list of Virtual Author Activities for Students. “Hearing authors talk about how they write their books is really inspirational for kids. It’s also terrific to hear them read their own books out loud, bringing their work to life. We’ve rounded up a whole selection of pre-recorded author visits, author read alouds, and other virtual author activities like drawing sessions for you and your students to enjoy!”

Self Publishing

You might have a regular writing group at your library, where authors can encourage each other and get inspired. Eventually, these authors may finish their work and want to take the next step. Of course, traditional publishing is one route people may want to take, and that’s fine. But it takes time, and the odds are not always with authors – especially people who choose to write on really local topics, or books focused on their family history, or other things they just want to enjoy sharing without the pressure of publishing.

Minnesota has a wonderful self-publishing program: Minnesota Libraries Publishing Project Pressbooks Public Self-Publishing Platform. 

“The Minnesota Library Publishing Project (MLPP) provides online publishing tools and training information to support independent authors and small publishers. We believe that libraries have a vibrant role to play in helping local communities come together to create and share books.

The MLPP is a pilot project coordinated by Minitex and Minnesota’s academic and public libraries. We are providing Pressbooks to Minnesota libraries to encourage conversation among libraries about and promote experimentation with open- and self- publishing. This is an experimental endeavor, and we welcome your feedback.

MLPP’s book design tool is Pressbooks: an easy-to-use online service that enables authors and publishers to create attractive content using a wide variety of templates and formatting options. Pressbooks allows ebooks to be kept private, shared with other authors or editors, or made publicly available. Templates are available that are specifically tailored for poetry, fiction, family history, dissertations, and many other content types.”

These books can then go into library catalogs, unlike many other self-published books.This is especially good for libraries who want to share local authors with their patrons!

Memoir Writing:

Everyone has some really interesting stories in their lives – things they have done, things that happened to them. And there are a lot of libraries that are offering programs in memoirs. This is another pretty easy program to offer: set aside a study room or other space once a week or every other week, maybe put out some snacks to encourage writing, and decide the focus: is it a time for people to concentrate on their writing, or is it a time for authors to talk with others about their work? Either is fine, and maybe it switches back and forth between the two. Talk with your patrons about what they want.

A few libraries that are doing it now:

• The Library of Congress is offering a Veterans History Project. “Participating in the Veterans History Project is easy to do. The entire VHP Field Kit is available as a fillable PDF document, as well as in audio and braille formats. The step-by-step process is presented on this website, but is also contained in the Field Kit. Follow each step to ensure your submission meets all requirements.” 
• “Author Frank P. Thomas will conduct the five-week course “Writing Your Personal Memoirs _ A Family Gift” starting Tuesday in the St. Petersburg Main Library, 3745 Ninth Ave. N. The course is open to all adults who wish to leave a record of their lives for their families. The sessions will be on Tuesdays from 10 a.m. to noon. Instruction will focus on practical, tested techniques developed by Thomas in his classes and seminars over 15 years. Collecting and organizing family facts, “Memory Sparkers” for jogging the memory, overcoming writer’s block and achieving variety in the life story will be covered.”
• The Belmont Public Library: “Award-winning author, instructor and editor Lynette Benton will teach you how put your life or family stories down on paper. This four-week course will cover: how to get started and keep writing; engaging your readers; resources for memoir and family history writing”
• The Powell River Public Library: “The Library has been committed to helping seniors write their memoirs through a highly anticipated seven-week Memoir Writing for Seniors course. Many of the participants continue to meet monthly through the Library’s Monthly Memoir Writing programs. These initiatives have also resulted in more than a dozen events in which seniors have read short memoirs to the community, and the Library annually publishes books and video anthologies of seniors’ memoirs”
• The Clermont County Public Library offered a program for November: Thanks for the Memories: November and Writing Memoirs: “November, the month dedicated to family and being thankful, is also National Memoir Writing Month. During the holidays, remember your experiences and think about channeling them into a memoir.” “Your memoir doesn’t need to be written with the intent of publication, however. Perhaps you can come to terms with a difficult part of your past or illuminate a common struggle. It is hard to say it without sounding trite, but write down what you remember happened and also what you were feeling when it happened. You think you have lived too boring a life? You can write a memoir about anything, trivial or large events, a specific time in your life or the first time you experienced something. No matter the kind of memoir you write, just tell your story in your own voice.”

Our libraries need books, and encouraging patrons to be part of the process of creating books might lead to some wonderful things to read. But maybe more importantly, it gives us the opportunity to offer some good programs, and to give our patrons the opportunity to work on their creativity in a very cool way!

Books Read

Now, let’s get to the part of every episode that is everyone’s favorite: sharing books! We will link to these books on our shownotes pages, and the link will take you to Amazon. You probably know this, but when you click one of our links and then buy anything at all from Amazon, they give us a small percentage of their profits. That support really helps us, and although it’s anonymous so we won’t know it was you – we appreciate you taking the time to help us!

• Never Cross a Vampire (Toby Peters #5) by Stuart M. Kaminsky
  Coffins fill the basement of a crumbling Los Angeles movie theater. Five vampires crowd around fading horror idol Bela Lugosi, peppering him with questions. A malfunctioning plastic fang causes one of the undead-wannabes to lisp. The effect is less than fearsome, but Lugosi is terrified, for one of these oddballs has been making threats on his life. He hires Toby Peters to provide security against his unbalanced fans. The detective is not concerned, but he should be. Even fake vampires can kill.

Meanwhile, the Warner brothers contact Peters regarding a murder. A body has surfaced in one of Hollywood’s darker corners, and police suspicion has fallen on one of the studio’s star screenwriters: William Faulkner. As he struggles to balance the murder investigation while protecting Lugosi, Peters finds a thread connecting the two cases. To get Faulkner off the hook, he’ll have to find out who wants to kill Hollywood’s original Dracula.

• Who Is Vera Kelly?, by Rosalie Knecht New York City, 1962. Vera Kelly is struggling to make rent and blend into the underground gay scene in Greenwich Village. She’s working night shifts at a radio station when her quick wits, sharp tongue, and technical skills get her noticed by a recruiter for the CIA.

Next thing she knows she’s in Argentina, tasked with wiretapping a congressman and infiltrating a group of student activists in Buenos Aires. As Vera becomes more and more enmeshed with the young radicals, the fragile local government begins to split at the seams.

When a betrayal leaves her stranded in the wake of a coup, Vera learns the Cold War makes for strange and unexpected bedfellows, and she’s forced to take extreme measures to save herself.

An exhilarating coming-of-age story, Who Is Vera Kelly? introduces an original, wry, and whip-smart female spy for the 21st century.

Conclusion

This was a quick overview of a few ideas that you might want to use in your library. Be sure to check out the show notes for links to everything discussed today. We are looking forward to chatting with you all season! We will have more ideas to help you keep your library running well, and strategies to help you serve your community.

And if you want to hear more book suggestions, be sure you are also subscribed to our other podcast: Reading With Libraries. Short episodes drop every Tuesday, and we look at different aspects of Minnesota. This season we look at a different historic site across the state each week, and then suggest six books that reference the site. Join us each week!