Horror Writers Association + Partners Announce Summer Scares 2024 Spokesperson, Timeline, and More!

The Horror Writers Association (HWA), in partnership with United for Libraries, Book Riot, Booklist, and NoveList®, a division of EBSCO Information Services (EBSCO), is proud to announce the fifth annual Summer Scares Reading Program. Summer Scares is a studying program that gives libraries and faculties with an annual checklist of beneficial horror titles for grownup, younger grownup (teen), and center grade readers. It introduces readers and librarians to new authors and helps begin conversations extending past the books from every checklist and promote studying for years to come back.

Summer Scares is proud to announce the 2024 spokesperson, writer Clay McLeod Chapman:

“To this day, I still have vivid memories of my grandmother escorting six-year-old me through our local library — Go, Bon Air! — and striking a deal: Pick two books, any two books, one for her to read to me and one for me to read to myself. When we both finished our individual reads, we could always come back and pick another pair. I can still list off practically every book I selected — beginning with “Monsters of North America” by William A. Wise — returning to the library to replenish our limitless reservoir of studying each week of my childhood. Now I really feel as if I’m returning to the library another time, due to Summer Scares, the place the deal this time is to select these books that proceed to make an influence on me and share them with as many readers as humanly potential.”

Chapman is joined by a committee of six library staff who, collectively, will choose three beneficial fiction titles in every studying stage, totaling 9 Summer Scares choices. The purpose of this system is to encourage a nationwide dialog concerning the horror style, throughout all age ranges, at libraries world wide, and in the end appeal to extra adults, teenagers, and kids fascinated about studying. Official Summer Scares designated authors may even make themselves out there at public and faculty libraries.

The committee’s closing choices might be introduced on February 14, 2024, Library Lover’s Day. Chapman, together with a few of the chosen authors, will kick off Summer Scares on the eighth Annual HWA Librarians’ Day, Friday, May thirty first, throughout StokerCon® 2024 on the San Diego Mission Bay Marriott.

Additional content material, together with podcast appearances, free webinar with Booklist, and lists of prompt titles for additional studying, might be made out there by the committee and its companions between the announcement of the Summer Scares 2024 titles and the kickoff occasion.

Of particular word is the annual Summer Scares Programming Guide, courtesy of HWA Library Committee Co-Chair Konrad Stump and the Springfield-Greene County Library, which gives artistic concepts to interact horror readers. Centered across the official Summer Scares titles, the information affords ideas and examples for readers’ advisory, ebook dialogue guides, and pattern packages, enabling librarians, even those that don’t learn or particularly benefit from the horror style themselves, to attach their communities with Summer Scares.

To see previous yr’s Summer Scares titles, spokespeople, and programming guides, please go to this system archive.

This yr, Summer Scares is as soon as once more excited to associate with iRead and all ages Summer Reading Program developed by librarians for libraries. iRead is utilized by libraries throughout the United States and world wide via their partnership with the US Department of Defense, bringing Summer Scares to our navy households deployed everywhere in the world.

2024 additionally brings NoveList as an official associate after a number of years of offering program help.

“The goal of connecting readers with their next favorite book shapes everything we do at NoveList. We know reading can transform and delight, including being delightfully frightened,” mentioned Danielle Borasky, Vice President of NoveList. “The dedication of the Summer Scares program to connecting readers of all ages with horror aligns with our passion for matching every reader with their next book,” she added. “Our team includes devoted genre readers, including die-hard horror fans, so we understand the importance of genre fiction. We’re thrilled to support a program that highlights how enriching horror can be for readers.”

“I’ve been unofficially involved in parts of the Summer Scares program for the last couple of years and have worked to spotlight the selections in the NoveList databases. While collaborating with Summer Scares, I’ve also become an HWA member and a more active member of the horror community, which has been a wonderful gift,” mentioned Yaika Sabat, MLS, Manager of Reader’s Services for NoveList. “I am fortunate to channel my lifelong love of horror into helping readers discover the genre in my work, both in NoveList and beyond,” she added. “As someone who began reading horror as a child and considers every season the right time to read horror, I’m thrilled to join the Summer Scares selection committee.”

Keep your eyes peeled for extra updates coming quickly from Booklist, Book Riot, NoveList and United for Libraries, in addition to on the HWA’s web site: www.horror.org and RA for All Horror: https://raforallhorror.blogspot.com/p/summer-scares.html.

Questions? Reach out to HWA Library Committee Chairs Becky Spratford and Konrad Stump by way of e mail: libraries@horror.org.

Summer Scares Committee Members:

Clay McLeod Chapman writes books, comedian books, kids’s books, in addition to for movie and tv. His most up-to-date novels embody What Kind of Mother and Ghost Eaters. You can discover him at www.claymcleodchapman.com.

Becky Spratford is a library guide and the writer of The Readers’ Advisory Guide to Horror, third version which was launched in September of 2021. She evaluations horror for Booklist Magazine, is the horror columnist for Library Journal and runs the Readers’ Advisory Horror weblog, RA for All: Horror. Becky can also be a member of United for Libraries and is at present serving as Secretary for the Horror Writers’ Association.

Konrad Stump is a Local History Associate for the Springfield-Greene County (MO) Library, the place he co-coordinates Springfield-Greene’s standard “Oh, the Horror!” collection, which attracts lots of of patrons throughout October. He created the Donuts & Death horror ebook dialogue group, featured in “Book Club Reboot: 71 Creative Twists” (ALA), and co-created the Summer Scares Programming Guide. Library staff who’re fascinated about cultivating horror programming can contact him at konrads@thelibrary.org free of charge help.

Carolyn Ciesla is a tutorial library director within the Chicago suburbs. She has labored as a teen librarian and reference librarian, and evaluations horror titles for Booklist Magazine. She’s at present having fun with offering all of the scary books to her teen daughter, and revisiting a number of alongside the way in which. You can discover her everywhere in the web as @papersquared.

Kelly Jensen is an editor at Book Riot, the most important unbiased ebook web site in North America. She covers all issues younger grownup literature and has written about censorship for practically ten years. She is the writer of three critically-acclaimed and award-winning anthologies for younger adults on the subjects of feminism, psychological well being, and the physique. She was named an individual of the yr in 2022 by Publishers Weekly and a Chicagoan of the yr in 2022 by the Chicago Tribune for her anti-censorship work. She has additionally earned commendation from the American Association of School Librarians for her censorship protection. Prior to her work at Book Riot, she was a public librarian for youngsters, teenagers, and adults in a number of libraries in Northern Illinois and Southern Wisconsin. She is at present enrolled in a medical psychological well being counseling grasp’s program to bolster her work with psychological well being.

Julia Smith joined the Books for Youth workforce at Booklist in 2015, the place she is now a senior editor. Her love of middle-grade literature and all issues unsettling and unusual attracts her to creepy kids’s tales. You can observe her at @JuliaKate32 on Twitter.

Yaika Sabat (MLS) comes from a background in public libraries of assorted sizes. She now works at NoveList because the Manager of Reader Services, the place she trains library employees nationwide on readers’ advisory, creates genre-focused content material, and works on reader-focused merchandise and companies. As a Horror Writers Association’s Library Advisory Council member, she works to assist librarians perceive and embrace the horror style. Her different passions embody writing, graphic novels, movie (the scarier, the higher), and folklore.