Monday, December 21, 2009

Library Displays by Morgan Mandel


A while back, when I first joined Chicago-North RWA, Pat White mentioned her display at Arlington Heights Memorial Library. I went to check it out and was quite impressed. Pat since moved on to Seattle, but her idea stuck with me.

A few years ago, I set up a display for myself and another for the chapter at the library. Now that Killer Career is out, I thought it would be a good idea to put up another, so I reserved a spot in the lineup. The result was last Sunday I spent over 2 hours setting up my display. I didn't remember having to reach in so far to tack up the clippings and excerpts. Also, I had to borrow a step stool to get to the top shelf.



I'm not a professional at such things, so it took longer than someone who does it often. Anyway, I was happy with the way it turned out. I included mementos from each of my books Above, there I am with the entire display, then I've got the Killer Career corner to your left, Girl of My Dreams to your right and across from here the left is Two Wrongs. A few people even stopped by and commented on a few of the items while I was in the process, so having a display does attract attention. One liked the picture of the Big Tree from the Walnut Room, part of my inspiration for a scene in Two Wrongs. It brought back childhood memories for him of visiting Marshall Field's for the Holidays.


Also, on the bottom shelf, it's hard to see from this picture, but if you look closely on the bottom toward the right, I managed to include a few pictures of Rascal to introduce her, since I'm doing a book about her next.

Anyway, hopefully readers will remember me from the display and be curious enough to read my books. The display will be up through January.

What about you? Have you ever put up a display at your library? Do you think you might try, if you haven't before? If I can do it, you can.

Happy Holidays!
Morgan Mandel
http://morganmandel.blogspot.com/

6 comments:

L. Diane Wolfe said...

I've never done a display, thought I know many who have - and yours looks really nice, Morgan!

Anna Kathryn Lanier said...

My RWA chapter did a display and I was included. I've put up displays at my daughter's school, but that was for Girl Scouts. And just so you don't think you actually took too long, putting up a display always takes a while and a lot longer than taking it down!

PS for those who are still thinking if they should do one...librarians would most likely love for you to take a month, then they don't have to come up with an idea and display themselves.

Marilyn Meredith a.k.a. F. M. Meredith said...

When I was going to give a talk at our local library, the librarian put up a display of all my books and my photo. Not sure how much good it did because only six people came to the talk not county my hubby.

Marilyn

Jean Henry Mead said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jean Henry Mead said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

That's quite a display. I need to do something like this for events bigger than brick and mortar books signings.

Merry Christmas to you and yours.

Stephen Tremp