Why Genrefy?

Has a kid ever asked you, “Where are the sports books?”

When I first took over my school library, I had never heard the term “genrefied school library,” and questions like that flummoxed me.

For one thing, I’d only just stepped into this role, and it still felt like someone else’s library. I had yet to place my first book order, and I definitely didn’t have a strong handle on the nuances of my fiction collection, which was neatly and traditionally alphabetized by authors’ last names. This organization system made it very easy to find a book by a specific author, but much harder to quickly access all the sports stories for easy browsing. 

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I would stammer a lame reply like, “Uh, they’re kind of…sprinkled all over,” explain that the collection was organized alphabetically by the authors’ last names, and watch the kid’s eyes glaze over. 

Not the reaction I was going for.

It didn’t take me long to realize a few things about my new population of teenage patrons.

Kids don’t care about the “right” way to organize books.

Dewey Decimal system? *shrugs* 

Alphabetical order? *meh* 

Traditional library strategies? *frowns*

They just care about finding ones they’re interested in. 

Kids have opinions.

Most of them, now that they were in high school, had a pretty good idea about the types of books they liked–and definitely about which ones they didn’t.

Some of them had only a single genre they would even consider reading (sports and romance come to mind). Others were willing to entertain multiple possible genres–say, sci-fi or dystopian–but wanted absolutely nothing to do with books featuring athletes or love stories. 

The hard-core readers were going to find books no matter what I did. 

I could place the books with their spines facing in, arrange them by color, or stack them arbitrarily; the most motivated readers would find their books in spite of me.

Some of them were happy to read any book at all. Some of them, like homing pigeons, had an uncanny knack for pulling “their” books off the shelves. And some of them seemed to have the entire collection memorized, often returning to check out the same books over and over. 

These were not the people who needed a genrefied school library.

Genrefication helps picky and/ or reluctant readers.

Now, all my sports fiction is shelved together. Same with romance, dystopian, fantasy, and suspense… so it’s easy to steer the murder mystery aficionados, the love story fans, and, yes, the sports kids to the area where they can easily browse for their chosen topics. And once they become familiar with it, they return to those same areas over and over. 

The hard-core readers still have the entire library memorized. But now, a lot of the niche readers  have their own genre sections memorized, too! I love seeing more kids confidently navigating the library–and finding the niche where they feel they belong.

Reading Round-Up: Three YA Mystery/Thrillers With Dual Timelines

 Disclaimer: I participate in bookshop.org’s affiliate program and may earn a small commission if you use any of the links in this article for a purchase. Please rest assured I will only recommend books I really love and think you will, too–plus, purchases from bookshop.org support local, independent bookstores, and that’s a cause we should all get behind.

Who doesn’t love a thrilling mystery? And it’s even better when an author skillfully weaves together dual timelines to ratchet up the suspense; after all, the past usually looms large in most literary crimes.

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These stories are all whodunits, but, equally important, they are WHYdunits in which the events of the past set in motion the situations the protagonists must wrestle with in the present. 

The Truly Devious series by Maureen Johnson

Maureen Johnson is an actual wizard. 

This series, starring the haphazard, awkward, indefatigable teen sleuth Stevie Bell, is a delight… even as it probes some really dark places. In the first book, Stevie is just beginning her academic career at Ellingham Academy, where she has been accepted based on her desire to solve a decades-old cold case involving the school’s founder. The investigation evolves in books two and three. Throughout the trilogy, Johnson flips back and forth seamlessly between modern-day Stevie and the 1930s cast of characters, building suspense and gradually revealing secrets until everything gets wrapped up in a nice bow by the end of book 3–sort of.

Book 4 is Box in the Woods, a stand-alone that stars most of the same supporting cast from the original trilogy, Stevie gathers the gang to investigate a trio of unsolved murders at a summer camp.

In the fifth installment, Nine Liars, Johnson plays with the “deserted English manor” trope, presenting Stevie with a seemingly impossible double murder from the 1970s that still has ripple effects in modern London. 

The Girls I’ve Been by Tess Sharpe

Wow. Just…wow.

In the opening scene of this book, Nora and her two friends are taken hostage by bank robbers. Those criminals have no idea who they’re dealing with. 

Raised by a con artist mom, Nora has an… unusual set of skills for a teenage girl. Sharpe reveals Nora’s history in tight flashback scenes interspersed with her modern-day struggle to survive the bank robbery, culminating in a terrifying climax. Netflix is turning it into a film starring Millie Bobbie Brown.

Deposing Nathan by Zack Smedley

Nate spent sixteen years behaving himself. Then, he met Cam, and everything changed. 

In the aftermath of a fight that turned violent, landing Cam in jail and leaving Nate with a stab wound, Nate must testify about what happened… and risk sending his best friend to jail. Smedley handled the dual timelines masterfully, using flashbacks to gradually fill in the gaps as the legal proceedings spin inexorably to a stressful climax.

Distressing and compelling–it reminded me a little of The Perks of Being a Wallflower–this is realistic fiction that reads like a thrilling courtroom drama. By the end, I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. 

Whether you like playing armchair detective from the comfort of your own couch or just strapping in and letting the author take you on a heart-stopping ride, these three YA options are for you. And they prove that the past is never really past…at least when it comes to these crimes.