Word on the street is that school librarians across this country, serving every grade, are noticing a sharp uptick in students checking out horror. Even at libraries where there are no horror sections, the kids are finding it.
Enter Rain Smith to this conversation:
Rain Smith is an award-winning School Library Media Specialist at Whiteland Community High School (IN) in her 27th year in education and 10th in the school library. She co-teaches in every department of the high school supporting students and staff with a focus on information literacy and incorporating high quality reading, research, and writing into the daily work and lives of all. She is an active and involved member of many library and education related organizations including being the 2026 Association of Indiana School Library Educators (AISLE) Chair, American Association of School Librarians (AASL) Indiana Chapters Representative, Indiana Library Federation (ILF) Communications Committee Co-Chair, Indiana State Teachers Association (ISTA) Professional Practices and Standards Committee Chair, Midwest Collaborative of Library Services (MCLS) Board Member representing School Librarians, Indiana Freedom to Read founder and steering committee members, as well as an ALA Law for Librarians trainer. She earned her BS in 2000 from Indiana State University in Speech, Communications, and Theatre Teaching with an English Minor and her MLS from IU in 2005. Rain is an educator, speaker, facilitator, presenter, author, advocate, and reader, and her special interest lies in the promotion, growth, and advancement of school librarianship.
Quite the expert, right?
As Rain writes below, when she and I started to discuss this marked increase in horror checkouts, I quickly realized she was better positioned to write about this than I was.
So thanks to Rain for this 31 Days of Horror guest post examining the popularity of Horror in School Libraries right now. Take it away Rain...
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I love horror.
I love libraries (especially school libraries).
I love giving kids great books and talking to kids about reading.
And I love my friend, peer, author, and extraordinary human, Becky.
And that is what got me into this pickle of writing for her blog.
It started with a text, “I dunno how much attention you get to pay to school librarians on socials, but EVERYONE is talking about the HUGE uptick this school year on the checkouts for HORROR.”
I was excited to be contributing by giving the horror and RA expert a great nugget to run with. Instead that conversation ended in, “You can do a guest post…”
After a lot of hemming and hawing and a few choice words, here we are--me summarizing what many may already know about the trend of horror being the coolest genre for students of all ages in the school library.
I am a horror reader. Like all readers, professional librarians have some biases. As a default, I often recommend horror, and horror has always been “popular” in my high school library. Even I had mentioned last school year that I was noticing an uptick in the number of horror checkouts. Recently, my dearest friend and middle school library partner in my district said to me one day, “Rain, my students are begging for horror. Do you know some titles I can add to beef up my collection?” She was the second person to ask me in a short amount of time.
While working on giving horror recs and resources, I noticed I kept seeing my school librarian peers pop up in my social feeds talking about the uptick in horror’s popularity. When I began scanning through the social posts I have been seeing for weeks regarding this trend, a few things stood out. First, it is not limited to one grade level or one geographical area. It is nationwide and beyond and includes elementary through high school students at all reading levels. Second, the reasons for the uptick seem obvious to outsiders, but I think it is a bit more subtle than, “the world is scary so kids want to read scary books.” So, let’s explore this trend.
Of course the world and the news is scary right now. It is super scary for adults--war, political discourse, financial instability--and that is certainly more intense for kids. Books are the safest way to explore the world. They allow readers to delve deep into complex ideas and emotions without consequences. Books let us ferret out our place in the world and feelings on people and issues. We should always be encouraging kids of all ages to read what they want for learning or feeling or escaping. But as I decided to explore the whys of this trend I posed the question online to my peers. MANY non-school librarians also decided to share and remind me that in historically turbulent times horror becomes more popular. I certainly agree that is a part of it but the world is always a scary, turbulent place and that would be a surface-level incomplete explanation of why horror is having a moment now.
There are always trends that wax and wane in publishing and reading; publishers are chasing--or maybe creating--trends. Readers try on trends and genres. Some they stick with and some they move on from. This is especially true with developing readers including students. Horror is always present, but not always at the level of demand it is seeing right now. Obviously, what publishers choose to make available certainly affects the options readers have. And right now, horror is one of the options being made more widely available to readers. As a librarian who gets to purchase books, it has recently become less difficult to find quality horror materials to put on my shelves. Maybe more horror is available because it is what readers are demanding or maybe the demand has been created for readers by publishers. Either way, it is benefitting to all involved right now.
We have all heard about the reading crisis and the fact that reading has to compete for kids’ attention. That means for them to choose reading it must be better than what they are not choosing. And with horror, it is. Horror is familiar. Horror is “forbidden.” Horror is engaging. Horror is communal. Horror is visceral and raw--very human--even in its extremes. It is available in multiple formats like short stories, graphic novels, series, and stand alones. Horror has subgenres that appeal to readers' niche interests. I think that horror's ability to pack so much emotion and action and often humor in addition to terror into what is often considered short readings is one of its greatest advantages with young people. “One and done” is appealing to readers with limited time, stamina or capacity. Horror is ultimately accessible.
Remember that kids of all ages are astute and demanding. They want and deserve quality materials to read, and that is the main reason I think horror is having its moment right now. There are interesting and engaging horror books being published at all reading and interest levels. The quality of the writing is incredible. Many of the writers of horror today will be canon tomorrow. More availability and more quality matter. Horror authors know their readers are smart and treat them as such.They are engaging with their audiences with respect. Additionally, there is more representation happening in horror publishing. This is not to say that there can not be more diversity and representation, because there certainly can be, but look at the incredible women, people of color, and people of diverse backgrounds who are publishing right now. What a wonderful time to be a horror reader and especially a young, developing horror reader.
Because this is a blog, I am going to spare you an entire dissertation about how horror ties into school librarianship, but I will say one of the most important things a school librarian does is get students of all ages excited and engaged in reading. We are not here to judge what someone reads, we are here to provide what they want and encourage them to explore. What they want is horror. I am so glad to be a school librarian right now during a time when one of my favorite genres is having a renaissance, and I get to share that excitement and passion with readers every day.
Provide and encourage kids to read horror.
Be excited about horror.
Recommend horror.
Read horror.
Love horror.
--Rain Smith
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