Here is the October edition of The Poetry Shelf, our suggested poetry assortment, compiled by Michelle Halket of Central Avenue Publishing.
Welcome to the October edition of The Poetry Shelf!
Until now, I've been putting The Poetry Shelf together every month. But given the amount of research that goes into each edition--and the fact that poetry shelves don't necessarily need rethinking every four weeks--I've decided to move to an every-other-month schedule. I think that will keep it useful without overwhelming your inbox (or me!). But hey, if you have strong feelings about why it's better as a monthly feature, please: I want to hear from you!
The last several months have seen the classics dominate the bestseller lists (thank you, Christopher Nolan!), but now we're starting to see some titles from our more recent history come back onto the list. Of particular note are several titles by Wendell Berry, who we lost this summer. His most popular one is The Peace of Wild Things. I'd also like to mention Anne Carson's Nobel win this past week, and while I can't predict if she'll be on bestseller lists next week, I certainly wouldn't be surprised if some of her work showed up. Also of note are some great new books by some great poets, such as:
- The Wonderment by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
- Love Between Men by Padraig Ó. Tuama
- Tongue: A Cognitive Hazard by Chase Hughes
- The Portal of the Mystery of Hope by Charles Peguy
For the feature, I'm thinking about holiday gifting and how we might get a few more people browsing the poetry shelf. I've pulled together some giftable poetry, along with a few poetry-adjacent books that you might normally shelve somewhere else in the store. Maybe pull an extra copy of those into poetry, add something for the chef, nature/dog/cat lover, or bring in a book that families might read together over the holidays. The idea isn't to reinvent your poetry section, but to have a little fun with cross-merchandising and give shoppers who might not normally browse poetry a reason to wander over.
As always, everything I put on these lists are just suggestions meant to spark ideas of your own. Pick and choose as best fits your store!