by Jessie Bach

Librarians may seem unflappable — they can handle twenty-five three-year-olds during a Halloween story time, recommend some truly blood-curdling horror novels, and win a fight with the printer … all in one day. The job is not for the faint of heart, and after seeing what they’re capable of you may think there’s nothing out there that could really keep them up at night. That said, there are a few things out there scary enough to have even the most imperturbable librarian shaking in their sensible pumps. So, if your Halloween vibe is a little more “trick” than “treat,” you’re in luck. In honour of spooky season, I’m sharing a list of things you could do that will chill the bones of any librarian.

Donate a set of old encyclopedias

You’ve spent hours (days even!) in your dank, dark basement decluttering decades worth of detritus. At the top of the “donate” pile is a stack of beautiful leather-bound books with marbled end pages and gilded spines. Surely these are priceless, sacred texts. But alas! There is no room for them in your home. You box them up alongside a few old paperbacks and stack of National Geographic back issues and haul them over to the one place they’ll surely be appreciated — the public library. As you drive away, good deed done, listen out for the faint howls of the terrified librarian who’s just checked the donations bin. Your job here is done!

Not only is this the third such set of mid-twentieth-century encyclopedias she’s encountered this week, but beautiful as they are, these books are extremely dangerous! In the wrong hands, an unsuspecting researcher may learn that the USA and the USSR are engaged in a Cold War, that eggs are bad for you, or that the Candango Mouse still roams Brazil. *shiver*

Ask them: “Why do we even need libraries anymore when we can just Google everything?”

This single sentence is enough to make a librarian’s eyes roll back in their head. Librarians spend time, effort, and money on building a collection of books and online resources with the sole purpose of providing the community with quality, credible information. Sure, Google returns massive amounts of information in seconds, but to get to the goods you’ll have to wade through an ogre’s swamp of online debris — ads, conspiracy theories, and forum posts from the early aughts, just to name a few. Digital literacy is your secret weapon; a stake in the heart of anyone who engages in the soul-sucking task of productive online research. Your librarian can help you get through the Hall of Mirrors that is the internet safely. If you can get them back up off the floor after your opening question.

Leave something gross in a library book

The tale you’re about to read is based on a true story, as reported to this blogger by a colleague who would prefer to remain anonymous for her own safety. Proceed at your own risk.

Imagine this. You’re a librarian and you arrive at work in the dark, before the library is open, to prepare for the day. You empty the book-drop of items that have been returned since the day before, stack them tidily on a cart, and wheel it through the dark halls to the circulation desk. As you begin to check in the books one-by-one, your hand brushes something wet, something … something that definitely doesn’t feel like a book. Reeling back from the unexpected sensation, you look closer at the book and to your horror, stuck between the pages is a nasty, slimy, wilted piece of … lettuce? Last month’s sandwich? Goblin goo? The pet that went missing in January?

Yes, folks, it happens, and librarians truly fear the furry friends you send them.

Call it a “Liberry”

I think it’s safe to say that most of us bookish folks have a particular grammatical bugbear. The misuse of their/they’re/there may make you cringe. Or perhaps you give a little shudder when you see a missing Oxford comma (or vice versa — to each their own). Librarians are no exception. If you really want to see a librarian reel back in horror, refer to the “library” as a “liberry.”

Reshelve your own books

Seems innocent enough, right? You’re leisurely browsing the library stacks for your next read, picking up one book, and then another, reading the blurbs to see what sparks your interest. Soon, you have a big stack in your arms. More than you can read during the three-week loan period. After picking out your top five titles — an ambitious reading goal, but hey, you can do it! — you go to replace the rejected titles. Should be simple, you remember where you got them from, right? Well, sorta. As long as it’s close it should be fine, right? The HORRORS! A misplaced book, in a building full of books, may as well be buried alive. Melvil Dewey himself would be no help to the stricken librarian left searching for the lost title.

Without proper order, the library stacks become a gaping black hole where books can be lost forever. Stuck on a dusty shelf for eternity (or at least until the next scheduled library inventory). Talk about spooky.

Walk up behind them and yell “BOO!!”

If you spot a library worker deep in the stacks, engrossed in their work — sneak up behind them, put on your best monster-voice, and yell, “BOO!!” They’ll jump out of their cardigan-clad skins.

Happy Halloween library lovers!

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