MARYVILLE, Tenn. — "We're not just a, you know, quiet building full of books."
To be fair, the Blount County Public Library does, in face, have a ton of books.
But also tons of DVDs, audiobooks, concerts, parties, a café, workshops, classes, a farmers' market and everything in between.
Sarah Smith's job at the library is to make sure people know about all these things through social media.
"We're hoping to bring people to new books through our Instagram and Facebook and all of our social media," said Smith, the library's public relations coordinator.
This isn't some boring old outdated Facebook page.
Smith and her team are way too fun for that.
They've made the library's online presence but information and fun.
"Pretty much every single meme you see on our page is made in house," she said.
Yes, memes. Book memes. Reading memes. Memes that make you laugh out loud in the quiet section of the library.
Smith has a goldmine of the memes stored on her computer ready to go. She makes most of them using an app on her phone.
"I'll see memes, you know, floating around. And I'll be like, huh, I could apply that to libraries, or I could apply that to books," said Smith.
She lives for the comments and interactions from users who connect with what she's made.
"I really hope that they see this and they're like, 'well, these people have a sense of humor. This isn't a dry stale library, people here have fun,'" said Smith.
That's proven through one of their most popular online segments, Book Face Friday.
"So it's a very scientific process," said Smith. "We start usually with young adult books because they have so many faces on the cover."
Then the use their staff members to imagine what the rest of the cover image would look like.
"People had such an awesome response to it that we just kept it up. And it's so fun to do," said Smith.
It's interaction like this that makes the library's social media presence so welcoming.
Their real fame came about four years ago when they asked followers to help them name a plant.
Someone submitted the name 'Jeff' 15 times.
"We named him Jeff and it became like a meme on the internet," said Smith.
Jeff sadly passed away in 2020.
"Jeff has since had a son named Joof, and Joof has had a son who I think on our last post we decided was named Jeef."
Another staple is Spooky Steve, a skeleton who recently started going on dates with books.
"That's how 'The Book Bachelor' came about that we did a few months ago," said smith.
Spooky Steve is "well read, undead and ready to wed."
Smith hopes the fun they have online will lead to more people enjoying books in any way, shape or form.
"All kinds of reading are reading," said Smith. "So it doesn't matter if you're reading print or eBooks or audiobooks, you're still reading and we're just glad you're doing that," she said.
With nearly 55,000 library card holders and counting, the Blount County Public Library isn't slowing down any time soon.
"We're all very dedicated to making the library an awesome place to be for the patrons, because without the patrons it's not a library," said Smith. "It's just a building full of books."
If you live in another county, you're still welcome to visit this branch for concerts, farmers markets, workshops and more.