BOOKMARK THIS
It’s a curious process, but as patrons check out books from the Calgary Public Library, they create a trail of digital data. Some of the library’s statistics make for interesting reading.
READERS ARE FICKLE BUNCH
A Give it a year: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which last week had 827 holds on 149 copies, will eventually end up like last year’s Fifteen Dogs— in the CPL’s warehouse of popular older titles. (For every eight or so holds on a book, the library buys another copy.) It seems that only James Patterson escapes this fate; the author of thrillers is the mostread at every branch.
Book clubs looking for a good read, take note: multiple copies of the following must-reads of yore are available:
Fifteen Dogs, by André Alexis The Heart Goes Last, by Margaret Atwood
The Marriage of Opposites, by Alice Hoffman
A God in Ruins, by Kate Atkinson
The King’s Curse, by Philippa Gregory
Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, by Helen Fielding The Orenda, by Joseph Boyden
Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls, by David Sedaris
The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden, by Jonas Jonasson
Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides
BOOK CLUB IN A BAG
The CPL’s popular Book Club in a Bag kits include 10 copies of a popular title, as well as sample reviews, discussion questions, and info on how to lead a book discussion. Unlike the regular twoweek library loan, patrons can keep the Book Club in a Bag books for six weeks, and can take two bags out at any time. There are 75 books in the collection; currently, the most popular kits (those with waiting lists) are Anthony Doerr’s novel All the Light We Cannot See and
Stalin’s Daughter, Rosemary Sullivan’s biography of Svetlana Alliluyeva. Three kits currently available are Kate Atkinson’s Life After Life, comedian Amy Poehler’s Yes Please, and Donna Tartt’s 784-page tome, The Goldfinch.
CRYPT LIT
It’s not just contemporary titles that end up in the warehouse. A while back there were over 300 holds on Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita, a novel written between 1928 and 1940 but not published until 1967. Why the sudden run on a book published almost 50 years ago? Daniel Radcliffe, the actor best known for playing Harry Potter, told Oprah it was his favourite book, then posed for a public-service poster clutching a copy. Demand has since died down; when we last checked, four copies were available immediately.
Other dead authors still in demand: Maeve Binchy Tom Clancy Roald Dahl Terry Pratchett Ruth Rendell