Well, here we are recovering from all the scurrying about, perhaps stuck at home, not traveling, not shopping—resting and reading. This week between Christmas and New Year’s can be a quiet time to regroup. At this time, many of us like to take a look back at 2010. It has but a few short days left. To that end, let’s look back at the top 10 books in Radford. These books checked out the most times in our library last year.
- To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
- At First Sight by Nicholas Sparks
- Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
- Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson
- The 8th Confession by James Patterson
- The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
- The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
- The Help by Kathryn Stockett
- Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
10. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
Out of the top 10, 40% were non fiction—authors Mortenson, Pausch, Kingsolver and Gilbert who wrote about subjects like education, life, food and travel enticed readers here. Several I recognize from book clubs and a few from perennially popular genres like mystery (Patterson) and thriller (Brown). The #1 most circulating title in Radford last year, To Kill a Mockingbird celebrated its 50th anniversary this year. We have recently seen a plethora of books and movies celebrating Harper Lee and her world. Charles Fields wrote a book in 2006 about Harper Lee called Mockingbird. The film Capote, released in 2005 portrays the relationship between Lee and Truman Capote who influenced the character Dill.
On this link you can listen to a podcast from “With Good Reason” a wonderful resource from Virginia Foundation of the Humanities which focuses on To Kill a Mockingbird . http://withgoodreasonradio.org/2009/09/to-kill-a-mockingbird/
If you would like to check out a copy of Lee’s book, we have one available for you.