Some of the most checked-out books in public libraries across the country in 2024 include Kristin Hannah's The Women, Rebecca Yarros' Fourth Wing, and Emily Henry's Happy Place.
These books landed on the year-end wrap lists of public libraries in New York City, Cincinnati, Seattle and other cities.
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, by Gabrielle Zevin, was the most checked-out adult book in New York City and the second-most popular adult fiction book in Denver. There, The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store was number one; that novel by James McBride also made the most-borrowed lists at libraries in San Francisco, Westport, Conn., and Louisville, Ky.
Other popular titles in 2024 included Tom Lake by Ann Patchett, Think Twice by Harlan Coben and Camino Ghost by John Grisham. One of the most-borrowed non-fiction titles from 2024 was The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War by Eric Larson.
NPR scanned the most-borrowed lists of 18 public libraries across the country. Not every library publicizes its year-end borrowing data, and there's no master list released by the American Library Association. Some libraries only released their five or 10 top-borrowed books overall; others sorted the year's most popular loans into fiction, non-fiction, books for children and other categories.
Libby, the app libraries use to provide e-books, audiobooks and magazines, has not yet released its data from 2024.
A number of 2024 books were also 2023 books
While many of 2024's top books are new, a scan of titles revealed a striking number of repeats that also appeared on numerous most-borrowed lists in 2023, including Fourth Wing Rebecca Yarros, The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese, Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas and the memoir I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy.
"I think people are just looking for something that's going to comfort them a little bit," observed Roosevelt Weeks, director of the Fort Bend County library system in Texas. He pointed to the novel James, by Percival Everett, as a top title he particularly enjoyed this year. It made the most-borrowed lists at public libraries in Broome County, N.Y. and Boston's Codman Square branch.
But Quinn McQueen, director of marketing and communications for the City Library in Salt Lake City, said public library users sometimes have to wait for in-demand e-books and audiobooks.
"Sometimes libraries can be a little behind," she said. "We try to buy as many books as we can."
Some publishers, she noted, restrict the number of popular e-books that libraries can buy during their first year of release. And even after an e-book is purchased, they sometimes require ongoing payments tied to the number of check-outs. "So that can go through our budget pretty quickly," she said.
McQueen said one of her library's most-borrowed nonfiction books this year and last year was Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, which was published in 2013.
"I just finished it and I recommend it," she said. "[Kimmerer] has her PhD in botany and is also an indigenous woman and a poet. And I think what's so interesting is it's showing people's desire to be connected to our natural world, to figure out a way to live reciprocally with nature and to be kind and appreciative. So that one's really interesting and impressive."
Braiding Sweetgrass also appeared on the most-borrowed lists this year at public libraries in San Francisco, Seattle and Amherst, Mass.
Year-end lists are fun to parse, but it's important to keep perspective, said Brian Bannon, the Meryl and James Tisch Director at the New York Public Library. He oversees the 88 neighborhood branches of the nation's largest library system.
"Even though we published our top ten, none of these books made up more than 1% of our overall circulation," he said. "When you actually look at what people read in New York City, it wasn't like 20% of our audience were only reading these books. It's only 1%. There is still interest in a broad range of subject areas in the city, a lot of other genres: poetry, history, different types of fiction. To me, that's actually really heartening that we're not just driven by what happens to be popular or what's making its way into the mainstream media, but people are actually tracking their own interests and finding what they love at the library."
And in case you were wondering, 2024's most-borrowed poetry collection at the New York Public Library was Ocean Vuong's Time Is A Mother, about the loss of a parent and the Covid-19 pandemic.
If you are looking for your next book to read, head over to Books We Love. Our site has more than 4,000 recommended titles from the last 12 years.
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