Marking 20 years
of bold journalism,
reader supported.
Tyee Books

The Ten Most Borrowed Books of 2010

Want help reading minds? Here are the titles most lent by the Vancouver Public Library this year.

Shannon Smart 30 Dec 2010TheTyee.ca

Shannon Smart writes for The Tyee and others.

image atom
Exploring a city's imagination through its taste in literature.

A few days before Christmas, Tyee staff got together and compiled a list of books to help you find the perfect gift for even the toughest person to buy for. We recommended the right read for the Halo 3-addicted younger cousin, the tennis partner with the receding hairline, the secretly sentimental history buff, anyone thinking of running for BC Liberal leadership, the cat-crazy old aunt, and many more.

In considering what books we loved this year, we also got to wondering about what books were most popular with the average Vancouver reader. What were you reading and recommending this year? What titles racked up the most overdue charges on your library card or cost you the most at the bookstore checkout? What e-books were you scrambling to finish reading as the battery died on your Kindle?

To get an idea of what stories thrilled Vancouverites this year, we asked the helpful staff at the Vancouver Public Library to comb the databases and provide a list of the top 10 most-borrowed books of 2010. Read on to see how your favourites fared with the 6.4 million Vancouver readers that passed through the doors of a VPL branch in the last 12 months.

10. The Year of the Flood Margaret Atwood (2010)

As the author of more than 40 books, Margaret Atwood hardly needs an introduction. Her newest book, written in the same dystopic vein as her 1985 Governer General's Award-winner, The Handmaid's Tale, quickly climbed the charts to become a #1 national bestseller. The Year of the Flood tells the story of an Earth altered drastically by a natural disaster, and Toby and Ren, apparently the only two survivors. A long awaited book from one of Canada's most-loved writers.

9. Eclipse Stephenie Meyer

The third of four books in the Twilight series, Eclipse brings readers back into the world of Bella Swan, a teenage girl in love with a vampire. Popular primarily with teenage girls who hope the same will happen to them, Eclipse and the other three Twilight books have sold over 100 million copies around the world. This summer, on June 30, 2010, Eclipse was released in film. The opening night ticket sales set a new record for biggest midnight opening in American and Canadian box office history. June 30 also holds the North American record for most broken curfews in one night, but a connection between the events has yet to be established.

8. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest Stieg Larsson (2008)

Without a doubt, we expected to see Stieg Larsson's name on this list. The third title in the late author's popular Millennium Trilogy, this story picks up where the second left off with computer hacker Lisbeth Salander arriving in hospital after being shot numerous times. Her attacker, who also happens to be her father (!), was also injured, and is convalescing in a room just down the hall. That's all we're saying!

7. Outliers: The Story of Success Malcolm Gladwell (2008)

Gladwell seems to know something the rest of us don't. Before this most recent chart-topper, he published two "pop-economics" titles, Blink (2005) and The Tipping Point (2000). Both quickly became bestsellers. In Outliers, Gladwell considers the factors that contribute to great success in North American society. Drawing on psychology, statistics and the influences of family, friends, and culture, and plenty of his own experience, Gladwell repeatedly emphasizes that it takes more than biology and innate smarts to be truly good at something, it takes dedication.

6. "U" is for Undertow Sue Grafton

You won't get very far spelling "unoriginal" without a U either, but while Grafton's winning formula is running out of letters, her latest novel has no shortage of interested readers. Set in 1988, the novel follows private detective Kinsey Millhone as she investigates a kidnapping that happened decades earlier.

5. The Golden Mean Annabel Lyon

Nice choice, Vancouver. This book, the first novel by New Westminster resident, won the Rogers Writers' Trust Award and was nominated for several others. For the most part firmly basing her work in history, Lyon takes a little liberty with the past: she constructs an imagined relationship between young Alexander the Great and Aristotle. The result isn't the usual cast-in-bronze or cut-in-marble representations of the men. Instead, The Golden Mean is an insightful look at two fascinating, warm-blooded human characters.

4. The Girl Who Played with Fire Stieg Larsson (2007)

The second novel in Larsson's Millenium Trilogy includes many of the same characters as the first, including Mikael Blomkvist, journalist and magazine publisher, and Lisbeth Salander, a computer hacker and the "Girl" in the three books' titles. This part of the saga follows the pair as they take on Swedish sex traffickers, grapple with misinformed police, and are hounded by the tabloids.

3. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo Stieg Larsson (2006)

In this novel, the book that starts the wickedly popular Millenium Trilogy, readers are introduced to social misfit and tech genius Lisbeth Salander, who joins forces with journalist Mikael Blomkvist to track down a serial killer.

2. Breaking Dawn Stephenie Meyer

The final chapter in the Twilight series, this novel is a tourniquet: it wraps up the loose ends for all the gushing fans of the Meyer's phenomenally popular young adult series, but leaves things slack enough to allow for future additions. Babies and "newborn" vampires, a honeymoon off the coast of Brazil, and the continuing feud between bodybuilding werewolves and tall, dark and handsome bloodsuckers. Fans should be sated, at least until the newborn introduced in Breaking Dawn is old enough to have a teenage saga of her own.

1. The Lost Symbol Dan Brown (2010)

This story of codes, clues, and secrets -- the follow-up to the bestselling Da Vinci Code -- has been called "thrilling" and roller coaster-esque by the Los Angeles Times and "mind-blowing" by the New York Times. Though Brown has been accused of plagiarism, historical inaccuracy, and simply being a terrible writer, Vancouverites seem to have a soft spot for him.

There you have it! The top 10 most popular books at the Vancouver Public Library this year. It seems Vancouverites spent 2010 looking for entertainment and answers: the list is rife with code cracking, computer hacking, vampires, dystopian days of reckoning, and... popular economics and ancient philosophy. In 2011, perhaps a post-apocalyptic, post-recession world will bring different books to the top of B.C. readers' lists, or maybe Justin Bieber's First Step 2 Forever will soar to #1. I'll bet Malcolm Gladwell has the answer.

[Editor's Note: As per Tyee tradition in recent years, we've closed the comment section for the holidays. Thank you all for creating such a thoughtful, alive and insightful conversation this year. We look forward to more of the same in the next. To you and yours, a heartfelt happy holidays!]  [Tyee]

  • Share:

Facts matter. Get The Tyee's in-depth journalism delivered to your inbox for free

LATEST STORIES

The Barometer

Do You Think Trudeau Will Survive the Next Election?

Take this week's poll