People in Erie County read — and listened to and downloaded — a lot of books last year.
To give you an idea how much reading went on across Erie County during this second year of the pandemic, Buffalo & Erie County Public Library Assistant Deputy Director Joy Testa Cinquino said the library broke a record last year.
"Last year, in 2020, we broke a record for over 1 million downloaded books from our patrons. That was in 2020. It will be the same in 2021. We will exceed 1 million downloadable books. That would include downloadable audio books, as well, that we will have broken that record again," Testa Cinquino said.
The library puts together a list each year of the most requested books of the year. What has changed is that a book can be in more than one format.
Jeff Kinney's Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Deep End hit the top of the list in both old-fashioned book and as an e-book for kids. That 's also true for Matt Haig's The Midnight Library. There's also a local book, Elizabeth Licata's Secret Buffalo: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure on the list.
Kristin Hannah's The Four Winds topped the list on paper and on a computer screen. Natalie D. Richards' ebook, Five Total Strangers was tops in young adult/teen most popular.
"Typically, our authors show up on The New York Times best-sellers list, Publishers Weekly best-sellers list," said Library Assistant Deputy Director of Public Services Dorinda Darden. "As you said, they bring people into the library to read their books and then, of course, they find books similar to that author."
The library is also continuing to add material in languages other than English, like the Chinese-language books donated by the Western New York Chinese Association to libraries in the northtowns.
Readers also can now order a book from a different library to be sent to their own — for free — and most branches have staffers who can put newly-released books on their budget list for purchase.
