Top Five: In Demand Romance

I haven't done one of these round-up posts in forever, and for that I apologize. Every Monday when I roll into the office, I get to look forward to a spreadsheet that lays out the "in demand" titles amongst our library patrons. Those books with large waiting lists. I got out of the habit of doing my Top Five feature because frankly? It was like the same five books for the last several months. The Reader, The Story Of Edgar Sawtelle, White Tiger, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, blah blah blah. For the love of God people - discover some other books will ya! I'm getting bored! Now that most of the demand for these is settling down to the dull roar, I thought I'd relaunch my Top Five segment by talking about the Top 5 Most Requested Romance Titles for the Week of May 11.


Lover Avenged by J.R. Ward - I had mentioned in a previous post that the request list for this was pretty stagnant. Well that changed the minute the book was actually released, because my holds queue jumped up to the next level. Not quite as off the charts as I was originally expecting (seems like plenty of readers are still willing to buy their own copies), but very respectable.






Vision In White by Nora Roberts - Yes it's trade paperback, but the discount retailers are selling this at an extremely reasonable price (I think I saw $9 and change at Costco) so I wasn't sure how high library demand would be for this title. Also, it's Roberts' first straight-up contemporary romance title in a long while - so I thought that might drive retail sales more so than library lending. Not quite as off the charts as her J.D. Robb series, but still a very nice holds list, plus my first go-around of ordering this title was pretty significant, so that's been keeping the list down to a manageable level.



Black Hills by Nora Roberts - A romantic suspense title that's not due out until July, but I already (naturally, it's Nora) have it on order. People are already staking out their spot on the waiting list.









Crouching Vampire, Hidden Fang by Katie MacAlister - Yes, it's true. Good librarians do purchase titles for the library that they would rather be skinned alive than read. Case in point? This book. I'm burnt out on paranormals anyway, but even when I wasn't? Yeah, I don't "do" Funny Ha Ha Paranormals. To be fair? I don't "do" most Funny Ha Ha novels. Just ain't my thing. But, we have some libraries where they can't keep books like this on the shelf. That's how popular they are. So I ordered this latest from MacAlister, and now we have a waiting list.



Malice by Lisa Jackson - All of Jackson's titles circulate well for us, but it's the hard covers that get the most mileage. I explain this with the reasoning that while there are readers who will buy her in paperback, maybe they just haven't made that jump to laying down hard cover prices for her books yet. Or it could just be the simple fact that this particular book has been getting some PR attention and new readers have been intrigued enough to add their names to the waiting list.