Top member reads of 2023

Mechanics’ Institute members are voracious readers and 2023 saw a revival in library use, event attendance, and engagement with our collections. As you can see from this list of our top 20 most checked out Fiction and Non-Fiction titles, interests are wide-ranging, self-reflective, and thought-provoking. 

Fiction 

Listed in order of the highest number of loans: 

1 Lessons in Chemistry: [a Novel] / Bonnie Garmus

2 Demon Copperhead: a Novel / Barbara Kingsolver

3 Horse / Geraldine Brooks

4 Birnam Wood / Eleanor Catton

5 Still Life / Louise Penny

6 The Old Success / Martha Grimes

7 Slow Horses / Mick Herron

8 Spook Street / Mick Herron

9 Before the Coffee Gets Cold: a Novel / Toshikazu Kawaguchi

10 Foster / Claire Keegan

11 Trust / Hernan Diaz

12 The Candy House: a Novel / Jennifer Egan

13 Dead Lions / Mick Herron

14 Joe Country / Mick Herron

15 Dark Rooms / Lynda La Plante

16 Independence Square: Arkady Renko in Ukraine / Martin Cruz Smith

17 The Humble Lover : a Novel / Edmund White

18 Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow : a Novel / Gabrielle Zevin

19 Simply Lies / David Baldacci

20 The Writing Retreat: a Novel / Julia Bartz

 

Nonfiction 

Listed in order of the highest number of loans: 

1 The Creative Act: a Way of Being / Rick Rubin, with Neil Strauss

2 Take Command: Find Your Inner Strength, Build Enduring Relationships, and Live the Life You Want / Joe Hart and Michael Crom

3 Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results: an Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones / James Clear

4 Excellent Advice for Living: Wisdom I Wish I'd Known Earlier / Kevin Kelly

5 100 Places to See After you Die: a Travel Guide to the Afterlife / Ken Jennings

6 The Half Known Life: in Search of Paradise / Pico Iyer

7 The Bible as it Was / James L. Kugel

8 The Apocryphal and Legendary Life of Christ : Being the Whole Body of the Apocryphal Gospels and Other Extra Canonical Literature Which Pretends to Tell of the Life and Words of Jesus Christ, including much matter which has not before appeared in English. In continuous narrative form, with notes, Scriptural references, prolegomena, and indices / by James DeQuincey Donehoo.

9 Playing God: American Catholic Bishops and the Far Right / Mary Jo McConahay

10 The Swedish Art of Aging Exuberantly: Life Wisdom from Someone who will (Probably) Die Before You / text and drawings by Margareta Magnusson

11 You Will Own Nothing : Your War With a New Financial World Order and How to Fight Back / Carol Roth

12 Solito: a Memoir / Javier Zamora

13 Weird Scenes Inside the Canyon: Laurel Canyon, Covert Ops & the Dark Heart of the Hippie Dream / by David McGowan

14 A Fever in the Heartland: the Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them / Timothy Egan

15 The Big Myth: How American Business Taught us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market / Naomi Oreskes, Erik M. Conway

16 Die with Zero: Getting All You Can From Your Money and Your Life / Bill Perkins

17 The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, & Healing in a Toxic Culture / Gabor Maté, MD, with Daniel Maté

18 Poverty, by America / Matthew Desmond

19 The Life We Chose: William "Big Billy" D'Elia and the Last Secrets of America's Most Powerful Mafia Family / Matt Birkbeck

20 Outsmart Your Brain: Why Learning is Hard and How You CanMake it Easy / Daniel T. Willingham, PhD