Taking a cue from music streaming platform Spotify, the Chattanooga Public Library released its own version of Wrapped on its Instagram page, highlighting Chattanooga’s year in reading.
A few years ago, the library started a collection analysis, using data to understand statistics of the library’s collection, trends in circulation and the personality of the different library branches, Carol Green, the library’s manager of collection services, said in a phone interview.
This analysis allows the library to do evidence-based purchasing, “which is basically, we purchase books that Chattanooga wants to read, rather than me sitting in my office, trying to guess what Chattanooga wants to read,” she said.
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According to the library’s Wrapped, the top five adult books in 2024 were “The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store,” “Lessons in Chemistry,” “The Secret,” “Tom Lake” and “Demon Copperhead.” The top five adult authors were James Patterson, Danielle Steele, Sarah J. Maas, Stephen King and Agatha Christie. Over 193,000 adult books were circulated in 2024, according to the social media post.
The top five young adult books were “The Lightning Thief,” “The Giver,” “The Inheritance Games,” “Fever, 1793” and “Legendborn,” according to the post. The top five young adult authors were Rick Riordan, Lois Lowry, Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Raina Telgemeier and Akira Toriyama. Over 29,000 young adult books were circulated in 2024.
The top five youth books were “The Lightning Thief,” “If You Go Down to the Woods Today,” “Cornbread and Poppy,” “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” and “The First Cat in Space Ate Pizza,” according to the post. The top five youth authors were Mary Pope Osborne, Dav Pilkey, Geronimo Stilton, Jeff Kinney and Lauren Tarshis. Over 198,000 youth books were circulated in 2024.
The library’s Wrapped also included data for easy reader books, with over 228,000 circulated; family passes, with nearly 900 circulated; and items from the tool and adventure libraries, with 975 circulated.
According to the library’s complete data, which was not included in the Wrapped post, the family pass for the Hunter Museum of American Art was checked out more than any other passes, including those for the Chattanooga Zoo and Tennessee Aquarium, Christina Sacco, the library’s head of marketing and public relations, said by phone. Foam sleeping pads were the most checked out item from the adventure library, and a pressure washer was the most checked out item from the tool library, Sacco said.
The data allows the library to identify trends and helps the organization stay ahead of the curve, in terms of acquiring copies of books before demand hits, Sacco said.
Staff photo by Robin Rudd / The South Chattanooga branch of the Chattanooga Public Library, 925 W. 39th St., was photographed on June 13, 2022.Social media is a major influence on library patrons and circulation, both Sacco and Green said. Generation Z, those born between the late 1990s and early 2010s, is the No. 1 growing demographic for the library, Sacco said.
“The fact that they’re (social media platforms) driving some of our business and really increasing, basically, library usage across the country is really fascinating,” Sacco said. “Because it shows that the next generation of people, who are now starting to vote and buy houses and have children, they are already dedicated users of the library, and their kids are going to be because we have programs for people starting at age 0.”
Based on the data, Green said Chattanooga readers do not go for the typical bestsellers, rather they go for authors of various backgrounds, including authors who did not make The New York Times bestseller list. When asked to characterize Chattanooga readers, one word came to Green’s mind: eclectic.
“It tells me that we have voracious readers,” Green said. “That, basically, they’ll read anything as long as it’s good.”
Contact Sam Still at sstill@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6579.