This is Los Angeles County, as seen through the books we read
The blockbusters are all there; as the most populous county in the United States, Los Angeles is a big part of what made them bestsellers in the first place. Think “Becoming” and Michael Connelly’s “Dark Sacred Night,” John Grisham’s “The Reckoning” and Kevin Kwan’s “Crazy Rich Asians.”
The gathering, said librarian Ramin Naderi, is a Southern California reflection of life in Iran’s neighborhood teahouses, where performers called naghāls recite sections of the “Shahnameh,” an epic poem of pre-Islamic Persia that first appeared in the year 1010. Ahmad Pahlavani, left, and Afsar Moayedi share a laugh at a recent meeting of the West L.A. Library Farsi Reading Club.
The West Los Angeles library’s 10 most-read books start with Obama’s “Becoming” and end with “Ābī ārām,” by Iranian author, Bahārah Bāqirī, known for her romance novels. That “Becoming” would make the area’s list of the most-circulated is a no-brainer. But the popularity of “Ābī ārām” tells us more about the neighborhood, about who lives and reads there.
City Librarian Irene McDermott notes that the 2010 census showed 53% of residents identify as Asian in San Marino. That helps explain why three of the most-circulated adult books at the Crowell Public Library are in Chinese: “Stories of Lian Jiang,” “Love in Cold Palace” and “Struggles in the Palace.”
Patty Wong, Santa Monica director of library services, lauds the quality of children’s books, one reason she says they’re so popular. Not only do most have top-notch illustrations, but they’re “probably the strongest-edited of the materials out there.” They also have big crossover audiences. And then there’s politics. In these polarizing times, when social media is filled with angry ranting about all things electoral, political books of all stripes are liberally sprinkled among library branches’ most-circulated books and those with the longest wait lists.Throughout the LA County Library system’s 85 public branches, more people have reserved these books during the first quarter of 2019 than any others. They appear in descending order.
Get Lit meets monthly on the second floor of the Original Farmers Market at Fairfax Avenue and 3rd Street in Los Angeles. Members range from their 20s on up, and their conversation floats above clinking plates, barking dogs, and other people’s chatter. Alex Newman, “Asymmetry’s” rare defender: “To me, it never read as predatory. To me, he never did anything but give her money.”
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