Irvington Author Makes 2012 Best Books List

So what were your neighbors in Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown reading during 2012 or at least checking out of the library?

Westchester Library System keeps tabs on how many times a book circulates and they sent us the list of the most popular books this past year for the Warner Library in Tarrytown.

It seems as though they were doing some heavy duty ready as Walter Isaacson’s 656 page biography of Steve Jobs came in at number one for nonfiction followed by Pilates Anatomy by Rael Isacowitz, Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Irvington’s Robert Massie, In the Garden of Beasts Love, Terror and An American Family by Erik Larson, Quiet the Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain.

The top fiction book at Warner was Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James, followed by Janet Evanovich’s Explosive Eighteen and John Grisham’s The Litigators, E.L. James’ Fifty Shades of Grey phenomena swept through town with the book coming in at number four followed by James Patterson’s Private #1 Suspect.

There are a couple of sleeper hits that did not make the top five that I can recommend. The first is Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. In this page turner mystery/thriller, we explore a marriage gone very wrong as perky perfectionist Amy goes missing on her fifth anniversary and her husband Nick is caught in a web of evasions and deceit.

Since biographies are a perennial favorite of local residents, my nonfiction pick is Yes, Chef, a memoir by Marcus Samuelsen award winning chef and owner Harlem’s trendy Red Rooster Restaurant. His tale is a compelling one starting with being orphaned in Ethiopia when his mother succumbs to tuberculosis after a 75 mile trek to the nearest hospital. A year later he is adopted by a Swedish family where his grandmother teaches him to cook. Eventually he comes to the United States to make his way in the restaurant business in this extraordinary only in America story.