Hillsborough County Public Library Cooperative celebrates Literacy Week with a look at 2023 reading habits
Hillsborough County, Fla. (Jan. 22, 2024) - In celebration of the Florida Department of Education's Literacy Week, Jan. 22 to 26, Tampa-Hillsborough County Public Library Cooperative is taking a look at 2023 reading habits to help raise awareness about the importance of daily reading.
Library customers borrowed a record 8.5 million library materials last year. That's enough books, when placed end to end, to reach from Tampa to Boston! To break that number down, customers checked out over 3.6 million books, movies, and audiobooks from library branches and borrowed over 4.9 million digital items like eBooks and eMagazines.
Jimmy B. Keel Public Library branch had the highest circulation last year with 412,604 in total circulation. Library customers also attended over 7,500 events at library branches in 2023 and over 48,000 new customers signed up for library cards.
These are the top books checked out in 2023 in the Tampa-Hillsborough County Public Library branches and online:
2023 Top 5 Adult Fiction
"Desert Star" by Michael Connelly
"The Boys from Biloxi" by John Grisham
"Long Shadows" by David Baldacci"
"Lessons in Chemistry" by Bonnie Garmus
"No Plan B: A Jack Reacher Novel" by Lee Child
2023 Top Young Adult Fiction
"A Good Girl's Guide to Murder" by Holly Jackson
"The Summer I Turned Pretty" by Jenny Han
"The Inheritance Games" by Jennifer Barnes
"Six of Crows" by Leigh Bardugo
"The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes" by Suzanne Collins
To celebrate Literacy Week, Tampa-Hillsborough County Public Library is encouraging students and families to make reading part of their daily routine. The library offers dozens of events every month to help customers maximize the use of library resources to make reading fun and approachable. To apply for a library card, visit HCPLC.org/account/get-a-card.