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The Mudgee Guardian reached out to Mid-Western Regional Council and Mudgee Library to gather statistics from the last 10 years of borrowing habits, breaking them down into genre and gender.
66,043 items were borrowed in 2019. May saw the most borrowing and December saw the least, chalked up mainly to holiday closure.
In total there were 105,462 visits to the region's libraries. Broken down by site Mudgee's library had 92,816 visits, Kandos had 4,603, Gulgong had a little more with 5,089 and Rylstone saw 559 visits. The Mobile Library was also well attended with 2,395 visits.
The library isn't all about books, DVDs were actually among the most popular things people borrow from the library in 2019.
The most popular DVDs in 2019:
- Christopher Robin - 23 loans
- Spider-Man: Homecoming - 23 loans
- Deadpool 2 - 22 loans
- Mystery Road - 22 loans
- Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri - 22 loans
Most borrowed adult fiction titles in 2019:
- Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton - 20 loans
- The Secret Keeper by Susan Lewis - 20 loans
- Wild Fire by Ann Cleeves - 19 loans
- The Woman in the Green Dress by Tea Cooper - 19 loans
- What We Did by Christobel Kent - 19 loans
Most borrowed audiobooks in 2019:
- Scrublands by Chris Hammer - 15 loans
- A Song for the Dying by Stuart MacBride - 13 loans
- Redstone Station by Therese Creed - 12 loans
- One Little Mistake by Emma Curtis - 11 loans
- The Trusted by John M. Green - 11 loans
Most borrowed non-fiction titles in 2019:
- A Basket by the Door by Sophie Hansen - 18 loans
- Milkwood: Real Skills for Down-to-Earth Living by Kirsten Bradley - 15 loans
- Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari - 14 loans
- The Barefoot Investor for Families by Scott Pape - 13 loans
- The Australian Native Garden by Angus Stewart - 13 loans
Most borrowed young adult titles in 2019:
- Night Swimming by Steph Bowe - 11 loans
- The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan - 10 loans
- Fire and Flood by Victoria Scott - 10 loans
- To all the Boys I've Loved Before by Jenny Han - 9 loans
- Nanberry: Black Brother White by Jackie French - 8 loans
The last ten years
This is where it gets really interesting, looking back at the last ten years, 2010-2019, we see the five most borrowed items from the library weren't even books, DVD borrowing was most popular with a mix of films, tv and children's shows.
These were: Play School: Nursery Rhymes and Play School Favourites which was borrowed 187 times, Wuthering Heights, borrowed 171 times, Master and Commander: the Far Side of the World, borrowed 165 times, Cadfael: Series 1, borrowed 165 times and Dora the Explorer: Musical School Days, borrowed 159 times.
Similarly with adult fiction. From the same 10-year period, the most popular books in this category were:
- Sail by James Patterson, borrowed 137 times
- Broken by Karen Slaughter, borrowed 106 times
- Legacy by Tamara McKinley, borrowed 102 times
- Swimsuit by James Patterson, borrowed 102 times
- The Drop by Michael Connelly was borrowed 93 times
