Loan Stars is the readers' advisory tool that allows libraries across Canada to indicate popular upcoming titles. Using LibraryData, BookNet’s national library collection and circulation analysis tool, the forthcoming titles with the most orders become Loan Stars top picks!

Join us as we go back in time and recap what happened in the Loan Stars world in the Summer and Fall seasons of 2022 (click here to see the full lists by month).

Library circulation

Thanks to LibraryData we were able to determine which of the 60 books on the six lists were the most popular among library patrons from their publication dates up until January 1, 2023.

These are the results:

Collage of covers of Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid, Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng, and The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell

Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid (August 2022 list)
Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng (October 2022 list)
The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell (September 2022 list)
A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny 🍁 (November 2022 list)
Things We Do in the Dark by Jennifer Hillier 🍁 (July 2022 list)
Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood (August 2022 list)
We Spread by Iain Reid 🍁 (September 2022 list)
Reputation by Sarah Vaughan (July 2022 list)
Upgrade by Blake Crouch (July 2022 list)
The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia 🍁 (July 2022 list)

Subject popularity

Similar to what we've seen in previous roundups, Fiction remains popular with 44 out of 60 titles belonging to this category. Next is Biography & Autobiography with six titles, followed by History with five, Cooking with three, and Self-Help with two.

Bar graph showing the distribution of all the 60 titles by subject.

But what Fiction subcategories were present in all the six lists? Thrillers and Romance made up the majority with 10 and nine titles respectively, next is Mystery & Detective and Literary with five titles each, Fantasy has four titles, Historical three, and Women had two. Science Fiction, Occult & Supernatural, Indigenous, Horror, Friendship, and Anthologies had one title each present in the lists.

Bar graph breaking down the Fiction titles by categories.

Repeat authors

Of the authors whose titles were Loan Stars picks during these seasons, 15 had been featured on a previous Loan Stars list!

The authors previously included (and the titles that got them on the list):

Jane Smiley’s Perestroika in Paris was on the December 2020 list
Louise Penny’s The Madness of Crowds was on the August 2021 list and also on the Best of the Brightest 2021 list; A Better Man was on the August 2019 list; Kingdom of the Blind on the November 2018 list; and Glass Houses on the August 2017 list
C. L. Polk’s Stormsong was on the January-February 2020 list
Lisa Unger’s Confessions on the 7:45 was on the October 2020 list
Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere was on the September 2017 list
Maggie O'Farrell’s Hamnet and Judith was on the June-September 2020 list
Iain Reid’s I'm Thinking of Ending Things was on the June 2016 list
Naomi Novik’s The Last Graduate was on the September 2021 list
Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Malibu Rising was on the June 2021 list and also on the Best of the Brightest 2021 list
Lilian Nattel’s Girl at the Edge of Sky was on the August 2019 list
Joanna Schaffhausen’s The Vanishing Season was on the December 2017 list
Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Velvet Was the Night was on the August 2021 list and Mexican Gothic was on the June-September 2020 list and also on the Best of the Brightest 2020 list
Blake Crouch’s Recursion was on the June 2019 list and Dark Matter on the July 2016 list
Jennifer Hillier’s Little Secrets was on the April 2020 list and Jar of Hearts was on the June 2018 list
Lacie Waldon’s The Layover was on the June 2021 list

Canadian 🍁 contributors

We also looked at the number of Canadian contributors present in the six lists. (For reference, a Canadian contributor is an author, illustrator, translator, or editor who is a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident of Canada.) Of all 60 titles on the lists published between July and December, 23% were by Canadian contributors.

ICYMI, these are the titles that made it to the lists

July Loan Stars Adult List

The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia 🍁 (Del Rey)
Upgrade by Blake Crouch (Ballantine Books)
Things We Do in the Dark by Jennifer Hillier 🍁 (Minotaur Books)
Where You End and I Begin by Leah McLaren 🍁 (Random House Canada)
Hokuloa Road by Elizabeth Hand (Mulholland Books)
Reputation by Sarah Vaughan (Atria/Emily Bestler Books)
Just Like Home by Sarah Gailey (Tor Books)
From the Jump by Lacie Waldon (G.P. Putnam's Sons)
After Hours on Milagro Street by Angelina M. Lopez (Carina Trade)
Kaleidoscope by Cecily Wong (Dutton)

Find all these titles in this CataList Catalogue

August Loan Stars Adult List

House of a Thousand Lies by Cody Luke Davis (Crooked Lane Books)
Into the Broken Lands by Tanya Huff 🍁 (DAW)
Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid (Doubleday Canada)
Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood (Berkley)
Only Sisters by Lilian Nattel 🍁 (Random House Canada)
All Good People Here by Ashley Flowers (Bantam)
Love in the Time of Serial Killers by Alicia Thompson (Berkley)
The Last Housewife by Ashley Winstead (Sourcebooks Landmark)
Long Gone by Joanna Schaffhausen (Minotaur Books)
Bad Fruit by Ella King (Astra House)

Find all these titles in this CataList Catalogue

September Loan Stars Adult List

Before We Were Trans by Dr. Kit Heyam Ph.D (Seal Press)
The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell (Knopf Canada)
Something in the Heir by Suzanne Enoch (St. Martin's Griffin)
Nadiya's Everyday Baking by Nadiya Hussain (Clarkson Potter)
We Spread by Iain Reid 🍁 (Simon & Schuster)
Ghosts from the Library by Tony Medawar (Collins Crime Club)
A Haunted History of Invisible Women by Leanna Renee Hieber and Andrea Janes (Citadel)
A Minor Chorus by Billy-Ray Belcourt 🍁 (Hamish Hamilton)
The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik (Del Rey)
People Person by Candice Carty-Williams (Gallery/Scout Press)

Find all these titles in this CataList Catalogue

October Loan Stars Adult List

The Atlas Paradox by Olivie Blake (Tor Books)
The Ghost Woods by C.J. Cooke (HarperCollins)
Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng (Viking)
Uphill by Jemele Hill (Henry Holt and Co.)
Madly, Deeply by Alan Rickman (Henry Holt and Co.)
Lavender House by Lev AC Rosen (Forge Books)
Amish Soups & Casseroles by Linda Byler, Laura Anne Lapp, Anna Kauffman, and Emily Stoltzfus (Good Books)
Tastes Like Schitt by Rachel Floyd and Hannah Floyd (Media Lab Books)
Cold Case BC by Eve Lazarus 🍁 (Arsenal Pulp Press)
Midnight Storm Moonless Sky by Alex Soop 🍁 (UpRoute)

Find all these titles in this CataList Catalogue

November Loan Stars Adult List

A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny 🍁 (Minotaur Books)
All the Broken Places by John Boyne (Bond Street Books)
Mussolini's Daughter by Caroline Moorehead (Random House Canada)
The Queen by Andrew Morton (Grand Central Publishing)
Terry Pratchett: A Life With Footnotes by Rob Wilkins (Doubleday UK)
Even Though I Knew the End by C. L. Polk 🍁 (Tordotcom)
Secluded Cabin Sleeps Six by Lisa Unger (Park Row)
Africa Risen by Sheree Renee Thomas, Zelda Knight, and Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki (Tordotcom)
The Mother of All Degrassi by Linda Schuyler 🍁 (ECW Press)
Paris Daillencourt Is About to Crumble by Alexis Hall (Forever)