'Fire and Fury' sparks interest at Sewickley library, Penguin Bookshop
It's the dead of winter, but things are heating up at libraries and bookshops throughout the country due to the behind-the-scenes tell-all about President Trump.
“ Fire and Fury : Inside the Trump White House,” by author Michael Wolff, has been flying off of the shelves since its Jan. 5 release.
Currently, there are 25 copies of the book circulating in Allegheny County, but that number is expected to rise as branches receive more copies.
By noon Jan. 10, there were 634 holds on print books, 67 holds on books on CD, 140 holds on one eBook version and 56 holds on one eAudio file across the county system.
Meghan Snatchko, communications librarian at Sewickley Public Library, says she hasn't seen a literary uproar like this since the release of “50 Shades of Grey” in 2011.
As of mid-week, Pleasant Hills Public Library still was waiting for their two hardcover copies of “Fire and Fury” and one audiobook to arrive from the distributor.
Library Director Sharon Julian-Milas says requests for the Trump tell-all are higher than usual for a non-fiction work. Typically, new fiction books or the most recent title in a fiction series generate the most demand.
“Because I must stay unbiased as I buy materials for the library, I do not want to consider too deeply the reasons that certain titles are more popular, but ‘Fire and Fury' is undeniably creating a book buzz,” Julian-Milas says. “When ordering for the library, I only look at the statistics of ‘what' is being requested and not the ‘why.'”
Penguin Bookshop in Sewickley sold 49 of its 50 copies in four days. An additional shipment is expected to arrive this week.
“This book was unusual because the release date was suddenly moved up [from Jan. 9 to Jan. 5] and most stores were caught scrambling for books,” owner Susan Hans O'Connor says. “It was hard to get them from the publisher and from our distributor even though we had put in a pre-order back in November.
O'Connor opened her store on Jan. 7 just to sell “Fire and Fury.”
“I was actually surprised we didn't sell out sooner than we did,” she admits.
Kristy Locklin is a Tribune-Review contributing writer.
