The Check-out Champs of 2021!

Happy New Year, and welcome to our annual In Case You Missed It list of AAPLD's Top 50 most checked-out Adult Fiction, Young Adult Fiction and DVD/Blu-Ray titles for 2021!

Most of the items were released in 2021, but you'll also find perennial favorites, and a few surprises on our lists.

How many have you seen or read? We've profiled check-out champs in each category, and also included two special online catalogs, our Top 50 favorite movies, and a Best Books of 2021 catalog, which includes "Best of" picks from Kirkus, Booklist, Goodreads, The Atlantic, NYT, Time, Literary Hub, Vulture, Vogue, New Yorker, and NPR.

You can also browse in person in the Adult Services department, where we've set up ICYM displays. Pick up a handy list of our Top 50 check-outs, and mark off what you've seen or read. Then add one of our Top 50 reads to your Winter Reading selections, or settle in with one of 2021's most popular movies. We hope you discover a new favorite of your own!

Adult Fiction

With 396 check-outs, The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah was AAPLD's most popular Adult Fiction selection of 2021.

Texas, 1934. Millions are out of work and a drought has broken the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as the crops are failing, and dust threatens to bury them all. One of the darkest periods of the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl era, has arrived with a vengeance. Elsa Martinelli must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or go west, to California, in search of a better life. The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American Dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.

With 289 check-outs, our second most popular Adult Fiction book is The Guest List by Lucy Foley.

On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favors, the boutique whiskey. But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes.  And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why?

 

Young Adult Fiction

With 41 check-outs, our Young Adult check-out champ is A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas

Feyre's survival rests upon her ability to hunt and kill – the forest where she lives is a cold, bleak place in the long winter months. When she spots a deer in the forest being pursued by a wolf, she cannot resist fighting it for the flesh. But to do so, she must kill the predator and killing something so precious comes at a price. Dragged to a magical kingdom for the murder of a faerie, Feyre discovers that her captor, his face obscured by a jewelled mask, is hiding far more than his piercing green eyes would suggest. Feyre's presence at the court is closely guarded, and as she begins to learn why, her feelings for him turn from hostility to passion and the faerie lands become an even more dangerous place. Feyre must fight to break an ancient curse, or she will lose him forever.

With 38 check-outs, Midnight Sun by Stephanie Meyer is the Young Adult runner-up!

When Edward Cullen and Bella Swan met in Twilight, an iconic love story was born. But until now, fans have heard only Bella's side of the story. This unforgettable tale as told through Edward's eyes takes on a new and decidedly dark twist. Meeting Bella is both the most unnerving and intriguing event he has experienced in all his years as a vampire. As we learn more fascinating details about Edward's past and the complexity of his inner thoughts, we understand why this is the defining struggle of his life. How can he justify following his heart if it means leading Bella into danger?

 

Movies

Our most checked-out movie in 2021 was Godzilla vs. Kong, with 148 check-outs!

Legends collide as Godzilla and Kong, the two most powerful forces of nature, clash in a spectacular battle for the ages. As a squadron embarks on a perilous mission into fantastic uncharted terrain, unearthing clues to the Titans' very origins and mankind's survival, a conspiracy threatens to wipe the creatures, both good and bad, from the face of the earth forever.

Black Widow, with 132 check-outs, was the second most popular movie at AAPLD in 2021!

In Marvel Studios' action-packed spy thriller "Black Widow," Natasha Romanoff aka Black Widow confronts the darker parts of her ledger when a dangerous conspiracy with ties to her past arises. Pursued by a force that will stop at nothing to bring her down, Natasha must deal with her history as a spy and the broken relationships left in her wake long before she became an Avenger.