Finding a copy of ‘Spare’ can be a royal pain at the library. Here are other options.
The memoir is hot, but there are other reads to consider in the meantime.
Prince Harry’s hot, new memoir “Spare” only came out two weeks ago, but already the prospect of getting a copy from your library feels like trying to score a reservation at a top restaurant. Your bad luck? Nope. You’ve got lots of company on that wait-list.
Libraries all over the country are finding themselves swamped by the demand for the royal tell-all in all its forms — hard copy, e-book, and audiobook, the last of which has Harry reading his own story.
Even as libraries have been striving to increase their inventory of the book, the public appetite continues. According to OverDrive, the parent company of the Libby library reading apps, it has never seen this kind of demand for an e-book at public libraries in 20 years of business and millions of titles.
“It’s just a phenomenon,” said Meghan Volchko, Libby’s digital content librarian. “The investment some libraries have put into the e-book and the audiobook version is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before.”
And, she added, “It’s not showing any signs of slowing right now.”
Coming on the heels of a Netflix doc-series about Prince Harry and wife Meghan Markle, as well as the couple’s and Harry’s much-covered problems with the royal family, the British press, and their new life in America, Spare was primed for high demand.
Publisher Penquin Random House announced that the memoir had already sold 1.6 million copies in the United States alone and 3.2 million copies worldwide after one week of publication, the Associated Press reported. In the United Kingdom, Spare sold 400,000 in all its forms on its first day.
Local libraries are feeling the demand from readers.
The Camden County Library System, which currently has 20 hardcover editions, already has five times the number of people on its regular-size print wait-list as it has copies of that edition of the book, plus a long wait-list for its large print version, according to executive director Linda Devlin.
“People want it so badly that they’ll ask for either version,” Devlin said.
The South Jersey library system has more copies on order.
Among readers of the Philadelphia Free Library, the demand for Spare also outstrips the supply, and more have been ordered.
Of course, expect Philly to zig when others zag. Free Library spokesperson Kaitlyn Foti Kalosy said, as of the end of last week, four other books had more people waiting to read them than Spare.
Those were I’m Glad My Mom Died, by Jennette McCurdy, Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid, Verity by Colleen Hoover, and Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus.
Aside from all the pre-publicity, there are a lot of reasons why “Spare” intrigues people, suggested Libby’s Volchko.
“The British Empire has touched almost every place on this planet for better or worse,” she said. Plus there’s that storybook love story of the prince and the actress. And what family doesn’t have its share of problems?
With those themes in mind, Volchko put together a list of books to consider while you wait for your copy of Spare. Happy reading.
1. The Diana Chronicles by Tina Brown
2. Meghan and Harry by Lady Colin Campbell
3. The Palace Papers by Tina Brown
4. American Royalty by Tracey Livesay
5. The King by Christopher Anderson
6. Brothers and Wives by Christopher Anderson
7. Finding Freedom by Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand
8. Diana, William and Harry by James Patterson
9. American Royals by Katharine McGee
10. The New Royals by Katie Nicholl