It’s World Book Day today (3 March), which is a day to celebrate the world of literature.

Every child in the UK will be given a voucher to spend on books and will likely be heading to school this morning wearing a costume, inspired by their favourite novels and stories.

To commemorate the day, we can reveal some of the most popular books for Lancashire book lovers, based on the books borrowed from Lancashire libraries in 2021.

The Freedom of Information request, which was made by whatdotheyknow.com user to Lancashire County Council, reveals the top 25 books borrowed last year along with the number of times they were taken out.

The crime/thriller genre seems to be a popular choice for adult readers while Julia Donaldson books seem to dominate the list, appearing three times, for younger bookworms.

According to the data, the most borrowed book last year was The Thursday Murder Club, written by BBC’s Pointless presenter, Richard Osman.

A copy of this book was borrowed a whopping 1,278 times last year.

It is Osman’s debut novel and was published by Viking Press. The crime novel follows a group of pensioners in a small Kent village, as they attempt to solve the mystery of a property developer.

Lancashire Telegraph: Richard Osman (Photo: BBC/Amanda Benson/PA)Richard Osman (Photo: BBC/Amanda Benson/PA)

Richard was crowned author of the year at the British Book Awards for the novel. It went to the top of the charts after it was released in 2020 and at the end of February it was revealed as the sixth most popular audio book in the charts. 

There are even talks of a film being created.

The best-selling book has been picked up by Steven Spielberg’s production company, Amblin Entertainment, and will be written and directed by Ol Parker.

The data shows that The Sentinel by Lee Child was also a popular adult fiction book and was taken out of Lancashire libraries 947 times.

The most popular children’s book, a third popular overall, came from comedian, David Walliams; ‘Slime’ was borrowed 882 times last year.

Here is a full list of the most popular adult fiction books borrowed from Lancashire libraries in 2021: