In January of this year, I was at the very very beginning of getting back into reading and I picked up Secret History. It had been on my shelf for years and I had gotten it out of a neighborhood free library/exchange. Having not been in bookish communities much, I’d never heard of it–I just liked the blurb on the back. I was blown away and when I was telling my friend, an avid reader and lit major, about it, she told me about how it was very well-known as a really good book lol. Now that I’ve built out my own reading habits and book-loving community, I hear about it so often and it makes me chuckle every time.
Have you ever had an experience like this? Picked up a book blind or without knowing much about it, and then found out that it was really popular or loved?
Les Misérables. I read it in 7th grade and I picked it because I read the back and thought Jean Valjean was a really funny name.
Picked up the first Harry Potter in the library before I heard the hype.
I did the same thing with Twilight. It blew up about a year after I started getting into it but was already quite popular, I just had no idea. I just picked it up while browsing the young adult section.
ditto on secret history, read it on a whim as it was on the shelf of my office and finished it in practically two sittings! had zero idea it had a huge following
I’m currently reading one, the Devotion of Suspect.
I picked up the name of the wind randomly in my english highschool class, and had never been much of a reader before that. Being a highschooler, I loved it and couldnt wait to read more! I read the second book, and thought the third was just around the corner. This was in 2015.
LOL the third will never come out!
For me this was Don DeLillo’s “White Noise”. Not sure how big the following is compared to these other titles, but it definitely found a devoted audience.
I borrowed this from a library in Japan that had a single shelf of English language literature to choose from. War & Peace was on the same shelf, I eventually read it too out of sheer desperation.
The Shadow of the wind was gifted to me by my friend. Went in blind and loved it. Then realized it has a huge following. Personally love Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s works. RIP my man.
The Magician series by Raymond Feist. I read the first half and spoke to my friends about it. They couldn’t believe I hadn’t heard of it. My reply was why they hadn’t told me about it. This was near 30 years ago, mind you.
Little elderly librarian picked out The Fault in Our Stars for me when I was 14. I had no idea who John Green was or how huge it would be!
It was Never Let Me Go when it first came out. I was randomly buying titles off a blog post. Didn’t even know who Kazuo Ishiguro was, but now he’s my all-time favourite.
I read old short story anthologies so this happens to me a lot.
Stephen King’s Gunslinger was sitting around in a hostel I stayed at. Was the beginning of quite a journey.
Same for me with The Secret History, only I first read it more than a decade ago after discovering it discounted at a bookstore. I had no idea how popular it was until I got more into the bookish scene and joined a book club a few years ago.
I was in middle school and checked out a book based on its cool cover art of a spaceship, I very much enjoyed Enders Game.
Bought all released books of Song of Fire and Ice several years prior TV series started. Haven’t read it for around 5 years after that. But it was curious to see the hype around TV series, while I had books before that. Completed them before TV series ended.
Probably there were more examples like this. Usually, I buy books on the whim even if I don’t know anything about the author.