British British Library Popular Books
British British Library Biography & Facts
The British Library is a research library in London that is the national library of the United Kingdom. It is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British Library receives copies of all books produced in the United Kingdom and Ireland, including a significant proportion of overseas titles distributed in the UK. The Library is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. The British Library is a major research library, with items in many languages and in many formats, both print and digital: books, manuscripts, journals, newspapers, magazines, sound and music recordings, videos, play-scripts, patents, databases, maps, stamps, prints, drawings. The Library's collections include around 14 million books, along with substantial holdings of manuscripts and items dating as far back as 2000 BC. The library maintains a programme for content acquisition and adds some three million items each year occupying 9.6 kilometres (6 mi) of new shelf space. Prior to 1973, the Library was part of the British Museum, also in the Borough of Camden. The Library's modern purpose-built building stands next to St Pancras station on Euston Road in Somers Town, on the site of a former goods yard. There is an additional storage building and reading room in the branch library near Boston Spa in Yorkshire. The St Pancras building was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II on 25 June 1998, and is classified as a Grade I listed building "of exceptional interest" for its architecture and history. Early foundations The British Library was created on 1 July 1973 as a result of the British Library Act 1972. Prior to this, the national library was part of the British Museum, which provided the bulk of the holdings of the new library, alongside smaller organisations which were folded in (such as the National Central Library, the National Lending Library for Science and Technology and the British National Bibliography). In 1974 functions previously exercised by the Office for Scientific and Technical Information were taken over; in 1982 the India Office Library and Records and the HMSO Binderies became British Library responsibilities. In 1983, the Library absorbed the National Sound Archive, which holds many sound and video recordings, with over a million discs and thousands of tapes. The core of the Library's historical collections is based on a series of donations and acquisitions from the 18th century. These are known as the "foundation collections", and they include the books and manuscripts: in the possession of Sir Robert Cotton in the early 17th century (now called the Cottonian Library), of Sir Hans Sloane (d. 1753) of Robert Harley (d. 1721) the King's Library of King George III; and the Old Royal Library donated by King George II. For many years its collections were dispersed in various buildings around central London, in places such as Bloomsbury (within the British Museum), Chancery Lane, Bayswater, and Holborn, with an interlibrary lending centre at Boston Spa, 2.5 miles (4 km) east of Wetherby in West Yorkshire (situated on Thorp Arch Trading Estate), and the newspaper library at Colindale, north-west London. Initial plans for the British Library required demolition of an integral part of Bloomsbury – a seven-acre swathe of streets immediately in front of the Museum, so that the Library could be situated directly opposite. After a long and hard-fought campaign led by Dr George Wagner, this decision was overturned and the library was instead constructed by John Laing plc on a site at Euston Road next to St Pancras railway station. Following the closure of the Round Reading Room on 25 October 1997 the library stock began to be moved into the St Pancras building. Before the end of that year the first of eleven new reading rooms had opened and the moving of stock was continuing. From 1997 to 2009 the main collection was housed in this single new building and the collection of British and overseas newspapers was housed at Colindale. In July 2008 the Library announced that it would be moving low-use items to a new storage facility in Boston Spa in Yorkshire and that it planned to close the newspaper library at Colindale, ahead of a later move to a similar facility on the same site. From January 2009 to April 2012 over 200 km of material was moved to the Additional Storage Building and is now delivered to British Library Reading Rooms in London on request by a daily shuttle service. Construction work on the Additional Storage Building was completed in 2013 and the newspaper library at Colindale closed on 8 November 2013. The collection has now been split between the St Pancras and Boston Spa sites. The British Library Document Supply Service (BLDSS) and the Library's Document Supply Collection is based on the same site in Boston Spa. Collections housed in Yorkshire, comprising low-use material and the newspaper and Document Supply collections, make up around 70% of the total material the library holds. The Library previously had a book storage depot in Woolwich, south-east London, which is no longer in use. The new library was designed specially for the purpose by the architect Colin St John Wilson in collaboration with his wife MJ Long, who came up with the plan that was subsequently developed and built. Facing Euston Road is a large piazza that includes pieces of public art, such as large sculptures by Eduardo Paolozzi (a bronze statue based on William Blake's study of Isaac Newton) and Antony Gormley. It is the largest public building constructed in the United Kingdom in the 20th century. In the middle of the building is a six-storey glass tower inspired by a similar structure in the Beinecke Library, containing the King's Library with 65,000 printed volumes along with other pamphlets, manuscripts and maps collected by King George III between 1763 and 1820. In December 2009 a new storage building at Boston Spa was opened by Rosie Winterton. The new facility, costing £26 million, has a capacity for seven million items, stored in more than 140,000 bar-coded containers and which are retrieved by robots from the 162.7 miles of temperature and humidity-controlled storage space. On Friday, 5 April 2013, the Library announced that it would begin saving all sites with the suffix .uk in a bid to preserve the nation's "digital memory" (which as of then amounted to about 4.8 million sites containing 1 billion web pages). The Library would make all the material publicly available to users by the end of 2013, and would ensure that, through technological advancements, all the material is preserved for future generations, despite the fluidity of the Internet. The Euston Road building was Grade I listed on 1 August 2015. It has plans to open a third location in Leeds, potentially located in the Grade 1 listed Temple Works. Legal deposi.... Discover the British British Library popular books. Find the top 100 most popular British British Library books.
Best Seller British British Library Books of 2024
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Glass Houses
Louise PennyAn instant New York Times Bestseller and August 2017 LibraryReads pick!“Penny’s absorbing, intricately plotted 13th Gamache novel proves she only gets better at pursuing dark truth...
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Necessary as Blood
Deborah CrombieNecessary As Blood is the latest entry in Deborah Crombie’s New York Times Notable, Edgar®, Agatha, and Macavity Awardsnominated mystery series featuring Scotland Yard detectives D...
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Murder on the Orient Express
Agatha ChristieTHE MOST WIDELY READ MYSTERY OF ALL TIMENOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE DIRECTED BY KENNETH BRANAGH AND PRODUCED BY RIDLEY SCOTT!“The murderer is with uson the train now . . .”Just afte...
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All the Devils Are Here
Louise PennyINSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERPARADE MAGAZINE – ONE OF FALL'S MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKSAARP'S MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF FALLCRIMEREADS – ONE OF THE BEST TRADITIONAL MYSTERIES OF...
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Sacred Games
Vikram ChandraNow a Netflix original series“SACRED GAMES [is] as hard to put down as it is to pick up.” New York Times Book Review“Bold, fresh and big…SACRED GAMES deserve...
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Murder at the 42nd Street Library
Con LehaneThis first book in an irresistible new series introduces librarian and reluctant sleuth Raymond Ambler, a doggedly curious fellow who uncovers murderous secrets hidden behind the m...
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Watching the Dark
Peter RobinsonNew York Times bestselling author Peter Robinson brings back Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks and his colleague DI Annie Cabbot in a case riddled with corruption.A decorated po...
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The First 3 Miss Marple Mysteries
Agatha ChristieThe Murder at the Vicarage is Agatha Christie’s first mystery to feature the beloved investigator Miss Marpleas a dead body in a clergyman’s study proves to the indomitable sleuth ...
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The Long Call
Ann CleevesAN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!NOW A BRITBOX SERIES STARRING BEN ALDRIDGE AND PEARL MACKIEThe Long Call from Ann Cleevesbestselling and awardwinning author of the Vera and Sh...
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In a Dark House
Deborah CrombieAn abandoned Southwark warehouse burns next door to a women's shelter for victims of spousal abuse. Within it lies the charred corpse of a female body burned beyond all recognition...
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The Sound of Broken Glass
Deborah CrombieScotland Yard detectives Duncan Kincaid and Gemma James are on the case in Deborah Crombie’s The Sound of Broken Glass, a captivating mystery that blends a murder from the past wit...
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Hickory Dickory Dock
Agatha ChristieA most unusual series of crimes at a student hostel intrigues Inspector Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christie’s Hickory Dickory Dock, especially when a simple case of kleptomania paves...
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Silence in the Library
Katharine SchellmanRegency widow Lily Adler didn't expect to find a corpse when visiting a family friend. Now it's up to her to discover the killer in the charming second installment in the Lily Adle...
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Death of an Author
E.C.R. LoracE. C. R. Lorac spins a twisting tale full of wry humor and red herrings, poking some fun at her contemporary reviewers, who long suspected the Lorac pseudonym to belong to a male a...
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The Man in the Brown Suit
Agatha ChristieThe Man in the Brown Suit is Agatha Christie at her best, as a young woman makes a dangerous decision to investigate a shocking “accidental” death she witnesses at a London tube st...
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Dead Wrong
J. A. JanceJuggling a family and a career has never been easy for Cochise County Sheriff Joanna Brady. Now the impending birth of her second child only adds to her burden, especially when two...
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The Kidnapped Prime Minister
Agatha ChristieJust as World War I is drawing to an end, the prime minister is kidnapped. It is down to Hercule Poirot to locate him before a crucial conference, to avert an international crisis.
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The Case of the Middle-Aged Wife
Agatha ChristieMaria Packington suspects her husband of having an affair. In an attempt to revitalise her marriage, she responds to an ad from Mr. Parker Pyne – who promises to provide solutions ...
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The Serpent on the Crown
Elizabeth PetersThe New York Times bestselling “Grande Dame of historical mystery” (Washington Post) returns with another thrilling tale of mystery, As the l92122 season begins, the Emersons are e...
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The Lost Book of the Grail
Charlie LovettFrom the New York Times bestselling author of The Bookman’s Tale comes a new novel about an obsessive bibliophile’s quest through time to discover a missing manuscript, the unknown...
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Friend of the Devil
Peter RobinsonNew York Times bestselling and Edgar awardwinning author Peter Robinsona riveting double homicide leaves two seasoned detectives baffled as they race against the clock before more ...
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The Affair of the Pink Pearl
Agatha ChristieAgatha Christie’s Tommy and Tuppence Beresford are Partners in Crimeor rather partners in crime solvingand must demonstrate their deductive skills in a wide range of conf...
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Where Memories Lie
Deborah Crombie“Chilling and humane….Skillful and subtle….A deeply moving novel that transcends genre.” Richmond Times DispatchA sinister mystery that leads all the way back to the Holocaust ensn...
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Bunburry - Deadlier than Fiction
Helena MarchmontMiss Marple meets Oscar Wilde in this new series of cosy mysteries set in the picturesque Cotswolds village of Bunburry.In "Deadlier than Fiction”, amateur sleuth Alfie McAlister e...
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Bodies from the Library
Tony Medawar, Agatha Christie, Georgette Heyer, A. A. Milne, Nicholas Blake & Christianna BrandThis anthology of rare stories of crime and suspense brings together 16 rare tales by masters of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction for the first time in book form, including a ne...
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Bad Boy
Peter RobinsonFrom New York Times bestselling author Peter Robinson comes this mesmerizing storywithinastorythat will thrill his fans and bring him many new readers.A distraught woman arrives at...
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The Jewel Robbery at the Grand Metropolitan
Agatha ChristieHercule Poirot and Captain Hastings are on holiday at the opulent Grand Metropolitan Hotel in Brighton, where they meet the wife of a wealthy stockbroker. As they discuss the jewel...
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The Million Dollar Bond Robbery
Agatha ChristieA young banker is suspected of stealing one million dollars in Liberty Bonds on a transatlantic journey to New York, and appeals to Hercule Poirot to clear his name. Poirot learns ...
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The Seven Dials Mystery
Agatha ChristieA practical joke goes chillingly, murderously wrong in Queen of Mystery Agatha Christie’s classic detective story, The Seven Dials Mystery.Gerry Wade had proved himself to be a cha...
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All the Colors of Darkness
Peter RobinsonNew York Times bestselling and Edgar Awardwinning author Peter Robinson delivers a gripping novel of jealousy, betrayal, envy, ambition, greed, lust, revengeall the colors of darkn...
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The Janus Stone
Elly GriffithsIt’s been only a few months since archaeologist Ruth Galloway found herself entangled in a missing persons case, barely escaping with her life. But when construction workers demoli...
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In a Dry Season
Peter RobinsonNew York Times bestselling and Edgar Awardwinning author Peter Robinson delivers an unforgettable, compelling thriller of a lost village and the deadly secrets that are unearthed u...
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Children of the Storm
Elizabeth PetersOnce again, the New York Times bestselling author of the Amelia Peabody novels “kicks up a desert storm.”PeopleThe “grande dame of historical mystery” (Washington Post) is back wit...
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This Body of Death
Elizabeth George“Elizabeth George reigns as queen of the mystery genre. The Lynley books constitute the smartest, most gratifyingly complex and impassioned mystery series now being published.” Ent...
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The Bodies in the Library
Marty WingateHayley Burke's fresh start as the curator of The First Edition Society's library in Bath, England, is about to take a rotten turn in this charming new mystery series from USA Today...
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The Little Lost Library
Ellery AdamsIn the latest in the mystery series hailed as “a love letter to reading” (Entertainment Weekly) from New York Times bestselling author Ellery Adams, Nora Pennington helps her books...
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The Silence of the Library
Miranda JamesWhen a beloved mystery author’s visit causes a stir in their small Mississippi town, librarian Charlie Harris and his cat Diesel must outwit a fiction fanatic turned reallife kille...
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The Woman in the Library
Sulari GentillWINNER OF THE CRIME FICTION LOVER BEST INDIE NOVEL 2022 NOMINEE 2023 EDGAR AWARDS MARY HIGGINS CLARK AWARD ‘a true master of the genre’ The Sydney Morning Herald ‘Wickedly clever...
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Guardian of the Horizon
Elizabeth PetersReaders have long wondered what befell the Emerson clan during the years before the Great War. Now, at last, the silence is broken and the truth revealed of a perilous journey to a...
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Lion in the Valley
Elizabeth PetersThe 189596 season promises to be an exceptional one for Amelia Peabody, her dashing Egyptologist husband Emerson, and their wild and precocious eightyearold son Ramses. The muchcov...
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A Test of Wills
Charles Todd“Todd has written a first novel that speaks out, urgently and compassionately, for a longdead generation….A meticulously wrought puzzle.”New York Times Book Review“An intricately p...
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Partners in Crime
Agatha ChristieAgatha Christie’s Tommy and Tuppence Beresford are Partners in Crimeor rather partners in crime solvingand must demonstrate their deductive skills in a wide range of conf...
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The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim
Agatha ChristieMr. Davenheim, a wealthy financier, leaves his home to mail a letter, then fails to return. The story fills the newspapers and intrigues Hercule Poirot, who challenges Inspector Ja...
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The Secret of Chimneys
Agatha ChristieWhat is The Secret of Chimneys? A young drifter finds out when a favor for a friend pulls him into the heart of a deadly conspiracy in this captivating classic from Agatha Chr...
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Den of Iniquity
J. A. JanceNew York Times bestselling author J. A. Jance returns with a new pulsepounding suspense novel featuring beloved private investigator J. P. Beaumont as his investigation of a seemin...
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Piece of My Heart
Peter RobinsonNew York Times bestselling author Peter Robinson’s Chief Inspector Alan Banks must turn to a murder committed in the 1960s in order to solve a presentday homicide as he races to un...