About a year ago, I wrote about frequently stolen books. The Times just did an unscientific survey to discover the most-stolen book in the United Kingdom. The winner is a street atlas. Also on the top ten list are fantasy novels (Terry Pratchett is the highest-ranking author, but Tolkien and Rowling are right up there, too) and lots of reference books. (Do they not have Google in Great Britain?)
It's a really interesting piece that looks at petty offenders and big-time crooks:
Paranoia or conspiracy? In 2004 a man was jailed after it was revealed that he ran a gang of thieves who stole Lonely Planet travel guides to order. He had sold an estimated 35,000 stolen books a year.In April last year, a Glasgow man was jailed for 26 months for selling stolen books worth ÂŁ50,000 on eBay, under the pseudonym âeasypeesyâ. Gary Little, 44, admitted taking the books when he was working as a forklift truck driver at a HarperCollins publishing plant. When an annoyed book trader found deluxe bound editions of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion collection, which usually sold for ÂŁ100, on offer at ÂŁ30, he contacted Little's bosses and the jig was up.