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[jerseyjay]

Do a search on WorldCat. It won't say how many people have read the book, but at least if it has been bought by different libraries.

But, in history at least, it sometimes takes a while for books to hit the radar screen.

On journal I have on my desk has review articles covering 26 books. Here are the publication dates:
2007: five books
2008: twelve books
2009: eight books
2010: one book

Also, keep in mind that due to peer review, a reference to a recent book in an article I am writing now would not appear in print until at the very earliest a year from now, and quite possible several years.

[11thfloor]

Thank you JerseyJay for those review dates which are very comforting and the worldcat advice is brilliant, I looked up all sorts of things, I can't believe what books of mine are in all these university libraries all over America!  America is amazing!  The UK has comparatively nothing, of mine, that is, but I'm not American - how did these libraries know I existed?  I feel like visiting all these libraries and taking down my books just to believe they are really there!  I hope students are browsing the shelves...

[bwwm1]

Bear in mind that Worldcat does not have all the libraries that own a given book. Libraries have to pay to have their catalogues uploaded to Worldcat, and many choose not to do so. It may be that many libraries in the UK do not want to pay Worldcat.

[koda_kube]

Thanky you JerseyJay - I didn't know about Worldcat either.  My one and only book came out in August - publisher told me how many copies had been sold but worldcat let me know which universities have it which was great.
I get quite embarrassed though when students and faculty buy it and come to get my 'autograph'

[ellerton]

Well, you should try selling them to libraries, then after they purchase the book, look it up on WorldCat and see who owns them. 22 libraries own my book because of my own marketing.

This is a far out idea: get your book into a time capsule, then it will be opened in 100 years, and I bet somebody will read it then. Only you will never know! By then books may be obsolete or rare.

Seriously, it takes time and much patience for people to read books, especially depending on its length and difficulty.
I do not recommend that you ask people to read your book. They might say yes, then won't. It has to be their idea and they must insist on reading it. Of course, some will read only part of the book then quit.

[11thfloor]

Does anyone have an inspiring story about their own book not getting read - as far as they knew - for a year or two and then suddenly getting picked up and cited by people and they started getting invited to conferences etc?  Or, does anyone have a story about how their groundbreaking research never made an impact, and what they did next? 

[collegekidsmom]

If you are in Worldcat, you can click through to the catalogs to see where they are checked out. I have one book out this year and I am sorry to say that on occasion I go to the best libraries on the list hoping to see "checked out." I am so excited when I see that they are out. Of course, I have never admitted that I do that. I started checking WorldCat within weeks of the book's release...

I show everyone WorldCat because it does cover most of the "good" academic libraries. The RLIN catalog, now defunct was the source for only those books in research level libraries. WorldCat now includes most research libraries, small libraries, public libraries all in one place. WorldCat is also a good place to do a good old subject search of books on topic. It's pretty comprehensive really. Many people search WorldCat instead of their native library catalog because the interface is good and the search works well.

[seniorscholar]

It may be that many libraries in the UK do not want to pay Worldcat.

Most do, I think, but in any case, there's a university union catalogue in the UK:

http://copac.ac.uk/

[hegemony]

Wait five years and then type the name of your book into Google Book Search and see how many people have published citing you.  That's usually a nice encouraging survey.  It will be even more after ten years, of course, because of the time it takes others to write and publish their stuff that cites you.

The lack of obvious response right now certainly doesn't mean that no one will care in the long term.  How many of the books you've used for various projects are hot off the press, or even published in the last three years?  Academic books aren't like John Grisham novels where everyone waits breathlessly for publication date.  They come out without fanfare and gradually people do searches and find them and read them and cite them and other people read those books and follow up their references and find your book, and so on.  The feedback accumulates slowly over time.

[luder]

Haven't yet tried it myself (one of these days, maybe), but Amazon has recently been crowing about how it is giving Nielsen BookScan figures to authors who set up an "author central" account (free, I think) at Amazon. BookScan figures don't cover all sales, of course, and they don't tell you who is reading your books, but they are interesting, as they can tell you where (by city) they are being sold.

[verbena]

For those checking Amazon rankings: these can vary widely within the space of one afternoon.