Contents -- Introduction -- Fiction and the Archives -- The 'Rise' of the Novel, Women Readers, and the Problem of Evidence -- London Booksellers and their Archives -- The Booksellers: The Clays and Stevens and their Communities -- Clay Day Books, their Nature and Problems -- Day Book and Ledger Evidence and the Market for Fiction -- 1. Audiences for Novels: Gendered Reading -- The Audiences for Novels and Gender -- Adult Customers of the Clays and Stevens -- Men, Reviews, and Book Clubs -- Provincial Women Readers -- Case Studies of Women Customers -- Some Conclusions -- 2. Consuming Practices: Canonicity, Novels, and Plays -- Canonization, Readers, Anonymity, and Female Novelists -- Canonizing Drama -- Reading Practices: Multiple and Repeated Readings -- Reading Practices: Desultory Reading -- 3. Schoolboy Readers: John Newbery's Goody Two-Shoes and Licensed War -- Rugby School -- School Culture: Licensed War -- Reading Children's Books -- The Case of Goody Two-Shoes -- The Episodes of Goody Two-Shoes -- Making Sense of Goody Two-Shoes -- 4. Schoolboy Practices: Novels, Children's Books, Chapbooks, and Magazines -- Accounts of Schoolboy Reading -- Little Books-Abridgements in Chapbooks versus Children's Books -- Schoolboys Read Novels: Rugby School -- Secret Novel Reading at Rugby? -- More Schoolboys Read Even More Novels: Daventry Dissenting Academy -- Schoolboy Subscribers to Magazines -- 5. Audiences for Magazines and Serialized Publications -- Men who Read the Lady's Magazine -- Concealed Women Subscribers -- Magazine Subscribers and the Market -- Growth and Attrition in Magazine Audiences -- Audiences for Magazines and Novels -- Case Study: The Novelist's Magazine -- Serialized Publications -- Summary -- Conclusion -- Appendices -- 1. Clays' Circulating Library Stocks -- 2. Novels in English Bought and Borrowed, 1744-1807.

3. All Children's Book and Chapbook Titles Bought by Rugby Boys -- 4. Magazines taken by Clay customers, 1746-1780 -- 5. Adult consumers of Novels and Magazines, 1746-1780 -- Bibliography -- Index to Novels, Bought and Borrowed -- A -- B -- C -- D -- F -- G -- H -- J -- K -- L -- M -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- V -- W -- Index to Customers for Novels -- General Index -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- R -- S -- T -- V -- W.