EL James — Fifty Shades of guests … two of El James's erotic novels appear on list of books most likely to be left at a Travelodge hotel. Photograph: Michael Lionstar

Fifty Shades Freed is book most likely to be left in Travelodge hotel room

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EL James's erotic novel tops the list of 20 books readers leave at hotels as a favour to others – or because they find them boring

Erotica writer and highest earning author of the year EL James has bagged a not-so-glittering accolade: book most likely to be left in a Travelodge, for her Fifty Shades Freed.

The multimillionaire appears three times with her Fifty Shades trilogy in the budget hotel chain's annual top 20 discarded books list; she secured the number one spot with 1,209 abandoned copies of Fifty Shades Freed.

Erotica rules the list of forgotten or unwanted tomes in 2013, picking up on a theme from 2008 when 10 copies of the Kama Sutra were left in a Travelodge in Peterborough. This year at number two, and number seven, are erotica titles Bared To You and Reflected In You by Sylvia Day, while New York Times' bestselling author Jennifer Probst features three times with books from her erotica trilogy Billionaire.

At number four is Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl, and JK Rowling's The Casual Vacancy, her debut novel for adults published under her own name in 2012 makes it in at number five.

The top three reasons for abandoning books in Travelodge rooms are "finished reading it and left it for others", followed by "genuinely lost or forgot it", and "got bored". A total of 22,648 books were left behind during the past 12 months.

Three celebrity autobiographies feature in this year's top 20 most discarded books: Olympic Gold medal winning cyclist Bradley Wiggins's My Time, in at number eight, pop singer Cheryl Cole's My Story, at 11, and comedian David Walliams's autobiography, Camp David, at 13.

Surprise entry F Scott Fitzgerald scrapes in at number 20 with his 1925 novel The Great Gatsby.