It isn't a known bug. The contents of those shelves are random, so the manuscript can be ignored if you can not find a workaround (assuming that is the only place it crashes).
If you have the Steam version, try verifying local files: in the Steam library, right click on the game and select Properties, switch to the Local Files tab and then click on the 'Verify Integrity of Game Cache...' button.
With the GOG version, if you downloaded the installer (or Anthology version, etc) you can do a clean reinstall of the game. Copy, zip or move the savegame folder as a precaution, then uninstall, maybe reboot, shut down all non-essential programs, make sure everything except the savegames folder is removed from the install folder, then reinstall the game.
You could try lowering the game resolution, and see if that avoids the crash. I don't recall any non-startup crashes dependent on resolution, though.