SECTOR ANALYSIS
Fiction Indie Retailers’ Top 50 Fiction sales soar despite nationwide lockdowns as a result of the pandemic
Title 1 Girl, Woman, Other
2 The Thursday Murder Club 3 Where the Crawdads Sing 4 The Dutch House 5 Queenie 6 Hamnet
7 The Midnight Library 8 V2
CANDICE CARTY-WILLIAMS ENJOYED SUCCESS AT THE NIBBIES WITH QUEENIE
9 The Beekeeper of Aleppo 10 Agent Running in the Field 11 The Second Sleep 12 The Giver of Stars 13 Troubled Blood 14 The Nickel Boys
Fiction sales proved resilient over the course of 2020, despite the government guidelines restricting bookshops opening
Kiera O'Brien @kieraobrien
I
n June, as lockdown restrictions eased and bookshops could open once again, the print market soared. It seemed quarantined Britain had made a specific effort to go to its local bookshop and buy books in person, as that week recorded a 30% rise in both volume and value against the same week in 2019. Weekly summertime sales were at Christmas levels. But then, the boom continued—and continued.
In the period between lockdowns from mid- June to early November, print books sold 80
million units for over £700m, a rise of 15% in volume and 13% in value. Fiction, in particular, exploded. In the week running up to Lockdown 1.0,
06 The Bookseller Buyer’s Guide Fiction
15 Those Who Are Loved 16 Normal People 17 The Offing 18 Summer
19 Sweet Sorrow 20 The Testaments
21 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this... 22 The Confession 23 Ghosts
24 A Thousand Ships 25 The Vanishing Half
26 The Lying Life of Adults 27 The Darkest Evening 28 A Gentleman in Moscow 29 Big Sky 30 Trio
31 Conversations with Friends 32 Us Three
33 A Song for the Dark Times 34 Girl
35 Fleishman Is in Trouble 36 Lockdown
37 The Long Call 38 Burnt Sugar 39 Summerwater 40 Utopia Avenue 41 The Shadow King 42 Shuggie Bain 43 Such a Fun Age
44 My Sister, the Serial Killer 45 My Brilliant Friend 46 A Single Thread 47 The Starless Sea
48 Miss Benson’s Beetle 49 Expectation
50 The Evening and the Morning Author Bernardine Evaristo
Imprint Penguin
Richard Osman Viking Delia Owens Corsair Ann Patchett Bloomsbury Candice Carty-Williams Trapeze Maggie O’Farrell Tinder Press Matt Haig Canongate Robert Harris Hutchinson Christy Lefteri Manilla John le Carré Penguin Robert Harris Arrow Jojo Moyes Penguin Robert Galbraith Sphere Colson Whitehead Fleet Victoria Hislop Headline Sally Rooney Faber & Faber Benjamin Myers Bloomsbury Ali Smith Hamish Hamilton David Nicholls Hodder Margaret Atwood Vintage Elif Shafak Penguin Jessie Burton Picador Dolly Alderton Fig Tree Natalie Haynes Picador Brit Bennett Dialogue Elena Ferrante
Europa Editions
Ann Cleeves Macmillan Amor Towles Windmill Kate Atkinson Black Swan William Boyd
Viking
Sally Rooney Faber & Faber Ruth Jones Bantam Ian Rankin Orion
Edna O’Brien Faber & Faber Taffy Brodesser-Akner Wildfire Peter May riverrun
ISBN (+978) Volume 0241984994
0241425442 1472154668 1526614971
Paperback Hardback Paperback Paperback
1409180074 Paperback 1472223791 1786892706 1786331403 1838770013 0241986547 1787460966 0718183219 0751579932 0708899427 1472223227 0571334650 1526611307 0241207062 1444715422 1784708214 0241979464 1509886197 0241434543 1509836215 0349701462 1787702363 1509889518 0099558781 0552776660 0241295953 0571333134 1787632257 1409176978 0571341184
Ann Cleeves Pan 1509889600 Avni Doshi Hamish Hamilton Sarah Moss Picador David Mitchell Sceptre Maaza Mengiste
Canongate Douglas Stuart Picador Europa Editions
Hardback Hardback Hardback Paperback Paperback Paperback Paperback Hardback Paperback Paperback Paperback Paperback Hardback Paperback Paperback Paperback Paperback Hardback Paperback Hardback Hardback Hardback Paperback Paperback Hardback Paperback Hardback Hardback Paperback
1472267078 Paperback 1529411690
0241441510 1529035438 1444799422 1838851170 1529019278
Kiley Reid Bloomsbury Circus 1526612144 Oyinkan Braithwaite Atlantic Elena Ferrante
Tracy Chevalier Borough Press Erin Morgenstern Vintage Rachel Joyce Doubleday Anna Hope Black Swan Ken Follett Macmillan
Paperback Paperback Paperback Hardback Hardback Paperback Hardback Hardback
1786495983 Paperback 1787702226 0008153847 1784702861 0857521989 1784162801 1447278788
Date range 15th June to 7th November 2020. Unless otherwise stated, charts use data from Nielsen BookScan Total Consumer Market, representing print book sales through around 6,500 retailers. Any title discounted by more than 74.5% is ineligible for inclusion.
Paperback Paperback Paperback Hardback Paperback Hardback
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