1. The Overstory, by Richard Powers
2. The Bookish Life of Nina Hill, by Abby Waxman
3. The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, by Kim Michele Richardson
4. Milwaukee Noir, edited by Tim Hennessy
5. Girl Woman Other, by Bernardine Evaristo
6. Unsheltered, by Barbara Kingstolver
7. Killing Commendatore, by Haruki Murakami
8. Best American Short Stories 2019, edited by Anthony Doerr
9. The Librarian of Auschwitz special edition, by Antonio Iturbe
10. We're All in This Together, by Amy Jones
11. Ohio, by Stephen Markley
12. The Driver V1, by Nick Petrie
13. The Apple Tree, by Daphne DuMaurier, with illustrations by Seth
14. Florida, by Lauren Groff
15. There There, by Tommy Orange
16. The Way of Kings V1, by Brandon Sanderson (Ogi's handselling go-to)
17. Elevation, by Stephen King
18. The Great Alone, by Kristin Hannah
19. Flights, by Olga Tokarczuk
To put the list in perspective, we sold well more than twice as many copies of The Overstory as the #2 book.
What else can we note here? For one thing, four of our top five books are paperback originals, though I should note there are only two others scattered in the top 20, the always paperback original Best American Short Stories and The Apple Tree (we're out of it) the top seller from the Seth graphic Christmas stories that is so popular. It's from Biblioasis.
The Librarian of Auschwitz came out in 2017 as a young adult novel, but when they did the paperback release, they decided to do both an adult and a kids version. The adult one is a hit, probably helped along by sounding connected to that 2018 hit that is still #1 on the bestseller lists, The Tattooist of Auschwitz. That means every major adult bestseller list is dominated by a book published more than a year ago in its current edition - Educated, Where the Crawdads Sing, and I Hear You Paint Houses, which doesn't quite count as its also a newly released movie tie-in as The Irishman.
Paperback Nonfiction:
1. No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference, by Greta Thunberg
2. Field Guide to Birds of Wisconsin, by Charles Hagner/American Birding Association3. These Truths, by Jill Lepore
4. 111 Places in Milwaukee You Must Not Miss, by Michelle Madden
5. Magnificent Machines of Milwaukee, by Thomas H Fehring
6. Leadership, by Doris Kearns Goodwin
7. The Fifth Risk, by Michael Lewis
8. Classic Krakauer, by Jon Krakauer
9. Instant Loss, by Brittany Williams (signed copies available)
10. Calypso, by David Sedaris
11. The Death and Life of the Great Lakes, by Dan Egan
12. St Francis of Assisi, by Jon M Sweeney
13. The Impeachment Report, by the House Intelligence Committee (Jon Meacham introduction)
14. Numbers in Minutes, by Julia Collins
15. Think Little, by Wendell Berry
16. Born a Crime, by Trevor Noah
17. Upstream, by Mary Oliver
18. The Library Book, by Susan Orlean
19. Erebus, by Michael Palin
20. The Wisconsin Story, by Dennis McCann
I'd say there are only four regional books on the list this week, but I can't remember if that's high or low. First time showing is Dennis McCann's The Wisconsin Story, which launched locally at the Milwaukee County Historical Society.
Erebus: One Ship, Two Epic Voyages, and the Greatest Naval Mystery of All Time is the latest from Michael Palin - yes, that Michael Palin, a reprint of a Greystone book from 2018. This is the quote that delivers, from Bill Bryson: "Beyond terrific. I didn't want it to end." We're out of it!
Michael Lewis's The Fifth Risk: Undoing Democracy, is hovering a little higher, in our top ten. For that quote, we'll go to Cory Doctorow: "A hymn to the Deep State, which is revealed as nothing more than people who know what they're talking about."
And finally, we're having a very nice post-event sale for Jon M Sweeney's St Francis of Assisi - we won't have more stock until after Christmas. Sweeney told me that he plans to launch his next book in...Assisi.
Oh, and if someone told you they liked How to Bake Pi, Julia Collins's Numbers in Minutes is a good gift idea, but not from us, not this Christmas - we're out! Collins, among her other accomplishments (she's currently Outreach Officer at the Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute), organized the first Math Crafts Festival - which I'm assuming was either in Scotland or Australia.
Despite us being out of a lot of titles I've highlighted, Boswell is packed with books. I'm sure we'd find titles to check off every person on your holiday gift list - if there's a copy on hand on the Boswell Books website, it might be available, but it also might be on hold or otherwise temporarily displaced. You should probably call or email us first if you're looking for a particular book. And don't forget, if it says "ships in 1-5 days," it means the book is not in stock but is orderable. Browsing is best at this point! We're open 10 am to 5 pm today and closed on Christmas.
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