Sunday, September 15, 2024

Boswell bestsellers, week ending September 14, 2024

Boswell bestsellers, week ending September 14, 2024

Hardcover Fiction:
1. By Any Other Name, by Jodi Picoult (signed copies)
2. Remarkably Bright Creatures, by Shelby Van Pelt
3. James, by Percival Everett
4. Somewhere Beyond the Sea V2, by TJ Klune
5. Tell Me Everything, by Elizabeth Strout
6. Creation Lake, by Rachel Kushner
7. The Devil Raises His Own, by Scott Phillips (signed copies)
8. Colored Television, by Danzy Senna
9. Spirit Crossing V20, by William Kent Krueger
10. Here One Moment, by Liane Moriarty

Wow, this is the first really competitive week for hardcover fiction new releases in a long time, but none of them hit #1, outflanked by our Jodi Picoult event for By Any Other Name, to say nothing Shelby Van Pelt selling out copies as her conversation partner. The top debut is Somewhere Beyond the Sea, the latest from TJ Klune, a writer so popular even his reissued backlist is selling in bestseller numbers. It's got yellow sprayed edges, which means that the standard image we pick up from the publisher is 3D to show it off. From Library Journal: "The follow-up to The House in the Cerulean Sea is another heart-wrenching tale of being perceived as different, finding acceptance, and having a place in the world."

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Experiencing the American Dream, by Mark Matson
2. The Rediscovery of America, by Ned Blackhawk
3. Little Frog's Guide to Self Care, by Maybell Eequay
4. Bone of the Bone, by Sarah Smarsh (Boswell September 19 event)
5. The Demon of Unrest, by Erik Larson
6. What's Next, by Melissa Fitzgerald
7. Nexus, by Yuval Noah Harari
8. Autocracy Inc, by Anne Applebaum
9. The Dane County Farmers Market Cookbook, by Terese Allen
10. The Creative Act, by Rick Rubin

Top debut with traditional sales is Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI, one of many titles about AI coming out this fall. I even read one, just not this one. Yuval Noah Harari, author of the Sapiens phenomenon, has gotten mixed reviews per BookMarks. Dennis Duncan writes in The New York Times: "After a lot of time, we have arrived at a loose proof of what we hopefully felt already: Systems that are self-correcting - because they promote conversation and mutuality - are preferable to those that offer only blind, disenfranchised subservience."

Paperback Fiction:
1. Wish You Were Here, by Jodi Picoult
2. 19 Minutes, by Jodi Picoult
3. Mad Honey, by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan
4. Demon Copperhead, by Barbara Kingsolver
5. The Bookshop of Hidden Dreams, by Karen Hawkins 
6. Whalefall, by Daniel Kraus
7. Some Desperate Glory, by Emily Tesh
8. My Brilliant Friend, by Elena Ferrante
9. Weyward, by Emilia Hart
10. Pay the Piper, by George A Romero and Daniel Kraus

I used the British pop chart model of only including the top 3 backlist titles on the list, avoiding flashbacks of the old New York Times list with seven Garfield titles. Had I not, we would feature eight Jodi Picoult titles. But then I wouldn't be able to note that the paperback release of Whalefall coincides with another Kraus new release, as he completes the second unfinished manuscript of classic filmmaker George A Romero. Pay the Piper got a negative Publishers Weekly, contrasted with upbeat reviews from Library Journal and Booklist, to say nothing of enthusiastic blurbs from contemporary horror greats Paul Tremblay, Grady Hendrix, Tananarive Due, and Joe Hill. From Booklist: "The pervasive unease and steady pacing will lead readers eagerly to the book's final third, where it all breaks wide open, violently revealing the epic root of the terror."

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Caste, by Isabel Wilkerson
2. American Whitelash, by Wesley Lowery
3. As Long as Grass Grows, by Dina Gilio-Whitaker
4. River Profiles, by Pete Hill
5. A Philosophy of Walking, by Frédéric Gros
6. The Art Thief, by Michael Finkel
7. Murdle, by GT Karber
8. Frightful Folklore of North America, by Mike Bass (Boswell September 18 event)
9. How to Listen, by Thich Nhat Hanh
10. Awakening the Heart, by Thich Nhat Hanh

Our top debut from individual sales this week is the latest pull-out from the late Thich Nhat Hanh, How to Listen. Years ago we pulled out this series from Parallax Press and had a little chair on a table inspired by the How to Sit entry. Over half a million Mindfulness Essentials books have been sold since 2015, all illustrated by Jason DeAntonis.

Books for Kids:
1. Shot Clock V1, by Caron Butler and Justin A Reynolds
2. Clutch Time V2, by Caron Butler and Justin A Reynolds
3. The Yellow Bus, by Loren Long
4. Popcorn, by Rob Harrell (Shorewood Library event September 20)
5. Impossible Creatures, by Katherine Rundell
6.
Running in Flip Flops from the End of the World, by Justin A Reynolds
7. We Are Big Time, by Hena Khan (Milwaukee Public Library event today, 2 pm)
8. Peekaboo Pumpkin, by Camilla Reid, illustrated by Ingela P Arrhenius
9. Buffalo Fluffalo, by Bess Kalb, illustrations by Erin Kraan
10. Everything We Never Had, by Randy Ribay (Wauwatosa Library event October 2)

Impossible Creatures, Katherine Rundell's detour into classic kids fantasy has been a huge success in the UK (it was the Waterstone's Book of the Year for 2023), and now it's published Stateside. Kirkus: "An epic fantasy with timeless themes and unforgettable characters." Publishers Weekly: "A boy with an affinity for animals, a girl who can fly when the wind blows, and a secreted-away world in need of saving propel this realms-roving dazzler, a trilogy opener from Rundell" School Library Journal: "A quintessential fantasy that will delight readers of all ages who can handle intense storylines." And I think, despite the 2D cover, that sprayed edges are involved.

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