Order in the Court

Fantasy author Sarah J. Maas has the #1 book in the country with A Court of Silver Flames, fifth in the series she launched with 2015’s A Court of Thorns and Roses. Bloomsbury originally published the first four books as YA; the fifth book, which is the first whose protagonist is a grown woman, has been released as an adult novel. The preceding books in the series have also been moved to Bloomsbury’s adult list, and a 2020 edition of A Court of Thorns and Roses lands at #17 on our trade paperback list.

Add It Up

The #6 book in the country, The Sum of Us, is political commentator and strategist Heather McGhee’s “astute and persuasive debut,” our starred review said, in which she makes the case that “income inequality and the decline of the middle and working classes in America are a direct result of the country’s long history of racial injustice.” McGhee documents instances in which “racism against Black Americans has diminished everyone’s quality of life and forestalled social progress,” marshaling “a wealth of information into a cohesive narrative that ends on a hopeful note” and “casts America’s racial divide in a new light.” The author’s wide-ranging slate of virtual appearances has included a webinar with Sen. Elizabeth Warren and, above, a discussion with musician and philanthropist John Legend on his 13.5 million follower–strong Instagram platform.

Online Chatter

No One Is Talking About This, poet and essayist Patricia Lockwood’s first novel, debuts at #20 on our hardcover fiction list. The book, in which a social media maven copes with a family crisis, is “packed with the humor, bawdiness, and lyrical insight that buoyed her memoir Priestdaddy,” our starred review said. In a prepub interview with PW, Lockwood discussed her own evolving relationship with the online world. “I wanted to look at periods where you’re forced off the internet,” she said. “You inhabit your body more when you’re in crisis, or when someone you love is in crisis, and I think you need to go to the scene where things are happening. You need to support a human body.”

NEW & NOTABLE

HOW TO AVOID A CLIMATE DISASTER
Bill Gates
#1 hardcover nonfiction, #3 overall
Microsoft cofounder and philanthropist Gates “is optimistic in this cogent guide to avoiding ‘the worst effects of climate change,’ ” our review said. Though “not all of his ideas strike as politically feasible,” readers “looking for an accessible review of how global warming can be countered will find this a handy—and maybe even hope-inspiring—guide.”

THE DAUGHTERS OF KOBANI
Gayle Tzemach Lemmon
#18 hardcover nonfiction
The author, a national security analyst, “delivers a fascinating portrait of Kurdish female fighters and their role in the Syrian civil war and the fight against the Islamic State,” our starred review said. “Lemmon briskly sketches the biographies of individual fighters and commanders, and unravels the complex history of the region with skill.”