With juvenile sales falling 13% and adult nonfiction dropping 8.6%, print unit sales fell 8.3% last week at outlets that report to NPD BookScan.
The decline in adult nonfiction compared to the week ended March 13, 2021, came despite a strong showing by three new bibles released by Tyndale House. The NLT Premium Gift Bible was #1 on the adult nonfiction list, selling more than 91,000 copies, while two other bibles combined to sell about 34,000 copies. A number of other new releases had good debuts as well, including The Wok by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, which sold over 33,000 copies, and William Barr’s One Damn Thing after Another, which sold just over 23,000 copies.
The 13.1% decline in juvenile fiction was due in part to another week of difficult comparisons to sales of Dr. Seuss books that were benefitting last year from the controversy over the decision by Dr. Seuss Enterprises to stop publication of six older Seuss books. Though sales last year had cooled compared to previous weeks, they were still higher than normal. Green Eggs and Ham, for example, sold almost 45,000 copies a year ago and sold only 18,000 copies last week. Last year's sales also began to see the first affects of Easter book buying. (Easter was almost two weeks earlier in 2021 than this year, when it is on April 17.)
The discrepancy in Easter dates also likely played a role in dropping juvenile nonfiction sales by 13.5% in the week. The #1 title in the category last week was Super Extra Deluxe Essential Handbook (Pokémon), which sold over 6,000 copies.
Adult fiction sales rose 2.9% over 2021, helped by sales of three new releases. Run, Rose, Run by James Patterson and Dolly Parton was the #1 seller overall seller last week, selling nearly 113,000 copies in its first week on sale. In second place on the category list was Shadow Reel by C.J. Box, which sold over 36,000 copies in its first week.
