Despite a huge gain in adult fiction, print unit sales fell 2.5% last week compared to the week ended July 17, 2021, at outlets that report to NPD BookScan. The decline was the smallest in months, and the sales drop for the year-to-date was 6.4%, a small improvement compared to the previous week.
The 23.1% jump in sales of adult fiction was driven by big week-over-week increases by backlist titles that have been selling well for most of the year. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens was #1, selling nearly 123,000 copies as the film based on the novel opened in theaters. Sales of Colleen Hoover’s books also had huge gains in the week, with It Ends with Us selling about 84,000 copies and Verity selling just over 78,000 copies. The top-selling new release was The 6:20 Man by David Baldacci, which sold almost 40,000 copies in its first week on sale.
The solid week in adult fiction was countered by a 13.8% decline in adult nonfiction. Last year at this time, American Marxism by Mark Levin sold more than 329,000 copies in its first week on sale, propelling a spike in sales in the category. Last week, the newly-released Tanqueray by Brandon Stanton and Stephanie Johnson was #1 in the category, selling more than 31,000 copies. Another new title, Thank You for Your Servitude by Mark Leibovich, sold nearly 9,000 copies, landing it in sixth place on the category list.
Young adult fiction sales rose 11.8% in the week as Jenny Han continued to rule the category. With Han’s The Summer I Turned Pretty a huge hit in film, her books took the first five places on the category bestseller list, selling a total of approximately 110,000 copies.
