Holiday sales of print books followed a small increase over Thanksgiving week with a 4.2% gain last week over the week ended December 3, 2022, at outlets that report to Circana BookScan.
Juvenile fiction sales had a good week, with sales up 8%. The category was the latest entry in Dav Pilkey’s Cat Kid Comic Club series, Influencers, which sold more than 87,000 copies in its first week on sale, making it the week’s top overall seller.
The young adult fiction category had the largest sales increase, with units jumping 22.6%. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins remained number one, selling over 38,000 copies. A new release, The Do-Over by Lynn Painter, sold nearly 10,000 copies, landing it in sixth place on the category list.
Adult fiction continued to rebound after a summer and fall slump, with sales up 9.4%. Three of the top four bestselling titles were by Rebecca Yarros, selling a total of about 134,000 copies, with Iron Flame taking the top spot. The eighth volume in Heaven Official’s Blessing by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu sold over 23,000 copies in is first week, putting it in the sixth spot on the category list.
Adult nonfiction was the only category in which sales fell last week. Last year, Michelle Obama’s The Light We Carry was number one, selling over 93,000 copies. Last week, the category’s top seller was The Woman in Me by Britney Spears, which sold more than 34,000 copies. In second place was the newly released How to Be the Love You Seek by Nicole Lepera, which sold over 28,000 copies.
Sales of juvenile nonfiction, down 8% for the year-to-date, were up 3.9% last week, led by two books about Taylor Swift. Wendy Loggia's Little Golden Books biography of the pop star was number one, selling nearly 26,000 copies, followed by Arie Kaplan’s 96 Facts about Taylor Swift, which sold just under 20,000 copies.
