November 2011 sales of children's and YA hardcover titles rose 27% over the same period in 2010 and audiobook downloads rose 25.9% over the same period according to the AAP’s monthly sales figures. However, November over November e-book sales, while up 65.9%, dropped below the monthly triple digit increases the category has shown. Nevertheless, year to date e-book sales still rose 123%.
Some publishers suggest that the drop in triple digital month to month sales was due to consumer waiting for Amazon’s new tablet device for purchasing new e-books. Publishers also suggested that after years of high growth rate in e-book sales, some drop in the rate of growth of e-book sales was expected. In addition to growth in Children’s hardcover and digital downloads, University Press publishing showed Year to Date growth across all segments with hardcover publishing up 1.4% and paperback publishing up 19.9%.
November month to month adult hardcover trade books were down 20.9% and November month to month adult trade paperback sales were down 3.7%
