Some customers might think they are suffering a slight case of dyslexia when looking at two new books exploring mother/daughter relationships through essays by and portraits of famous and not-so-famous women. Doubleday's Mothers &Daughters, by award-winning journalist Carol Saline and Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Sharon J. Wohlmuth (the same duo that was behind the 1995 bestseller Sisters, which was on the national charts for more than a year), makes it on our list this week, with a 350,000-copy first printing. Their 17-city tour, which began April 15 in Westchester, N.Y., will end in Costa Mesa, Calif., May 10.
Running Press, which originally published Sisters -- it was the Philadelphia-based publisher's first major national bestseller and went on to sell more than a million copies in hardcover -- has published Daughters &Mothers by award-winning journalist Lauren Cowen and portrait photographer Jayne Wexler. The jacket, featuring actresses Laura Dern and her mother, Diane Ladd, with family matriarch Mary Garey, uses the same type and photo design as Sisters. The book is one of five new titles percolating below the top 15 and currently has 265,000 copies in print after a 150,000 first printing. Doubleday's $2.5 million two-book offer to Saline and Wohlmuth (their second book will be called Best Friends) was more than enough to keep Running Press from making any counter offer.
