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Bestsellers

Behind the Bestsellers
Daisy Maryles -- 5/8/00

O's Magazine Magic

Oprah's influence on consumer book-buying habits has a new venue, and her enormous clout is immediately evident. The debut issue of O--The Oprah Magazine featured The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz, in a department called "Books That Made a Difference." Oprah noted that immediately after she read the book, she bought 10 copies. A week later, she got a copy for everyone in her office. "So far I've bought 410 copies! What I love is that you can't miss the point that if you can make four simple pacts with yourself, that will make a huge difference; if you can keep all four, you're in the bliss zone. For me, the second agreement, 'Don't take anything personally,' was life-changing." The day after the magazine was launched, Tuesday, April 18, Oprah appeared on Rosie O'Donnell. Oprah talked about the magazine, and told Rosie that she has reached a point in her life where she's finally gotten over "the disease to please," after reading Ruiz's book. That was more than enough to get the book on to the national charts. Originally published in October 1997 with a 6,500 first printing, the book was, according to Amber-Allen publisher Janet Mills, a word-of-mouth bestseller published in 12 languages. Pre-Oprah, the book was up to 90,000 copies; now, copies in print total than 200,000. PGW handles distribution. This is Amber-Allen's second national bestseller. The first, The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success by Deepak Chopra, was published in 1994 and has sold about two million copies.

Zukav's Double Delight

Gary Zukav's new book, Soul Stories, landed on PW's hardcover nonfiction list in the #4 slot and his backlist paperback bestseller, The Seat of the Soul, climbed to the #1 slot on the trade paper list. He, too, has Oprah to thank for this performance. He was on her show for a full hour to discuss his new book and he also writes a monthly column for O. First printing for the hardcover, which went on sale April 25, is 400,000. Zukav is finishing a six-city tour and is drawing crowds of 700-800 people. Over the last three years, Seat has been on PW's weekly charts for a total of 60 weeks. Simon & Schuster's Fireside edition has 2,207,5000 copies in print after 50 trips to press.

Case Not Closed

Few murders in recent years have captured the public's attention--and have garnered as much media coverage--as that of six-year-old JonBenet Ramsey in December 1996. As generally happens, public interest leads to publisher interest, and that's been the case with this puzzling crime, which has spawned three bestsellers. Lawrence Schiller's Perfect Murder, Perfect Town (HarperCollins) spent six weeks on our list starting in March of last year; The Death of Innocence by John and Patsy Ramsey (Nelson) was on our list for a month beginning March 27; and now comes JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, which was published by St. Martin's on April 11 (first printing: 250,000). That book, which hit the nonfiction list last week (it's now #16) is by former Boulder, Colo., police detective Steve Thomas (with veteran correspondent Don Davis), who began working on the case within 72 hours of the discovery of JonBenet's body.

Novel Competition

This week there were lots of new fiction titles hovering close to the top 15. Even though four new books made it on to the list--The Bluest Eyes,Ravelstein,TheHeir and Anil'sGhost--and several bestsellers are still moving lots of copies, several new titles fall in the top 16 to 25. They include: The Running Mate by J Klein (Dell); The Forest by Edward Rutherfurd (Crown); Half Moon Street by Anne Perry (Ballantine); Tides of War: A Novel of Alcibiades and the Peloponnesian War by Steven Pressfield (Doubleday); and After the Fire by Belva Plain (Delacorte).With reporting by Dick Donahue.
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