Here are the five titles booksellers say are the most likely to win over the Da Vinci faithful:
Improbable by
Adam Fawer (Morrow, Feb. 1)
Advance: $100,000—$250,000 range, world rights
First Printing: 50,000 copies
Foreign sales: six countries, including Italy and the Netherlands
Hook: This story of a compulsive gambler with an extraordinary ability to calculate odds also has a backstory on a par with Tuesdays with Morrie: the author and a dying friend pledged to write novels together. Morrow returned to press for a total of nearly 5,000 ARCs (the second edition sports a Caleb Carr blurb) and has put up a six-figure hard/soft marketing budget that will include an interactive Web site (www.improbablebook.com) with a poker contest for a Las Vegas trip, playing cards, bookmarks and a 25-city radio campaign.
The Geographer's Library
by
Jon Fasman (Penguin, Feb. 7)
Advance: five figures, North American rights
First Printing: 100,000 copies
Foreign sales: eight countries, including the U.K., France and Sweden
Hook: Penguin solicited early reads for this tale of a New England professor who investigates an international smuggling ring with 4,000 galleys, including a BookSense white box mailing. The imprint also sent the media about 300 galleys wrapped in gold paper
to hint at the book's alchemy-related plot and boxed in cartons printed "Antiquities Enclosed: Handle with Care." A seven-city author tour may help spur interest in this debut effort, which is more literary than others and also cost its publisher significantly less.
The Third Translation by
Matt Bondurant (Hyperion, Apr. 6)
Advance: $200,000—$250,000 range, world English and audio rights
First Printing: more than 50,000 copies
Foreign Sales: five countries
Hook: Also on the higher end of the literary scale is this story of an Egyptologist working at the British Museum, written by a former employee there. Hyperion is printing 5,000 hardcover ARCs and developing a Web site geared to the teenage boys who put down their videogames to read Dan Brown's book. Bookseller interest is solid (B&N's Sessalee Hensley called the Egyptian angle "even better than what Da Vinci Code had"). But the Alexandria, Va.—based author, a professor of creative writing who has previously published stories in literary magazines like Glimmer Train, is making only local appearances.
Map of Bones by
James Rollins (Morrow, May 1)
Advance: first title in a seven-figure, three-book deal, North American rights
First Printing: 60,000 copies
Foreign Sales:three countries
Hook: Morrow will print more than 5,000 ARCs to promote this seventh effort from Rollins, whose latest, Sandstorm, performed well. The story of the theft of the bones of the Magi shares Dan Brown's religious angle, and there's plenty of Tom Clancy—ish military flavor as well. B&N's Hensley liked the plot, but Harry W. Schwartz's Daniel Goldin said, "We sell Tom Clancy fine, but we don't sell Tom Clancy knockoffs well," and declined to order the title.
The Historian by
Elizabeth Kostova (Little, Brown, June 14)
Advance: $2 million, world rights
First Printing: 300,000 copies
Foreign Sales: 15 countries
Hook: Kostova's debut is the 800-pound gorilla in the category. A graduate of Yale and the prestigious MFA program at the University of Michigan, she's got literary chops and reportedly spent 10 years immersed in researching this modern-day vampire story about a woman who may be descended from Dracula. Little, Brown has announced a $500,000 marketing campaign for the hardcover that includes 7,000 ARCs, a six-city presell tour aimed at booksellers and a 10-city tour after pub. It will also have a one-day laydown like The Da Vinci Code did—rare for a first novel. The question remains, however, whether the house's enormous investment will come back to bite it in the, er, neck.
