Unit sales of print books rose 1% in Nielsen BookScan’s retail & club channel in the week ended Dec. 8, 2013, compared to week 49 of 2012. The improvement was led by the juvenile fiction segment, where units rose 12% over the week ended Dec. 9, 2012. There was no new major hit in the week, but the six top-selling titles sold better than their counterparts in week 49 of last year; Hard Luck’s sales of approximately 175,000 copies in the week ended Dec. 8, 2013, were 2,000 ahead of The Third Wheel last year, while the next five books all sold more than the 33,000 copies sold by the #2 book in week 49 of 2012. The biggest-selling debut in the week was Tom Clancy’s Command Authority. The first new book since Clancy’s death earlier this fall, Command Authority sold just over 74,000 copies at outlets that report to BookScan. The mass market paperback edition of Clancy’s Threat Vector debuted in the third spot on the mass market list with almost 14,000 copies sold.

Unit Sales of Print Books by Channel

Dec. 9, 2012 Dec. 8, 2013 % Chge Week % Chge YTD
Total 17,843* 19,084 7% 4%
Mass Merch./Other 2,264* 3,361 48 54
Retail & Club 15,579 15,723 1 -3

Unit Sales of Print Books via Retail & Club

Category Dec. 9, 2012 Dec. 8, 2013 % Chge Week % Chge YTD
Adult Nonfiction 6,361 6,305 -0.9% -0.7%
Adult Fiction 2,772 2,573 -7 -12
Juvenile Nonfiction 1,249 1,311 5 4
Juvenile Fiction 3,827 4,277 12 -2
Format
Hardcover 5,420 5,673 5% -2%
Trade Paperback 7,437 7,417 -0.3 -4
Mass Market Paperback 1,153 1,001 -13 -9
Board Books 425 522 23 14
Audio 137 134 -2 -6

*Excludes walmart. Category segment excludes “other,” which includes audio, maps, calendars, and other miscellaneous categories. Format excludes calendars, boxed sets, and other formats (i.e., maps, minibooks).

Source: Nielsen BookScan and Publishers Weekly. Nielsen BookScan’s U.S. Consumer Market Panel covers approximately 80% of the print book market and continues to grow.