This Week's Bestsellers: June 30, 2014

Rowling and Galbraith, Together Again

Proving again that there’s life after Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling’s The Silkworm, written under the Robert Galbraith pseudonym, debuts at #4 on our Hardcover Fiction list this week. The mystery marks the megabestselling YA author’s second Cormorant Strike novel, after 2013’s The Cuckoo’s Calling. Both books are published by Mulholland Books, which is a Hachette imprint, and Silkworm has been at the center of the ongoing Amazon-Hachette dispute. The retailer made the title unavailable for preorder, and there have been shipping delays on the print edition. This hasn’t prevented it from selling; according to Nielsen BookScan, roughly 21,000 copies were purchased in its first week on sale.

Critical response to the book, about PI Cormorant Strike’s search for a missing novelist, has been strongly positive—a fact that Mulholland plans to make the focus of its publicity. According to PW’s review, the novel “demonstrates [Rowling’s] adroitness at crafting a classic fair-play whodunit in a contemporary setting.”—Everett Jones

Mollen Overshares for Our Entertainment

Actress and writer Jenny Mollen enters our Hardcover Nonfiction list at #22 with her first book, I Like You Just the Way I Am: Stories About Me and Some Other People, a humorous memoir. Mollen—who writes for Playboy Online, and has appeared on the WB series Angel and HBO’s Girls—capitalizes on her bold, raunchy, and endearing voice, which led the Huffington Post to proclaim her one of the funniest women on Twitter. In essays that include “Whine Kampf,” “The Birthday Whore,” “One Shade of Grey,” and “You Were Molested,” Mollen writes about colorful subjects, such as the time she hired a prostitute for her husband, actor Jason Biggs (Orange Is the New Black). To promote the book, she has appeared on Chelsea Lately and the View, she’s been interviewed with her husband for CNN and for People magazine, and she’s written an entertaining “Grub Street Diet” feature for New York magazine. Signings have included stops at PowerHouse Arena in Brooklyn, Bryant Park’s “Word for Word” series, the Book Cellar in Chicago, Barnes & Noble the Grove in L.A., and Changing Hands in Temple, Ariz. With plenty of juicy details and Moller’s promotional efforts, this debut will surely stay on readers’ radars for the rest of the summer.—Jessamine Chan

Fairstein Goes Underground

For more than 25 years, Linda Fairstein served as chief of the sex crimes unit of the district attorney’s office in Manhattan. She has used that experience to become a preeminent legal expert on sexual assault and domestic violence, as well as the author of the New York Times bestselling Alexandra Cooper series. The 16th entry, Terminal City, debuts at #19 on our Hardcover Fiction list.

As is her trademark, Fairstein transforms Grand Central Terminal into an active and menacing character in Terminal City. Known for her extensive research and fascination with the city’s mysterious underbelly, Fairstein exposes Grand Central’s hidden staircases, subterranean tunnels, and other enigmas not found on any map or blueprint. In Terminal City, ADA Cooper sets off on a manhunt through the Manhattan landmark’s colossal and dizzying infrastructure. Her target: a serial killer whose signature both fittingly and disturbingly takes the form of train tracks carved into the victims’ skin.

Fairstein kicked off the publicity campaign for Terminal City with a guest spot on NBC’s Late Night with Seth Meyers, making her the first fiction author to appear on the new talk show. She has also since made appearances on the Today show, Imus in the Morning, and Good Day New York, and notable print coverage has included a rave review from the Associated Press and an interview in the Huffington Post.—Peter Cannon

Top 10 Overall