'Girl in the Spider's Web' Dominated International Bestseller Lists in August

David Lagercrantz’s The Girl in the Spider’s Web, his continuation of the late Stieg Larsson’s wildly popular Millennium series, dominated the overseas charts last month. The book, published by Knopf in the U.S., debuted at #1 in France, Germany, and Sweden in August.

In France, the previous top-selling novel, E.L. James’s Grey: Fifty Shades of Grey as Told by Christian (another continuation of a series), dropped from #1 to the #3 spot. The book was published Stateside by Vintage in June. New at #2 was Christine Angot’s An Impossible Love.

Behind The Girl in the Spider’s Web on Germany’s fiction chart was About Finitude, the last book Nobel laureate Günter Grass completed before his death in April of this year. The book combines a series of short prose texts, each accompanied by a poem and a pencil drawing by the author. Old Country by Dörte Hansen, the previous top seller, moved to #3.

In Sweden, Grey debuted at #2 on the fiction chart, behind Lagercrantz. The latest crime novel from Leif GW Persson, The Bomb Maker and His Woman, fell from #1 to #3.

In France, scientist Giulia Enders held on to her #1 spot on the nonfiction list with The Discreet Charm of the Intestine. The next two books on the list were both new to the chart last month. Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s The Night of Fire, which details how the author found faith while lost in the mountains for 30 hours, came in at #2; and Jean d’Ormesson’s God, Business and Us, the French novelist’s views on French politics and foreign affairs, hit #3.

Mats and Susan Billmark’s Learn to Live, a guide to coping with stress and anxiety, was once again the top title on Sweden’s nonfiction chart.

International Bestsellers

France

Germany

Sweden