When it comes to sales, the big books are grabbing a bigger slice of the pie
Catching up with PW's Andrew Albanese
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | Email | Download
Multi-million-copy press runs for books from Michelle Obama, Jeff Kinney and Dav Pilkey racked up impressive sales in the 2018 holiday bookselling season. While big books are always hot at holiday season, such titles may be carrying more than their usual share of the business this year, according to Andrew Albanese, Publishers Weekly senior writer.
“This holiday season, it is especially notable that the big books in 2018 accounted for a disproportionate chunk of industry sales,” he tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “In many cases, the big titles were Trump related—from Fire and Fury to start the year, to James Comey’s memoir, and Bob Woodward’s Fear.
“Our industry publishes a lot of great books every year – just scan the major book awards and you can see how indie publishers have claimed a lot of hardware recently. But when it comes to sales, the big books, it seems, are grabbing a bigger slice of the pie.”
Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.
