Meyer top as Hachette dominates US
09.01.09 | Philip Jones
Children's author Stephenie Meyer was the biggest selling writer in the US in 2008 selling a massive 15 million books over the year, according to data from Nielsen BookScan US for the year ended 28th December 2008.
Meyer had the top two bestselling books of the year in the US. Breaking Dawn, the fourth book in the successful Twilight series, was number one, with the first book Twilight nestling in at two, despite having been published two years earlier. New Moon, the second title was fifth, one ahead of Eclipse, the third.
In total, Meyer had nine entries in the US top 50, with five different titles, racking up unit sales close to 15 million from the top 50 bestseller chart alone.
Meyer's success helped Hachette US dominate the top 50 with 17 titles from imprints owned by the group in the top 50, well ahead of nearest competitors such as Random House and Penguin, both of which scored seven top 50 hits.
Meyer also helped grow the children's market, with volume sales up by 6% on a like-for-like basis when measured against Nielsen BookScan US 2007 figures. The performance helped to offset a near 4% decline in sales of adult non-fiction titles, and stagnant growth of just 0.4% in adult fiction. Overall, the market showed a fractional year-on-year decline of 0.04%.
US TOP 10 (52 weeks ended-28th December)
1 Breaking Dawn Meyer, Stephenie Little, Brown Aug 08
2 Twilight Meyer, Stephenie Megan Tingley Books Sep 06
3 A New Earth Tolle, Eckhart Plume Books Jan 05
4 The Last Lecture Pausch, Randy Hyperion Books Jan 08
5 New Moon Meyer, Stephenie Little, Brown Young Readers May 08
6 Eclipse Meyer, Stephenie Little, Brown Young Readers Aug 07
7 The Shack Young, William P Windblown Media Jul 08
8 The Tales of Beedle the Bard Rowling, J K Arthur A Levine Dec 08
9 Brisingr Paolini, Christopher Alfred A Knopf Sep 08
10 Eat, Pray, Love Gilbert, Elizabeth Penguin Feb 07
For the complete top 50 click here
