Remember, remember the end of November: Charlie Mackesy jumps up to indie number one
While it could not quite make the top of the Official UK Top 50, Charlie Mackesy’s Always Remember (Ebury Press) has climbed two spots to claim the number one on the Independent Bookshop Top 20, according to the latest figures from NielsenIQ BookScan.
While BookScan does not make volume and value data available for the Indie Top 20, it is likely that indie bookshop favourite Mackesy owes part of his overall Total Consumer Market (TCM) sales increase of 18% to the sector. Mackesy pushes David Szalay’s Flesh (Jonathan Cape) down to third – the Booker Prize winner is one of the few titles in the UK Top 50 this week that has seen a fall, dropping 24.3% to 7,374 copies.
Of Mackesy’s success, Sian Fuller from The Violet Bookshop in Upton upon Severn said: “Charlie Mackesy’s Always Remember has been an incredibly popular title already for Christmas. As a dinky little shop in a small town with lots of supportive locals and tourists, tastes are so varied that we don’t get many stand-out bestsellers, and when we do they don’t often match national trends; Always Remember has firmly bucked that trend here.
“The Boy, The Horse, The Fox & The Mole is such a beautiful book and holds such a strong place in many people’s hearts that I think customers have been immediately drawn to its follow-up.”
There is no move in second place for the paperback edition of Andrew Miller’s Booker Prize shortlistee The Land in Winter (Sceptre), which appears 73 places higher for the indies than in the TCM. Meanwhile, Chloe Dalton’s Raising Hare (Canongate) climbs three places to fourth, which also puts it 73 places spots greater than its full-market position. Miller and Dalton’s overindexing with indies is dwarfed this week by The Countess of Canarvon’s Christmas at Highclere (Preface Publishing) which re-enters the chart in 18th, despite only making it to 1,297th place in the TCM on 619 copies sold.
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There is one prominent title that is performing less well is the Official UK Number One: Guinness World Records fails to make an appearance in the Indie Top 20 this week.
Two titles make their Indie Top 20 debuts, despite not having been released this week. The first is Carol Ann Duffy’s A Christmas Ghost Story illustrated by Vivien Mildenberger. First published at the beginning of November, it enters in 14th place, 815 places higher than its TCM position, with an ASP slightly higher than its RRP.
A special collector’s edition of RF Kuang’s The Dragon Republic (HarperVoyager) was first made available in July, but has this week sold enough to enter the indie bookshop chart in 17th place. It only makes it to 1,040th place in the TCM with total sales of 752 copies, its best performance since its week of publication when 900 copies were sold.
The full Independent Bookshop Top 20 can be found on The Bookseller’s bestseller pages. The Bookseller has adjusted the Independent Bookshop chart to remove some titles where sales do not derive from traditional bricks-and-mortar bookshops, such as exhibition catalogues and those featured on conglomerates’ subscription boxes.
