Yarros is boss as chart-topper crowns a pulsating year for SFF category
In the first 10 months of the year, £43.6m worth of Science Fiction & Fantasy books have sold through Nielsen BookScan’s Total Consumer Market in the UK.
In the first 10 months of the year, £43.6m worth of Science Fiction & Fantasy books have sold through Nielsen BookScan’s Total Consumer Market in the UK, almost a quarter up on 2022’s near-record performance, with the category sure to shatter its previous all-time high by 2023’s end. It’s all the more impressive given that SFF’s zenith – 2007’s haul of £49.1m – is boosted by a metadata fudge of a children’s book with an altered cover treatment skewing the market: 25% (£11.9m) that year’s sales came from the “adult” edition of J K Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
SFF’s growth this year is not due to spiking average selling price masking declining unit sales, as has happened in some other categories of late: 3.95 million SFF units have been sold in 2023, up 20.9% on this point in 2022. Prices have risen, too, driven by the profound change in the SFF market with its “fan service” trend of subscription boxes and special editions. Hardbacks account for 38% (£16.4m) of sales this year, by far the biggest hardback share for any fiction sub-genre (next best is Crime, Thriller & Adventure’s 24.7%). This is a step-change from the paperback-heavy model; at this stage throughout the 2010s, SFF’s top hardback share was 19.7%. As a result of these special editions, SFF a.s.p. is at an all-time high (£11.04) and the average discount off r.r.p. is 13.3%, a record low.
Aligned to the subscription box model is the surge of TikTokkable writers at the top, like Sarah J Maas, Samantha Shannon, Stephanie Garber and this week’s overall chart-topper, Rebecca Yarros, all of whom are having record years. But the old guard has done well, too, including Terry Pratchett – driven by the release of his “lost” stories, A Poisoned Pen – and Brandon Sanderson, helped by the publicity around the Kickstarter-record $41m he raised for four Secret Projects books, three of which were issued in 2023 (his long-time home Gollancz is publishing non-Kickstarter versions).
