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In the week that Ron Howard's film adaptation hit UK cinemas amid mixed reviews, book retailers sold more than 40,000 copies of the film tie-in edition of Dan Brown's Angels and Demons (Corgi), enabling the The Da Vinci Code prequel to top the Official UK Top 50 for a second week. Across all editions, just over 45,000 copies of the book were sold last week.
Patricia Cornwell's 16th Kay Scarpetta thriller, the succinctly-titled Scarpetta (Sphere), débuted in the Top 50 in second position thanks to a 25,000-plus part-week sale, while C J Sansom's fourth Matthew Shardlake thriller, Revelation (Pan), climbed seven places to third position thanks, in part, to its spot in W H Smith's "£2.99 if you buy the Times" offer last week.
Oscar-winner Julian Fellowes' Past Imperfect (Phoenix) was the first book under Richard and Judy's Summer Read spotlight last week, and climbed 26 places to 16th position thanks to a seven-day sale of 11,069 copies. Comparatively, last year's overwhelming Summer Read victor, Orion stablemate Linwood Barclay's No Time for Goodbye, sold 53,952 copies during its week under the R&J spotlight in early July. However, Toni Jordan's Addition (Sceptre) sold just 10,515 copies across all editions during the week it was discussed last year.
Meanwhile, in the race for the Orange Prize, Marilynne Robinson's Home (Virago) remains the sales leader. It sold 1,451 copies through Nielsen BookScan's Total Consumer Market last week, 79 copies more than Deirdre Madden's Molly Fox's Birthday (Faber) and 417 more than Ellen Feldman's Burnt Shadows (Bloomsbury).
According to BookScan data, £26.3m was spent at UK book retailers last week, down 0.6% week on week but up 3.7% year on year.