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Two HarperCollins titles top the Booksellers Association Christmas picks, chosen by independent booksellers.
David Walliams' Demon Dentist and Nigel Slater's Eat: The Little Book of Fast Food were the most highly recommended by 36 booksellers. The titles will be included alongside more than 200 others in the BA's 2013 Christmas Catalogue, produced with Bowker, which will be released on 14th September to coincide with the Books Are My Bag campaign launch and Big Bookshop Party events.
The rest of the top 13 titles chosen are Liz Pichon's Tom Gates Extra Special Treats (Scholastic); Patrick Leigh Fermor's The Broken Road (Hodder); Ian Rankin's Saints of the Shadow Bible (Orion); Mary Berry's Recipe for Life (Penguin); Bill Bryson's One Summer (Doubleday); Gabrielle Vincent's Happy Christmas Ernest & Celeste (Catnip); Julia Donaldson's The Further Adventures of the Owl & the Pussy-Cat (Penguin); Susan Hill's Black Sheep (Chatto); Robert Harris' An Officer and a Spy (Hutchinson); Sebastian Faulks' Jeeves and the Wedding Bells (Hutchinson); and Max Hasting's Catastrophe: Europe Goes to War 1914 (HarperCollins).
A record number of 79 publishers submitted titles for this year’s Christmas Catalogue and 67 made it into the final list. The catalogue will be distributed by independent booksellers to consumers during the Big Bookshop Party events due to take place on 14th September when the Books Are My Bag campaign is officially launched to consumers.
Tim Godfray, chief executive of the BA, said: "Independent bookshops take pride in recommending titles to their customers all year around and the Christmas Catalogue is a great tangible example of this. This year’s list features a real mix of genres and authors with something for all tastes and ages, chosen by real independent booksellers based on what they believe their customers will enjoy."
Nearly half a million catalogues were produced and distributed through 250 independent booksellers last year, the BA said.
Jo Henry, director of Bowker Market Research, added: “This list features a fantastic selection from publishers both large and small. We ask booksellers to rate titles for inclusion in the catalogue and whilst all these books were rated highly, we have a Baker’s Dozen top 13, which were rated very highly indeed. And for the first year we are including some non-book items, such as Moleskin Notebooks and Bookmarks.”