You are viewing your 1 free article this month. Login to read more articles.
Peter Robinson has claimed his first ever Official UK Top 50 number one. The mass-market edition of the Yorkshire-born writer’s 21st DCI Banks thriller, Children of the Revolution (Hodder), sold 15,628 copies in the UK last week—a lead of 4,600 copies over the second bestselling book of the week, Eric Lomax’s The Railway Man (Vintage). Last week’s number one, James Patterson’s Alex Cross, Run (Arrow), falls two places into third position.
Orange Prize for Fiction winner Lionel Shriver’s Big Brother (The Borough Press) is this week’s highest new entry, joing the chart in 28th spot. Other débutants include Adele Parks’ The State We’re In (Headline Review); Joanne Harris’ short story collection A Cat, a Hat and a Piece of String (Black Swan); and blogger Luca Veste’s début novel, Dead Gone (Avon).
Stuart MacBride’s A Song for the Dying (HarperCollins) remains the bestselling hardback novel in the UK and stays at the top of the Original Fiction chart for a second week. Jamie Oliver’s Save with Jamie (Michael Joseph) remains the UK’s bestselling hardback non-fiction book. It retains pole position in the Hardback Non-fiction chart for a 10th week. Just one book has spent longer at the top of the chart over the past two years: Oliver’s 15-Minute Meals (Michael Joseph).
The Minecraft Redstone Handbook (Egmont) proved the bestselling children’s title in the seven-day period ending 25th January. It sold 7,786 copies—some 1,000 units more than the heavily discounted Moshi Monsters: The Official Annual 2014 (Puffin) which sold at an average selling price of just £1.02—87% off its £7.99 r.r.p.
Nielsen BookScan TCM Top 5,000 data reveals the value of the children’s book sector was up 11% year on year last week. However, due to declines within the fiction and non-fiction sectors the overall value of the book market was down marginally year on year—by 0.3% (£65,000m), to £22.0m. Despite the poor week, total book sales in the month of January were up an impressive 2.2% (£2.0m) on January last year—the first calendar month of growth in the value of the printed book market since July 2012, when E L James’s Fifty Shades series enjoyed record-breaking sales.