The Association of American Publishers recently released 2023 results through the first half of the year. Overall sales were down just under 1 percent versus 2022 on a dollars basis; compare that to Circana BookScan’s figures, which report print book unit sales down by 3 percent in the first half.
Overall, fiction sales are noticeably slowing from last year’s heated volume, when Colleen Hoover and BookTok were driving gains. The latest analysis from BookScan shows that “BookTok authors” (a selection of authors that BookScan tracks) sold fewer units in July 2023 than in July 2022—the first time that has happened. Still, analyst Kristen McLean told Publishers Weekly that BookTok remains the most important platform for discovering new writers.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
