Circana BookScan reports strong May 2024 print book sales that put 2024 sales on par with 2023 thus far. Analyst Brenna Connor notes, “If the strong performance continues, we’ll see sales flat over last year and a possible gain over the summer months.” A strong Mother’s Day season and retail promotional events helped drive sales; adult fiction continues to perform well and contributed to 70 percent of the gains in May compared to last year.
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.
