Print book sales are holding steady for 2023, down about 2 percent versus last year, according to Circana BookScan. In April, adult fiction made up 70 percent of the monthly bestsellers on a print basis. New releases that recently hit BookScan’s top-10 list include the thriller novel Simply Lies by David Baldacci (Hachette); You Can’t Joke about That by Kat Timpf (HarperCollins); true-crime story The Wager by David Grann (Random House); and Meals She Eats (DK Publishing), a health book by Tom Sullivan and Rachael Sullivan.
Meanwhile: Simon & Schuster reported that its first-quarter sales increased 17 percent over last year. CEO Jonathan Karp noted (sub required), “It is clear we are living in a boom in fiction.” He credits sales growth to word-of-mouth recommendations via TikTok and social media. As part of the conference call to discuss results, S&S executives said parent company Paramount has restarted the sale process, and they believe a deal could close by the end of this 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.
