Friday

Sellers basked in Stephenie Meyer's 'Twilight' in 2008

From USA Today:

Stephenie Meyer sold more books in 2008 than any other author (22 million, according to her publisher) and did what no else — not even J.K. Rowling — has done in the 15 years of USA TODAY's Best-Selling Books list:
She swept the four top slots in 2008's best sellers with her Twilight series about a romance between a girl (mortal) and boy (vampire).
BEST-SELLING BOOKS LIST: The top 100 books for 2008
MORE: Read all about the movers and shakers in the book world in 2008
WINTER BOOKS CALENDAR: Settle in for a long winter of reading
In a year when publishers and booksellers struggled with a dismal economy, Meyer carried the holidays, accounting for about one in every five books sold since Thanksgiving. Her dominance has continued this year.

"Rowling's achievement over seven (Harry Potter) books remains singular — for now," says Michael Cader, founder of Publishers Lunch, a daily e-newsletter. "But Meyer had an astounding year and played as important a role for retailers."
A look at 2008's best sellers shows it was a good year, not just for Meyer, but for fiction.
Novels dominated the list: 69% of the books in each week's top 150 were novels, the highest since the list began in 1993. Cader says that with "the country gripped by the election and the economy," publishers had a tough time attracting attention for non-fiction.

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