Bestselling books 2016: the ghosts of Christmas charts past

JK Rowling and Bill Bryson top the charts, while film tie-ins give Paula Hawkins and Jojo Moyes a second bite of the cherry – but this unpredictable year has also seen a welcome revival of humorous writingIt was a year when the No 1 book was a play script. When hyper-prolific James Patterson, dubbed the “library king” as Britain’s long-reigning most-borrowed author, could manage no higher than 60th place. When the anonymous, insanely difficult GCHQ Puzzle Book was 43rd, and so beat super-sellers like Patterson and Ian Rankin, not to mention all those much-hyped hygge books.The all-year sales rankings for 2016 are full of such surprises, as befits an unpredictable year, but also contain much that is comfortingly recognisable, such as the ghosts of Christmas charts past at the top. With Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, JK Rowling reclaims the No 1 spot that used to be reserved for her in the noughties, and her versatility is underlined by four other entries in various genres (12, 28, 64, 95). Bill Bryson reprised the round-Britain trip behind his mid-90s hit, Notes from a Small Island, in The Road to Little Dribbling (13) and the result is the list’s highest placed non-fiction title. Mary Berry (17), easily this year’s leading conventional cookery writer, was penning bestselling festive gifts long before either of them emerged. Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2016-12-31 00:00:00 UTC ]
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