Heartstopper author Alice Oseman: ‘If you don’t have sex and romance, you feel like you haven’t achieved’

The writer and illustrator on turning her ‘weird hobby’ into a bestselling YA series and Netflix hit, the importance of asexual representation and lessons from her fans on love bitesAt 28, the author and illustrator Alice Oseman recently achieved what so many of her peers cannot: she bought a flat. But instead of giving up Netflix so she could save for a deposit, as Kirstie Allsopp notoriously recommended, she sold the streaming service the rights to her gay romance comic book series.The series in question is of course Heartstopper, the web comic turned graphic novel turned Netflix show that this paper’s reviewer described as “completely lovely” when it aired earlier this year. The boy-meets-boy tale, set in a British secondary school, sees rugby captain Nick and socially awkward Charlie navigate friendships, bullying, coming out – and falling in love. It’s not hard to see why the TV adaptation won over teenagers and adults alike, with its lovable characters, quirky nods to its comic book origins – for example, tiny animations of hand-drawn flowers form a circle round the actors when Nick and Charlie share their first kiss – and an injection of starriness in the shape of Olivia Colman (Nick’s mum) and Stephen Fry (headmaster Barnes). The show’s success resulted in a huge increase in book sales for Oseman: the Heartstopper series has now sold more than 6m copies worldwide. Volume One recently won the Books Are My Bag readers’ choice award and is a contender for the 2022... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2022-11-19 09:00:53 UTC ]

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AAP reports ebooks now account for over 22 percent of US publishers' revenue

It's well off the triple year-over-year growth that ebooks saw a few years ago, but the latest report from the Association of American Publishers shows that ebooks did inch up even further in 2012 to account for a sizeable chunk of overall book sales. According to its figures, ebooks now... Continue reading at Engadget

[ Engadget | 2013-04-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Book sales fall 6% at W H Smith

Book sales at W H Smith dropped 6% like-for-like in the six months to 28th February, according to... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2013-04-11 00:00:00 UTC ]
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There’s a General Global Decline in Book Sales, Why?

Research is showing that book sales around the world are in general decline and in some countries people are said to have simply stopped reading. What's to blame? Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives

[ Publishing Perspectives | 2013-03-21 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Information Diet: Andrew Lincoln

What’s the first information you consume in the morning? It would have to be my alarm clock. That’s purely because my son has a tendency to sit on my chest—he’s not yet 3—and look me square in the eye and say, “Milk.” He’s a bit like the child from The Shining. And that’s around 5:30 in the... Continue reading at AdWeek

[ AdWeek | 2013-02-11 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Book sales down 6% at WHS

Book sales at WH Smith have dropped 6% like-for-like across the high street and travel divisions... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2013-01-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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A Look at a Year of Bestsellers

No one would have been able to predict at the start of 2012 that a BDSM erotic romantic trilogy—Fifty Shades—would set new records for book sales and change/spice up what women worldwide would admit to be reading, many for the first time. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2013-01-14 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Publishers, Agents Turn to Latin America Amid Crisis in Spain

Spain’s financial crisis and slump in book sales has led Spanish-language publishers to focus on Latin America, with agents bypassing Spain to sell rights directly in the region. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives

[ Publishing Perspectives | 2012-12-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Santa Writes a Comic Book

A couple of years ago, I embarked on a quixotic quest: I gave up the Internet. Surfing, emailing, YouTube-watching—it had taken over my life, eating into time I wanted to be spending with my family, my students, and my work. I documented my four-month Internet fast in a series of articles for... Continue reading at Slate

[ Slate | 2012-11-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Aussie Rights Trade on the Rise

Despite a dip in overall book sales down under, Australian agents and rights managers report a booming business from the Frankfurt Book Fair. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives

[ Publishing Perspectives | 2012-10-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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DC Comics delays latest issue of 'Batman Inc.'

Comic book contains material deemed insensitive in light of Colorado shootings'The latest issue of a Batman comic series due to hit stores this week will be postponed in light of the shooting rampage at a Batman movie in Aurora, Colo., DC Entertainment said on Tuesday. Continue reading at Baltimore Sun

[ Baltimore Sun | 2012-07-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Unpredictable summer positive for book sales

Retailers say the summer’s mixed weather is giving book sales a lift, with Nielsen BookScan... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2012-07-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Sharp growth in book sales at Waitrose

Waitrose is now an "increasing force in fiction‚" having extended its book range... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2012-07-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Katy Perry to star in new comic book

US pop star Katy Perry will become the latest celebrity to be depicted in the biography comic book Fame series, publisher Bluewater Productions says. Continue reading at Stuff

[ Stuff | 2012-06-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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"Fantastic" first quarter for S&S

Simon & Schuster has revealed a 14% increase in like-for-like book sales in the UK, including... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2012-05-11 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Book sales down 8% at WHS

WH Smith has reported a 3% rise in group profit year-on-year for the six months to 29th February... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2012-04-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Stranger Than Fiction: Oprah Was Bad for Book Sales

By encouraging readers to tackle longer, more sophisticated novels, the queen of daytime TV may have hurt overall fiction sales. Continue reading at The Atlantic

[ The Atlantic | 2012-03-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Jobs to go as PGUK closes Enfield warehouse

Nineteen staff at book sales and distribution company Publishers Group UK are facing redundancy... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2012-02-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Beyond Bananagrams

At a time when ebooks and e-tailers are capturing a greater portion of the bricks-and-mortar book market, sidelines have become essential for filling the void formerly occupied by books—and keeping cash registers ringing. So much so that when Eileen McGervey opened One More Page in Arlington,... Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2011-12-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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International Bestsellers, November 2011: Literary Novels Hit in Germany, Italy

The top three fiction titles in Germany were all debuts in October, led by In Times of Fading Light, which recently won the 2011 German Book Prize and is set for publication in the U.S. by Graywolf Press in fall 2013. Umberto Eco’s newest book, The Prague Cemetery, which debuted at #3, is newly... Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2011-11-18 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Bookshop owners "earn £22,000 per year"

Written By: Lisa Campbell Publication Date: Wed, 25/05/2011 - 14:13 Independent bookshop owners paid themselves an average wage of £22,200 in 2010, according to a new survey. Figures revealed that the average sales of those bookshops which took part in last year’s Bookseller Fitness Programme... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2011-05-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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