The New Bestseller List You Need to Know About
On the day I wrote this — June 10, 2024 — James Clear’s Atomic Habits had been on the New York Times “Advice, How-to, and Miscellaneous” bestseller list for 236 weeks.
That’s 4.5 years of consistent sales. Great for James Clear, but bad for everyone else.
Having one or two titles dominate the bestseller list is:
• Unhelpful for readers who are looking for something new
• Discouraging for authors who dream of showing up there someday
• Annoying for publishing insiders like me who want their books and authors to have a chance of hitting that same list.
Something you may not realize about book publishing is that most books sell for a long time.
According to data from Bookscan — which tracks sales in real time — 70% of books being sold right now are at least a year old.
That’s great for authors and readers in the end (your book lasts, yay!) but also explains why James Clear has been on the New York Times list since before the pandemic.
To solve this problem, Publishers Marketplace has worked with Bookscan to create what they’re calling “The New List.”
To appear on this true bestseller list (i.e., based on real sales and not “curated” like the NYT):
Books must have been published within the past year
Titles can only stay on The New List for a month
What’s great and useful about The New List for you as an author is that you can understand what books are selling today and get an understanding of where your book would fit into that.
And, when your book does come out — you’ll stand a chance of understanding how well your book is truly doing compared to what’s happening right now.
