Saturday, March 20, 2010

Children's Book Sales Up in Hard Times


Nielsen BookScan reported that sales of juvenile books were the strongest of any category in 2008, rising 6 percent from 2007. In 2009, Nielsen reported, sales held mostly even. By contrast, last year adult hardcover and mass market paperbacks both declined nearly 4 percent, and trade paperbacks fell 2 percent.
Norris said that sales of children's books are still "very strong." But he cautioned that publishers should not become overconfident. Sales of juvenile books may be skewed because many adults are buying young adult titles such as "
Harry Potter" and "Twilight."
Kinney knows from book signings and other events that adults are buying a good number of his "Wimpy" books, 28 million of which are in print in the United States, according to his publisher, Abrams. "Great stories are being told that do not rely on violence or sex or those sorts of things that are the hallmarks of literature that is intended for adults," Kinney said. "I think we focus more on storytelling. There are a lot of adults I encounter who exclusively read children's literature."

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