The Canada Reads Effect Substantially Lifts Sales of All Five Titles
TORONTO – December 5, 2008 The five titles chosen as finalists for CBC’s Canada Reads 2009 panel have seen an average sales increase of more than 1700%.
The Book of Negroes, written by Lawrence Hill and published by HarperCollins, is the number one selling shortlist title in the first week after the announcement was made. The book, already a strong seller before the announcement was made, saw a sales increase of more than 35%.
The ECW Press title currently number five in the rankings, Fruit, written by Brian Francis, saw the largest percent increase in this week. Fruit’s unit sales increased by more than 3000%.
Relative rankings for the week ending November 30, 2008 are as follows:
Canada Reads 2009
- The Book of Negroes (HarperCollins) – Lawrence Hill
- The Outlander (House of Anansi) – Gil Adamson
- Mercy Among the Children (Doubleday Canada) – David Adams Richard
- The Fat Woman Next Door is Pregnant (Talonbooks) – Michel Tremblay
- Fruit (ECW Press) – Brian Francis
The 2008 winner, King Leary, was number five in the relative rankings this week last year. In 2007, Lullabies for Little Criminals was the relative number one selling book in the first week after the five novels for Canada Reads 2007 were announced. The sales of the title increased by a little over 90% from the week before to the week after the announcement.
For more information on BookNet Canada and BNC SalesData and, visit BookNet Canada’s website at www.booknetcanada.ca
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About BookNet Canada
BookNet Canada is the not-for-profit agency created by the Canadian book industry and the Department of Canadian Heritage to facilitate improvements in the book industry supply chain. It provides services and develops standards and certification in areas including electronic commerce via EDI (Electronic Document Interchange), bibliographic data, and analysis of point-of-sales and other supply chain data. BookNet acknowledges the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) for its initiatives.
