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1. Zach Weinersmith (zachweinersmith@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 15-Jun-2024 15:52:21 UTC Zach Weinersmith

   One of the secrets of the book-writing business is how few people read books. This is especially true of literary books. Like, if the NYT bestseller list were stripped of celeb books, self-help books, and "beach reads," I bet you could get on with fewer than 500 sales per week. Maybe fewer than 300. It's astonishing to read what publishing was like about 100 years ago before mass media, when regular people would buy the Saturday Evening Post for original short stories.

   • Charlie Stross (cstross@wandering.shop)'s status on Saturday, 15-Jun-2024 15:52:20 UTC Charlie Stross

     in reply to

     @ZachWeinersmith More than that many sales would be needed, but in a slow off-season week it's possible to debut on the NYTimes hardcover fiction list with a few thousand sales when the title launches. Also, there are other bestseller lists. (I've never made the NYTimes one, but apparently I hit the USA Today bestseller list with some launches.)

   • Robert McNees (mcnees@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 15-Jun-2024 15:52:20 UTC Robert McNees

     in reply to

     • Charlie Stross

     @cstross @ZachWeinersmith Charlie knows far more about this, of course, I just want to offer a corroborating data point. My wife is both an author and also worked in publishing for a while, and her circle of friends is about half-and-half bestsellers and mid-list authors. About 12 years ago, when her first book came out, the conventional wisdom was that 3k-5k of sales in that first week or so would land you on the NYT list.

   • Robert McNees (mcnees@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 15-Jun-2024 16:19:42 UTC Robert McNees

     in reply to

     • Charlie Stross

     @cstross @ZachWeinersmith (That being said, the astonishing thing to me was that no one at the big publishers who were putting out their books -- Harper Collins, Penguin, etc -- was referencing *any* kind of meaningful analysis of what drove sales. Nothing they knew was rooted in data. It was all throw-it-at-the-wall-and-hope-something-sticks. Even the 3k-5k numbers were partly vibe based. They saw which books made it, and knew their sales, but no one in contact with the authors knew for sure.)