The 'Arrival' of the Oscars boosts the 'Hidden Figures' of the book world

The Academy Awards are once again upon us, and a question more important than who wins what award, who criticises the President the most in their acceptance speech and even who wears which dress is: what books are most benefitting from the Hollywood treatment?

The success of "Arrival", nominated for Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay, gave its source material, Ted Chiang’s The Stories of Your Life and Others (Picador), a bump when it was released back in November—the short story collection was boosted by 1,401% fortnight-on-fortnight. It also featured in the November monthly e-book chart for the first time.

Saroo Brierley’s Lion: A Long Way Home (Penguin) has also had an Oscars-boost, as its film adaptation goes up for Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay on Sunday night. While it’s sold 12,678 copies in print since its publication in January, it has spent four weeks running in the e-book top 20—and could be heading for the chart’s first ever non-fiction number one.

Margot Lee Shetterly’s Hidden Figures (William Collins) rocketed into the Top 50 a week ago, with a volume of 7,857 copies sold to date. The title has already shifted in excess of 150,000 copies in the US, but missed out on an overall number one due to the Trump-bumped Nineteen Eighty-four.

"La La Land", nominated for 12 Oscars, has also had a (very small) effect on the book charts, despite being an original screenplay. Its sheet music La La Land: Music from the Motion Picture Soundtrack (Faber Music), has shifted a glitzy 248 copies since its release at the start of the month.

Lin-Manuel Miranda is nominated for Best Original Song for How Far I’ll Go from "Moana". Though the source material for his smash-hit Broadway musical Hamilton, Rob Chernow’s biography Alexander Hamilton, is yet to take off in the UK—it’s sold 4,894 copies to date, but expect that to change come October 2017—its sales have been boosted to 1.5 million copies in the US, increasing a whopping 16,000% in volume since the musical opened in 2015(?).

Though "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" has not be nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar—the Academy judges are clearly a bunch of Piers Morgans— it walks away with the award for bestselling screenplay ever, having shifted 374,149 copies since November 2016. While it’s coded as a children’s fiction title, if it was in the Drama Texts, Plays & Screenplays, it would be the second-bestselling of all time—beaten by that other 2016 J K Rowling-authored playscript, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (Little, Brown).