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Nine new Ladybird Books for Grown-Ups coming this autumn
Penguin Random House will release nine new titles in its Ladybird Books for Grown-Ups series for this autumn, including How it Works: The Student and The Ladybird Book of the Meeting.
The eight pocket-sized parodies authored by Jason Hazeley and Joel Morris were a hit last Christmas, selling over a million collective copies in volume sales in the UK at the end of last year. Since they first hit shelves in October 2015, they have now shifted 1.9m copies for £11.1m, according to Nielsen BookScan TCM.
The next title in the series will be How it Works: The Student, publishing on 25th August 2016 in time for the back to university season, to be followed by another eight titles on 20th October: How it Works: The Cat; How it Works: The Dog; The Ladybird Book of the People Next Door; The Ladybird Book of Red Tape; The Ladybird Book of the Zombie Apocalypse; The Ladybird Book of the Meeting; The Ladybird Book of the Sickie; and How it Works: The Grandparent. Each will be sold in hardback priced £6.99 each.
A spread from How It Works: The Meeting.
The series' biggest seller so far - and 2015's Christmas number one - is How it Works: The Husband, with 344,998 copies sold to date, according to Nielsen Book Scan.
Penguin Michael Joseph’s editorial director Rowland White said: "The overwhelming reaction to last year’s brilliant Ladybird Books for Grown-Ups was extraordinary and heart-warming – a real testament to the love and care that Jason and Joel put into writing them. It’s clear, with this new range of titles, that their affection and enthusiasm for Ladybird remains undimmed. We’ll be laughing like drains all over again."
A spread from How It Works: The Cat.
Hazeley and Morris, who have been writing together since their school days, first published spoof Ladybird books in a 2003 title Historic Framley (Michael Joseph). The duo have gone on to write for high profile names in comedy, including Charlie Brooker and Mitchell and Webb, Miranda Hart, Paddington Bear, and Matt Lucas.
In a statement, Hazeley and Morris said: "We’ve been fans of Ladybird since we were old enough to fall over with any dignity. Being allowed to have fun with Ladybird's astonishing picture archive is a ridiculous privilege – like being the official custard pie supplier to a Buckingham Palace garden party. It’s great to see how many people love Ladybird books as much as we do, and that it’s not only us who’d appreciate a helping hand with the baffling world of being a grown-up."
Last Christmas the Ladybird spoof books were so in demand that many bookshops were left without stock while the publisher was forced to reprint on more than one occasion.
