Bookstat chart: McGowan puts a ring on the top spot

The e-book of Claire McGowan's The Other Wife (Thomas & Mercer) has held the Bookstat number one for the week ending 18th April. The Amazon-published author's previous title What You Did racked up mulitple appearances in the Bookstat e-book top 10, including two weeks at the top in January. But her newest thriller could surpass What You Did's reign by next week.

The top three remained solid on the week before, with Beth O'Leary's The Flatshare (Quercus) and Harriet Tyce's Blood Orange (Wildfire) joining The Other Wife. Rebecca Serle's In Five Years (Quercus) leapfrogged Nicola May's The Corner Shop in Cockleberry Bay to join its Quercus stablemate The Flatshare in the top four. While the Bookstat chart is usually dominated by crime and thriller titles, comforting romantic reads seem to be making inroads into the chart as of late.

M Prefontaine's Difficult Riddles for Smart Kids (Horizon) continued to perform strongly, climbing to fifth place. Children's books don't often hit the e-book charts, but the last few weeks have seen the Harry Potter books chart reguarly, with Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Pottermore) boomeranging back into the top 10 last week, the week after ...Chamber of Secrets made its debut. When it comes to J K Rowling's blockbuster series, it's likely the e-books are being downloaded by 20- and 30-something millennial fans rather than actual children, operating as a literary comfort blanket during lockdown.

The e-book numbers show a slight increase in sales during the lockdown with BookStat's estimates for sales well short of publishers' own numbers, indicating that demand is running ahead of what BookStat expects at this time under normal conditions. Hachette has stated that The Flatshare has sold 20,594 e-books, Blood Orange 18,443 e-books, and In Five Years 10,795 e-books for the week ending 18th April, while Pan Macmillan has stated that Walk the Wire sold 6,320 e-books in that period. All are ahead of BookStat's estimates which in a typical week will have the number one selling title at between 16,000 and 17,000 sales.