David Walliams is the Christmas Number One

David Walliams’ Bad Dad (HarperCollins) has claimed the Christmas Number One, selling 60,694 copies for £376,111 through Nielsen BookScan’s Total Consumer Market. It beat challenger Jamie Oliver’s 5 Ingredients (Michael Joseph) by 1,608 copies to claim the number one for a sixth non-consecutive week.

This tops off a stellar year for the comedian-turned-author, in which he’s twice broken his own opening-week record, had the biggest-selling week for a lone World Book Day title since records began, seen three of his backlist titles crash through the million-copies-sold mark and scored his 100th Children’s number one.

Walliams is only the second author (after Jamie Oliver) to rack up two festive top spots in consecutive years, and Bad Dad is currently comfortably outselling 2016’s The Midnight Gang by 10,907 copies, having sold 567,818 in total.

Though 5 Ingredients leapt 8% in volume week on week to 59,092 copies sold—its highest volume to date—it couldn’t quite pip Bad Dad to the Christmas post. However, it did clinch its 17th straight week as Hardback Non-Fiction number one, and with over 700,000 copies sold, looks unassailable in the lead for 2017’s bestselling book of the year.

Guinness World Records 2018 rose to third place, as E L James’ Darker (Arrow) slid down the chart to ninth place. Sinclair McKay’s Bletchley Park Brainteasers (Headline) charted in the top 10 for the first time, and Dawn French’s Me. You. A Diary (Michael Joseph)—which a fortnight ago wasn’t even in the Top 50—made possibly the most dramatic rise, to 12th place overall.

Celebrity titles seem to get a late second wind, with Chris Heath’s Robbie Williams’ biography Reveal (Blink) climbing into the top 20, plus Sarah Millican’s How to be Champion (Trapeze) and The Grand Tour Guide to the World (HarperCollins) returning to the Top 50. Yuval Noah Harari’s Homo Deus (Vintage) also jumped back upwards, joining its 41-week predecessor Sapiens.

The release of "The Last Jedi" in cinemas last week helped boost Star Wars titles in the charts: The Star Wars Annual 2018 (Egmont) entered the Top 50 for the first time, and Where's the Wookiee 1 and 2 leapfrogged Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler in the Pre-School chart.

Usually at this time of year Christmas-gift titles put the chart in lockdown until January, yet the announcement of the Richard and Judy Book Club picks last week saw a premature wave of paperback fiction releases into the Top 50. Although “wave” may be overstating it— Jo Nesbo’s The Thirst (Vintage) hit 22nd place, with Lisa Jewell’s Then She Was Gone (Arrow) charting just below, in 27th place. Ruth Hogan’s The Keeper of Lost Things (Two Roads)—the bestseller of the autumn tranche—also made a return to the Top 50, in 46th place.