Mantel pre-orders surge as Waterstones plans Mirror & the Light preview signing

Hilary Mantel will sign copies of The Mirror & the Light in Waterstones Piccadilly for 200 lucky fans on the eve of its publication, it was announced today, as the chain revealed pre-orders for the new title have already surpassed those for Margaret Atwood’s The Testaments (Chatto & Windus).

The long-awaited final part of Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy will be published by Fourth Estate on 5th March, eight years after its Booker-winning predecessor Bring Up The Bodies was released.

Waterstones is going all out for the release, with around 100 events at stores around the country including an appearance by Mantel herself at the flagship London Piccadilly branch. The 4th March event, which starts at 8pm, will see 200 customers get their hands on a copy, signed by the author, before its official midnight release.

The chain‚Äôs fiction buyer Bea Carvalho promised customers “a bit more than your average signing” with refreshments, music and workshops on the night. Tickets for the preview signing will go on sale tomorrow (Friday 14th February)

Carvalho told The Bookseller: "The Mirror & the Light is the biggest publishing event this year, arguably for a lot longer than that. It’s the book everyone’s going to be talking about and we can’t wait to put it front and centre of our shops and online offer and be a key part of that conversation."

“It‚Äôs an absolutely huge occasion for us,” she added. “It‚Äôs a book that our customers have been asking us for the most for years so the anticipation is unprecedented. James Daunt put it very nicely when he said it‚Äôs the publishing event of a bookselling lifetime and that‚Äôs very much how we all feel about it. We‚Äôre all excited about it and want to make it as impactful and exciting a launch as we can.”

The book‚Äôs release even threatens to eclipse that of The Testaments (Chatto & Windus), which was the biggest fiction hardback of 2019 and sold 103,177 in its first week of release. Waterstones has pushed Mantel pre-orders with an exclusive gift card that is going down “extremely well” in shops and online.

Carvalho said: "Everything’s already kicking off with pre-orders but we see this very much as a year-long event for us and our shops. It’s our biggest pre-order for 2020. Our pre-orders have already overtaken total pre-orders for those of The Testaments which was our biggest event of last year."

Shops across the estate will be getting in on the action with reading groups, breakfast openings and panel discussions. The stores will be dressed to reflect the trilogy’s design with point of sale items, flags and banners. Waterstones is also hoping for some "very special guests" to come into stores and talk about the trilogy. Reading groups are also being held to discuss Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies ahead of the latest book’s release.

Carvalho added: "Obviously it’s been long-awaited by many, this release, but it’s also a huge opportunity to introduce Mantel’s amazing backlist to lots of readers for the first time. So we’re going to be holding reading groups with discussions such as the revolutionary nature of the books, their main themes, the relevance of the trilogy today and its cultural impact.

"To aid that, before Christmas, every Waterstones bookseller received a copy of Wolf Hall to boost excitement and anticipation for 5th March and around the estate. We’re hoping that lots of booksellers who hadn’t previously read the trilogy have got stuck in by now and shortly we’re going to offer them copies of Bring Up The Bodies to build excitement even further."

After publication, there will be more events including reading groups and book clubs for The Mirror & the Light. An online readalong with Kiran Millwood Hargrave of the trilogy is also currently underway while Waterstones will be sharing interviews with Mantel on social media.

"It’s going to be unmissable across all the channels online and in the shops," Carvalho promised.

Wolf Hall has sold 1.028 million copies across all editions, according to TCM data, while Bring Up the Bodies sold 572,186.