Lethal Galbraith strikes Fear from the top spot

Robert Galbraith’s fourth Cormoran Strike title Lethal White (Sphere) has proved deadly to Bob Woodward’s Fear (S&S), striking the UK Official Top 50 number one spot in its first three days on sale through Nielsen BookScan’s Total Consumer Market. With 34,967 copies sold, Lethal White has posted the best-ever single week—in any format—for a Galbraith title. 

In the year since the BBC adaptation started, the series as a whole has leapt 73% in volume (and collectively hit the Weekly E-Ranking top 20 for the first time)—but Lethal White, the first new hardback since the show’s launch, has jumped 91% on the first-week hardback sales of predecessor Career of Evil, and even outsold The Cuckoo’s Calling the week in July 2013 that J K Rowling’s secret identity was revealed.

Knocking Wilbur Smith from the Original Fiction top spot, Lethal White scored Rowling’s 45th number one in the category chart. The adult editions of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Half-Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows hit the Original Fiction number one a combined 23 times. 

The second-highest new entry was Together: Our Community Cookbook (Ebury), foreworded by the Duchess of Sussex, which sold 10,990 copies—elbowing Fear from the Hardback Non-Fiction top spot by just 11 copies.

Jo Nesbo’s Macbeth (Vintage) charted in the Mass-Market Fiction chart’s runner-up spot (to Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine), shifting 10,895 copies in its first week on sale, closely followed by Adele Parks’ new entry I Invited Her In (HQ)—though Louise Candlish’s Our House (S&S), the current Waterstones Thriller Pick of the month, made an impressive leap of 56% in volume week on week to finish between the two new entries.

Adam Kay’s This is Going to Hurt (Picador) scored its 22nd week as Paperback Non-Fiction number one. Due to a brief hiccup in June when it was leapfrogged by Anthony McCarten’s Darkest Hour (Viking), its current consecutive run stands at 15 weeks—which puts it level with the longest consecutive run of Pan Mac stablemate Joe Wicks’ Lean in 15 (Bluebird). If the junior doctor memoir can hold on for one more week, it will be the longest-running number one streak since Michael Mosley and Mimi Spencer’s The Fast Diet in January 2013.

Luke Jennings' Codename Villenelle—the source material for BBC series "Killing Eve"—made its debut in the Fiction Heatseekers chart in seventh place, selling 1,281 copies. It leapt 1,247 places in the top 5,000 week on week.

The market's value inched up 0.6% week on week to surpass £31m for the first time this year, with average selling price increasing 27p to £9.25 week on week. Value for the year to date has now topped £1bn, a week ahead of 2017. 

Cressida Cowell’s second Wizards of Once title Twice Magic (Hachette Children's) charted in second in the Children’s chart, with Philip Pullman’s La Belle Sauvage (Penguin and David Fickling) holding the kids’ top spot for a third week.