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The Mister and Mrs: E L James defeats Mrs Hinch to bag number one
E L James' The Mister (Arrow) has scorched into the UK Official Top 50 number one spot, selling 52,674 copies through Nielsen BookScan's TCM.
Though this volume is the highest single week for an Adult Fiction title since Dan Brown's Origin (Corgi) in July 2018, and the highest launch week for any Fiction title since James' own Darker (Arrow) in November 2017, it falls somewhat short of Darker's first-week volume of 85,537 copies—which was itself some 300,000 copies down on the launch of Grey in 2015. However, Darker still went on to sell nearly a quarter of a million copies, and seven years on from publication, Fifty Shades of Grey still looks untouchable as the bestselling book of all time, at 4.7 million copies sold. The Mister racks up James' 29th week at overall number one, and her 39th in the Mass Market Fiction pole.
Kay Featherstone and Kate Allinson's record-breaking cookbook Pinch of Nom (Bluebird) rose to push Mrs Hinch's Hinch Yourself Happy (Michael Joseph) down to third overall, re-claiming its Hardback Non-Fiction top spot. After just a month on sale, the title has now surpassed half a million copies sold.
Robert Galbraith's Lethal White (Sphere) was the second-highest new entry in the chart, hitting sixth place overall—though with its first-week volume of 15,012 copies sold, its paperback sold fewer than half what its September-published hardback did in its own launch week. Perhaps, like the Harry Potter series, the fourth Cormoran Strike novel will represent the tipping point of when the hardbacks started selling faster than the paperbacks.
Ian McEwan's Machines Like Me (Jonathan Cape) wheeled into the Original Fiction number one, defeating Wilbur Smith and Imogen Robertson's King of Kings (Zaffre). John Connolly's A Book of Bones (Hodder & Stoughton) and David Baldacci's Redemption (Macmillan) also entered the top three, pushing the previous week's reigning champion King of Kings down to fourth place.
The Secret Barrister (Picador) held the Paperback Non-Fiction number one for a second week, with both the justice system expose and Ant Middleton's First Man In (HarperCollins) holding strong in the top two against the BBC Proms 2019 Festival Guide (Bloomsbury), which debuted in third place, and strong first week sales from Dr Richard Shepherd's Unnatural Causes and Anthony Beevor's Arnhem (both Penguin).
Though Jeff Kinney's Diary of an Awesome Friendly Kid (Puffin) held the Children's number one for a second week, Fiona Watt and Rachel Wells' That's Not My Chick (Usborne) leapfrogged Martha Mumford and Laura Hughes' We're Going on an Egg Hunt (Bloomsbury Children's) for the Pre-School pole. That's Not My Chick sold 8,995 copies in the run-up to the Easter weekend, a 40% bump week on week.
The print market dropped 6.4% in value and 4.8% in volume week on week, to 3.1 million books sold for £25.3m—but the year on year figures continue to soar against spring 2018, with a 13.7% rise in value and 16.8% jump in volume.
