Pinch of Nom notches up a ninth week as Atkinson achieves a personal best

Kay Featherstone and Kate Allinson’s Pinch of Nom (Bluebird) has returned to the UK Official Top 50 number one spot, racking up a ninth non-consecutive week in the top spot. It sold 18,467 copies in its 14th week on sale, defeating its own sequel the Pinch of Nom Food Planner, which slipped down to fourth place.

With nine weeks under its belt, the slimming cookbook is now level with Bluebird stablemate Joe Wicks’ Lean in 15 for time spent in the top spot. One more week and it will become the second-longest running non-fiction title in the number one spot since records began, with Jamie’s 30-Minute Meals’ 13 weeks to beat. But, with David Walliams’ The World’s Worst Teachers (HarperCollins) looming up ahead, is the Pinch of Nom low-fat gravy train about to be derailed?

Peter Robinson’s Careless Love (Hodder & Stoughton) leapt into second place in its first full week on sale, swiping the Mass Market Fiction number one spot from Ian Rankin’s In a House of Lies (Orion). Jill Mansell’s Maybe This Time (Headline) was the highest new entry in Mass Market Fiction in ninth place. Tayari Jones’ An American Marriage (Oneworld), still rising in sales after its Women’s Prize for Fiction win, charted in the category top 20 for the first time, hitting 18th.

Kate Atkinson’s Big Sky (Doubleday) soared straight into the Original Fiction number one—incredibly, the author’s first—racking up her biggest single week in hardback to date, at 9,201 copies sold, and beating her previous record set by the last Jackson Brodie title, Started Early Took My Dog, in 2010. Mick Herron’s Joe Country (John Murray) was the second-highest new entry in second place. It also hit 43rd place in the Top 50, which takes Herron out of eligibility for the Fiction Heatseekers chart after five number ones.

An abrupt drop-off in Father’s Day gift titles saw some long-term chart hangers boomerang back up the non-fiction charts, with Mrs Hinch’s Hinch Yourself Happy (Michael Joseph) returning to second place below Pinch and Philippa Perry’s The Book You Wished Your Parents Had Read (Penguin Life) bouncing up five places to fourth in Hardback Non-Fiction.

Jeff Kinney’s Diary of an Awesome Friendly Kid (Puffin) re-claimed the Children’s number one from Mr Men: My Daddy (Egmont), for a ninth non-consecutive week in total. While a 10th week would achieve Kinney’s joint-longest run in the kids’ top spot since 2012, it is absolutely inevitable that Walliams will knock it off the top spot next week (sorry, Jeff).