Grafs and Bookstats 2012

Published: July 24, 2012

Everything hinges on the first paragraph of your book or story. A well-crafted first paragraph can convince a reader to buy your book or a magazine subscriber to read your article.

Galleycat is hosting an experimental First Graf Friday podcast. If you are proud of a particular first paragraph (or graf, as hardboiled reporters used to say), then you could get a chance to share it with Galleycat’s readers.

The 2012 edition of Bookstats, released a few days ago, includes data provided by 1977 publishers from all four industry sectors. The survey is available for purchase in three versions: as a customizable interactive online dashboard, an executive summary providing major highlights and a full in-depth report including each area’s granular data. The executive summary costs $99 while the full report will set you back $2,395. You can buy it here.

Key highlights, as reported by The Association of American Publishers, are:

In the overall Trade sector (encompassing Fiction and Non-Fiction for

Children, Young Adults and Adults), eBooks’ net sales revenue more

than doubled in 2011 vs 2010. This significant growth was particularly

fueled by eBooks’ performance in the Adult Fiction segment where, for

the first time, it ranked #1 for the year in net revenue among all

individual print and electronic formats.

Among categories, both Religion and Children’s/Young Adults showed

strong growth while Children’s/YA ranked as the fastest-growing category

in publishing in 2011.

Despite the negative impact of Borders’ bankruptcy and closures, particularly

on print book sales, through three quarters of 2011, the Trade market held