The novelist Guillaume Musso is the number one author in bookstores, while Asterix’s latest album was the best-selling book in 2021.
The latest Asterix album was by far the best-selling book of 2021, the year in which novelist Guillaume Musso remained the number one author in bookstores, according to rankings published on Wednesday by Weekly Books and Le Figaro.
Like every two years, namely the rate of publication of the adventures of the famous Gaul, Asterix and the Griffin (editions Albert René) largely dominates the ranking established by the GfK firm. The album sold 1,547,576 copies after its October 21 release, a rate of almost 21,500 comic books per day, or 15 per minute.
As for authors, all titles combined, Guillaume Musso continues, at 47, to outclass his competitors. It tops the chart for the eleventh consecutive year, with 1.278 million books sold according to GfK. He is followed by Virginie Grimaldi (2nd as in 2020, 877,000 copies). Third place was won by Franck Thilliez (750,000 copies) from Michel Bussi (721,000 copies).
Joël Dicker suffers from not having published in 2021
Follow six authors who are between 600,000 and 656,000 copies: in order Marc Levy, Bernard Minier, Valérie Perrin, Mélissa Da Costa (new in this top 10), Marie-Bernadette Dupuy and Aurélie Valognes. The Swiss Joël Dicker, who was fifth in 2020, suffers from not having published in 2021, even in his pocket. It plans to relaunch in 2022 with The Alaska Sanders Affair, expected in March.
Far behind Asterix, The Anomalies by Hervé Le Tellier (Gallimard), Prix Goncourt 2020, is the second best-selling book of 2021, under half a million copies, at 491,884. This brings sales to nearly 933,000 since the discreet release of this novel in August 2020.
The podium is completed by Life is a novel by Guillaume Musso, released in May 2020 in large format, and in March 2021 in paperback, with 433,355 copies. Fourth, The Stranger of the Seine (Calmann Lévy), published in September, has accumulated 399,615 copies.
Zemmour rises in the charts
Goncourt 2021, The most secret memory of men by Senegalese Mohamed Mbougar Sarr (Philippe Rey editions), is fifth with 378,219 copies.
After All the blue of the sky, novel by Mélissa Da Costa dating from 2019 (sixth with 331,010 copies), the presidential candidate Eric Zemmour has managed to rise in this list where political books rarely shine: 282,671 copies for France has not said its last word, which he self-published.
GfK noted the increasing share of comics among the top 50 sales of the year. “No less than 20 titles”, compared to six in 2020 and three in 2019, notes Casseline Rosello, consultant quoted by Livres Hebdo. After Asterix, the best-selling comic was volume 1 of the manga Naruto, with nearly 275,000 copies.