A Plateful of Pi

Yann Martel's Life of Pi, published by Harcourt, enjoyed a three-month run on PW's hardcover list in 2002 and sold about 210,000 copies—not bad for a book that started with a 20,000-copy printing. The Harvest trade paper moves up a notch to #5 this week and already has 250,000 copies in print. Sales catalysts for the hardcover edition included great reviews, strong media attention and the esteemed Booker Prize—a British literary award that does more for U.S. sales than most indigenous prizes. Consider that Julia Glass's Three Junes, the winner of last year's National Book Award, did not land on any of the weekly hardcover PW charts; happily, the trade paper reprint changes that track (see below).