This Plum Gets Juicier

Back in November 2002, this bestseller column sparked much controversy when we reported on which bestselling stars' unit sales were falling and who was enjoying rising sales. Janet Evanovich was in the latter group, with a sales growth in three years of more than 200%. That number goes even higher this year with her latest Stephanie Plum caper, To the Nines. Its combined first-week sales at the three big chains—Barnes & Noble, Borders and Waldenbooks—is about 56,575; that represents a 33% increase over Hard Eight, which enjoyed first-week sales of 42,700 at the same three chains in 2002. Back in 2001, Seven Up sold about 27,000 copies and in 2000, Hot Six had opening-week unit sales of 13,500. Evanovich's bookstore appearances—she is on a 10-city tour—keep getting bigger and bigger, according to publisher St. Martin's. It reported that in Indianapolis, Ind., and Ft. Worth, Tex., 2,000 fans showed up; at the Mall of America in Minneapolis, there were 3,000. First printing for Nines was 750,000 copies (that's 250,000 copies more than the first printing for Eight).