At BEA, Fiction and Sequels Had the Hottest Buzz
This story originally appeared in Children's Bookshelf on June 7, 2007 Sign up now!
by Diane Roback, Children's Bookshelf -- Publishers Weekly, 6/7/2007
The Javits Center has gone dark and Book Expo has come to a close, leaving in its wake 30,000 sweaty attendees, 60,000 weary feet, and countless totebags stuffed with readers' copies. By all accounts, this year's show was a good one for children's books, and booksellers are eagerly anticipating a number of the titles they saw and heard buzz about. Here we'll present the season's highlights. And click here to enjoy a collection of photos from last weekend's events.
The book of the show? Nowhere to be seen. That book, of course, being Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, due out next month, all 12 million copies. But as the booksellers of America wait for the trucks to arrive, they spent their BEA weekend learning about the books they'll be selling after Harry.
Fall will see many highly anticipated fiction sequels, most notably Eclipse, the third title from Stephenie Meyer featuring the characters from her phenomenally successful vampire novels Twilight and New Moon. Little, Brown is printing 700,000 copies, but because it's embargoed for an August 7 pub, no copies were available. Other big followups include The Sweet Far Thing, the concluding volume in Libba Bray's Gemma Doyle trilogy (Delacorte, 250,000 copies, Dec.); Peter and the Secret of Rundoon by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson (Disney Editions, 250,000 copies, Nov.); Love, Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli, followup to Stargirl from seven years ago (Knopf, 250,000 copies, Aug); and Jack Gantos's fifth book about Joey Pigza, this one titled I Am Not Joey Pigza (FSG, July, 75,000 copies).
Two bestselling adult authors are trying their hand at writing for younger readers. High Fidelity author Nick Hornby has his first novel for teens: Slam, due in October from Putnam with a 300,000-copy first printing. And Sherman Alexie offers The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Little, Brown. Sept., 100,000 copies); booksellers snatched up giveaway ARCs from huge stacks.
Other novels to watch for come fall: E.L. Konigburg's The Mysterious Edge of the Heroic World (Atheneum/Seo); Spud by John van de Ruit, a smash hit in South Africa that will pub here in October (Razorbill); Alex and the Ironic Gentleman, kicking off a fantasy/adventure series in September by Adrienne Kress, on the debut Weinstein Books list; The Name of This Book Is Secret by Pseudonymous Bosch (Little, Brown, Oct.), a (yes) pseudonymous author who entertained booksellers with a mini-magic act after the ABC annual meeting; The Luxe by Anna Godbersen (HarperCollins, Nov., 200,000 copies), historical chick lit set in 1899 Manhattan; and Candyfloss by Jacqueline Wilson (Roaring Brook, Sept., 100,000 copies); Roaring Brook will do its best to break out the British superstar author on these shores.
Two high-profile fall novels feature similar, intriguing premises: Deadline by Chris Crutcher (Greenwillow, Sept.), which carries the irresistible tagline, "What if you only had one year... to live and you knew it?"; and Before I Die by debut author Jenny Downham (Random/Fickling, Sept.), about a teenage girl with incurable cancer.
The Arrival, a graphic wordless novel by Australian Shaun Tan (Scholastic/Levine), had many booksellers buzzing as they picked up giveaway copies. And Artemis Fowl: The Graphic Novel by Eoin Colfer comes out this fall, with a 250,000-copy combined hard/soft printing.
Picture Book Picks
Lines snaked down the aisles as Peter Yarrow signed copies of Puff the Magic Dragon for two hours during the show. Sterling plans a 250,000-copy first printing of the August picture book, illustrated by Eric Puybaret, and a 25-city tour. Actress Julianne Moore also had huge crowds for her booth signing of Freckleface Strawberry, illustrated by LeUyen Pham (Bloomsbury, 100,000 copies, Oct.).
Big picture book sequels abounded. HarperCollins had Diary of a Fly by Doreen Cronin and Harry Bliss (Aug.), third in their bestselling series ("the best yet!" exclaimed bookseller Ellen Mager of Booktenders' Secret Garden in Doylestown, Pa.). Trixie and her stuffed Knuffle Bunny are back, in Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity by Mo Willems (Hyperion, Sept.), and indie bookseller favorite Skippyjon Jones returns in Skippyjon Jones and the Big Bones by Judy Schachner (Dutton, Oct.). Holt is calling 2007 "The Year of the Bear" with the publication of Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle's Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What Do You See? (Sept.); their giveaway bags were a big hit with retailers. Clarion had Eileen Christelow's Five Little Monkeys Go Shopping (Aug.). And Ian Falconer's irrepressible heroine will celebrates the holidays with Olivia Helps with Christmas (Atheneum, Oct. 2 laydown).
Other likely big Christmas picture books: Great Joy by Kate DiCamillo, illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline (Candlewick, Oct.); Angela and the Baby Jesus by Frank McCourt,
illustrated by Raúl Colón (S&S, Nov.); and The Night Before Christmas: A Magical Cut-Paper Edition with block prints by Niroot Puttapipat (Candlewick, Sept.)—Valerie Koehler of Blue Willow Bookshop in Houston said she was "blown away" by that title.
The ever-popular Jon Sciezska/Lane Smith duo have wrangled up Cowboy & Octopus for Viking (Sept.), one of several standalone picture books that got a lot of buzz. Gayle Shanks of Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe, Ariz., was one of several booksellers who singled out Gallop by Rufus Seder from Workman (Oct.). "It's going to be huge this fall," Shanks said. Everyone is going to want it." Mager at Booktenders' Secret Garden was "thrilled" to find Ted Lewin's At Gleason's Gym (Roaring Brook/Porter, Aug.). "Older picture books for sports other than baseball are "so needed!" Mager exclaimed.
Pop-ups are big business these days, and maestros Robert Sabuda and Matthew Reinhart have been busy. Sabuda's got a Chronicles of Narnia pop-up for HarperCollins (Nov., 500,000 first printing), and Reinhart will have Star Wars: A Pop-Up Guide to the Galaxy, complete with glowing light sabers (Scholastic, 350,000 copies, Oct.). "I thought it looked fabulous," said Ellen Davis of Dragonwings in Waupaca, Wis. And Candlewick is offering The All-New All-Different X-Men Pop-Up for fall, with a 150,000-copy first printing.
Carol Chittenden, owner of Eight Cousins on Cape Cod and children's buyer at BookStream, enjoys the serendipity of BEA, and finding smaller publishers she may not have heard of before. "This time I found a gem: Maren Green Publishing. My local Head Start director had asked about new books to help kids three and under to help with socialization and anger. Maren Green has half a dozen that meet that profile."
In nonfiction, HarperCollins was spotlighting Ana's Story by Jenna Bush, her account of a Panamanian teenage girl living with AIDS; they'll print 500,000 copies, for an October 2 laydown. Feiwel and Friends, exhibiting at its first BEA, was touting For Boys Only: The Biggest, Baddest, Best Book Ever! by Marc Aronson and HP Newquist; it's a 200-page compendium of "information, activities, and fun," Feiwel said. F&F is crashing it onto the schedule for November and printing 150,000 copies. Orchard Books was highlighting a title with a timely topic: The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming by Laurie David and Cambria Gordon (Sept.). And a nonfiction picture book project got a lot of attention: The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain by Peter Sís is the Czech author's own story of growing up in Communist Czechoslovakia (FSG/Foster, Aug., 75,000 copies); a large crossover audience is likely.
On the news side, Random House gave booksellers its first look at the new Robin Corey imprint, which debuts this fall, and there's a new American Girl coming this September: Julie, who lives in 1970s San Francisco; the books will be written by Judy Moody author Megan McDonald.
Kristin McLean, executive director of ABC, said that from her perspective the show had gone "really well." This year the ABC upped its collaboration with the ABC and Children's Book Council on various programming, which McLean had gotten a good feedback for. "Overall the attitude was pretty positive. It didn't feel like doom-and-gloom to me. People were generally in good moods and were upbeat." McLean said she was very interested to see what the children's market would be like post-Harry. "My gut feeling is that we will continue to see strong children's sales compared to the rest of the industry. It's the one place we have developed a new readership. The trick is just keeping it going."
