HarperCollins's Jonathan Burnham might want to look away. His million-dollar plays for novels by Vikram Chandra (Sacred Games) and the forthcoming Holocaust thriller by Jonathan Littell have a lot at stake, obviously. This past year, some other big bets were losers, though not all. And therein lies the hope....

Special Topics in Calamity Physicsby Marisha Pessl (Viking, Aug.)Viking has scored big with its six-figure advance to "book hot" debut novelist Pessl. After a 32,500-copy first printing, the book has gone back to press nine times and is up to 113,972 in print. Viking plans to publish the paperback in May to take advantage of in-store promotions at the beginning of the summer. Miramax Films and producer Scott Rudin have optioned screen rights. Special Topics is the sort of smart, accessible novel that can be huge in paperback. It's already pretty big in hardcover: 58,000 copies, according to Nielsen BookScan.The Expected One
by Kathleen McGowan (Touchstone Fireside, July)
S&S reportedly paid $1.5 million for a Da Vinci Code—like trilogy by this self-published author and self-proclaimed descendant of Mary Magdalene who claimed to have visions of Magdalene. Touchstone Fireside, which said it has 250,000 copies of Expected in print, cashed in by selling foreign rights in 29 countries and is planning a 125,000-copy paperback release for May. While Nielsen BookScan quotes sales at just under 50,000, an S&S rep says the actual number is double that, since the title moved well in non—BookScan-tracked channels. With the possibility of a Hollywood deal for McGowan still looming, Touchstone seems to have gambled wisely on this newbie.
Two Lives
by Vikram Seth(HarperCollins, Nov. 2005; paperback June 2006)
Seth isn't your typical blockbuster-writing author: he wrote his first novel, The Golden Gate, in verse; his second, A Suitable Boy, ran nearly 1,400 pages. A third, An Equal Music, was quieter, but his fourth book—the nonfiction work Two Lives—landed the author a roughly $2.5-million advance from Little, Brown in the UK. HarperCollins bought U.S. hardcover and paperback rights, and while the amount of that advance hasn't been released, the house clearly had high hopes for Two LivesStateside, printing a reported 150,000 copies of the hardcover in fall 2005 (a paperback edition landed in June '06). Sales, however, have been dismal; Nielsen BookScan reports sales of 14,000 in hardcover and 6,000 in paperback.
Beauty Junkies: Inside Our $15 Billion Obsession with Cosmetic Surgery
by Alex Kuczynski(Doubleday, Oct.)
Maybe there's no such thing as bad publicity, but what about too much publicity? When New York Times style reporter Kuczynski's debut book was published, the author—who'd landed a $500,000 advance—was everywhere. The combined Rolodexes of the well-connected writer and the Doubleday publicity department landed her on The Today Show, Entertainment Tonight and NPR; and in the New Yorker, the Wall Street Journal, the Village Voice, USA Today, Vanity Fair, Elle, Glamour, Allure, People and, of course, the Times. The result of all that exposure? According to Nielsen BookScan, the book has sold 6,000 copies so far. That works out to one copy for every $83 of Kuczynski's advance.
Water for Elephants
by Sara Gruen (Algonquin, May)
Algonquin paid five figures for world rights to this third novel (and hardcover debut) from Gruen. The Southern indie, which passed out armfuls of galleys at BEA—the house printed 3,500 ARCs—got behind the novel in a big way, and it paid off. Algonquin has not only seen the book take off in the U.S., with Nielsen BookScan citing Water at 189,000 copies, it also sold rights in 14 countries. Publicist Michael Taeckens says the house has 245,000 copies in print and the paperback, which is getting an announced first printing of 200,000, is set to drop April 3.
You: On a Diet
by Michael F. Roizen, M.D., and Mehmet Oz, M.D. (Free Press, Oct.)
After Roizen and Oz spent a considerable stretch on the bestseller list with their first book, You: The Owner's Manual, S&S poached the duo from HarperCollins for this follow-up. The seven figures Free Press paid for You: On a Diet—the deal was for three books in total, North American rights—proved a drop in the bucket. Free Press has 2.7 million copies of the book in print and has gone back to press 21 times, after doing an initial run of 750,000 copies. While Nielsen BookScan cites a whopping sales total of 908,000 copies, Carisa Hays, Free Press v-p and director of publicity, says the actual tally is 30% higher, with the book selling briskly in channels like Wal-Mart, which Nielsen BookScan doesn't track. Free Press, which also has paperback rights, will likely be seeing green for a very long time from this sweet deal.
Thirteen Moons
by Charles Frazier (Random, Oct.)
After his critical and commercial smash Cold Mountain, Frazier drew an $8-million advance from Random House for U.S. rights to his second book—the highest amount ever paid for a single novel. Random ordered a 500,000-copy first printing. As of January 22, Nielsen BookScan reported 225,000 copies sold, though Random House says total sales are closer to 300,000 copies. For most books, that would be impressive. But PW calculates that, based on standard publishing formulas, Random needs to sell about a million hardcovers and two million paperbacks to earn out its advance.
The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters
by Gordon Dahlquist (Bantam Dell, Aug.)
Set in Victorian England, this nearly 800-page saga was one of the most disappointing books of the season. Bantam, which paid a reported $2 million for a two-book deal, printed an initial 100,000 copies and—working off of prepub interest from retailers—went back for another 20,000. According to Nielsen BookScan, though, Glass Books has sold just 21,000 copies to date. Bantam's only hope for recouping its investment is for the book to sell big in paperback. With Viking UK planning a serialized hardcover release for the book (see p. 8), Bantam is hoping to build up Dahlquist's name and release the paperback of Glass Books at the same time as Dahlquist's hardcover sequel.
The Interpretation of Murder
by Jed Rubenfeld (Holt, Sept.)
It was the book everyone was talking about, and getting their hands on, at BEA. Holt, which paid a hefty $800,000 for Yale law prof Rubenfeld's historical thriller debut, printed some 10,000 galleys and hit the publicity circuit. Despite strong early buzz and positive (if mixed) reviews, the book fell far short of expectations. Holt said it has 185,000 copies of the book in print, but Nielsen BookScan reports sales of only 26,000 copies so far. Holt will get another chance to push the title when Picador releases the paperback in June.
A Spot of Bother
by Mark Haddon(Doubleday, Sept.)
In 2003, Doubleday published British author Haddon's debut novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time in the U.S. Nielsen BookScan reports the hardcover sold 129,000 copies here, and the paperback sold 1.5 million copies. A follow-up book of poems sold nicely (for poetry), but Haddon's second novel has been disappointing. While Random House won't say how much it paid for the book, given Haddon's past success—and the fact that there are 200,000 copies in print—the publisher clearly was betting on moving more than the 44,000 hardcover copies sold so far, according to Nielsen BookScan. Although it looks like a loss, Vintage has the paperback rights, so Random could still make back its advance.