A Second Family Business

Messrs. President and Patterson, make room. State of Terror, Hillary Rodham Clinton’s first foray into the political thriller realm, alongside Inspector Gamache series scribe Louise Penny, is at #1 overall in its first week on sale. The former presidential candidate and secretary of state’s pivot to fiction is a clear success, and our review, which said the book “is more likely to appeal to fans of Bill Clinton and James Patterson’s The President’s Daughter than the legion of readers devoted to Penny’s Inspector Gamache novels,” feels especially on point now. The question is, who will Chelsea Clinton team up with should she choose to follow suit?

Au Revoir, le Carré

The late John le Carré’s final novel, Silverview, debuts at #6 on the fiction list, pushing a solid 500 or so copies more in its first week than 2019’s Agent Running in the Field—though the last le Carré novel featuring his iconic character George Smiley, A Legacy of Spies, sold nearly double in hardcover during its first week. Still, with its “first-rate prose and a fascinating plot,” the novel is “a fitting coda to a remarkable career,” our review said.

Aristotle and Dante Return

No, not the philosopher and the poet. Benjamin Alire Sáenz’s 2012 YA novel Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe—which our review called “a tender, honest exploration of identity and sexuality”—was a sleeper hit: no exceptionally huge sales weeks here, but the book has sold an average of 765 trade paperback copies per week since its paperback publication in March 2014, for a total of more than 302,000 copies in that format alone. The sequel, Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World, which PW also gave a starred review, sold 13,081 copies in its first week, making it #3 on the children’s fiction list. A film adaptation, starring Max Pelayo and Reese Gonzales in the titular roles, was announced earlier this month.

NEW & NOTABLE

THE CHRISTMAS PIG
J.K. Rowling
#1 Juvenile Fiction, #2 overall
A standalone story from the Harry Potter author, Rowling’s latest is, according to its publisher, “a heartwarming, page-turning adventure about one child’s love for his most treasured toy, and how far he will go to find it.”

SOME THINGS I CAN'T TELL YOU
Misha Collins
#1 Trade Paper
Andrews McMeel has another hit poetry book in actor and activist Collins’s debut collection, which its publisher describes as “a compilation of small observations and musings” that is “filled with moments of reflection and a love letter to simple joys.”