The New York Times Book review
Paperback Best Sellers Trade Fiction
April 12, 2009
Copyright © 2009by The New York Times
Rankings reflect sales, for the week ending March 28, at many thousands of venues wherea wide range of general interest books are sold nationwide. These include hundreds of independent book retailers (statistically weighted to represent all such outlets); national,regional and local chains; online and multimedia entertainment retailers; university, gift,supermarket, discount department stores and newsstands. An asterisk (*) indicates thata book’s sales are barely distinguishable from those of the book above. A dagger (†) indi-cates that some bookstores report receiving bulk orders. Among those categories not ac-tively tracked are: perennial sellers; required classroom reading; text, reference and testpreparation guides; journals and workbooks; calorie counters; shopping guides; comicsand crossword puzzles. Expanded rankings are available on the Web: nytimes.com/books.
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TRADE FICTION
45
1
THE SHACK,
by William P. Young. (Windblown Media, $14.99.)A man whose daughter was abducted is invited to an isolatedshack, apparently by God.(
†
)
12
2
FIREFLY LANE,
by Kristin Hannah. (St. Martin’s Griffin, $14.95.)A friendship between two women in the Pacific Northwest en-dures for more than three decades as they make different choicesin their lives.
17
3
THE READER,
by Bernhard Schlink. (Vintage, $13.95.) A Ger-man high school student falls in love with a former Auschwitzemployee.
7
4
AMERICAN WIFE,
by Curtis Sittenfeld. (Random House, $15.)A pretty librarian marries the alcoholic scion of a wealthy politicalfamily who somehow becomes president.
12
5
SUNDAYS AT TIFFANY’S,
by James Patterson and GabrielleCharbonnet. (Grand Central, $13.99.) A woman finds an unex-pected love.
82
6
WATER FOR ELEPHANTS,
by Sara Gruen. (Algonquin, $13.95.)A young man — and an elephant — save a Depression-era circus.
18
7
*
A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS,
by Khaled Hosseini. (River-head, $16.) A friendship between two Afghan women against thebackdrop of 30 years of war.
7
8
SARAH’S KEY,
by Tatiana de Rosnay. (St. Martin’s Griffin,$13.95.) A contemporary American journalist investigates whathappened to a little girl and her family during the roundup of Jewsin Paris in 1942.
80
9
*
THE ALCHEMIST,
by Paulo Coelho. (HarperOne, $13.95.) ASpanish shepherd boy travels to Egypt in search of treasure.
13
10
PEOPLE OF THE BOOK,
by Geraldine Brooks. (Penguin, $15.)An expert unlocks the secrets of a rare manuscript.
30
11
THE BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF OSCAR WAO,
by JunotDíaz. (Riverhead, $14.) A nerdy Dominican-American struggles toescape a family curse.
12
12
STILL ALICE,
by Lisa Genova. (Pocket, $15.) A 50-year-old Har-vard professor is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease.
13
13
THE ELEGANCE OF THE HEDGEHOG,
by Muriel Barbery.(Europa, $15.) A young girl and a widowed concierge, both closetintellectuals, become friends.
17
14
*
REVOLUTIONARY ROAD,
by Richard Yates. (Vintage, $14.95.)Frank and April Wheeler, a beautiful young couple living in 1950sAmerica, see their supposedly perfect life come undone.
24
15
THE WHITE TIGER,
by Aravind Adiga. (Free Press, $14.) Achauffeur in India relates the story of his transformation frommanservant to entrepreneur to murderer; the winner of the 2008Man Booker Prize.
53
16
THE FRIDAY NIGHT KNITTING CLUB,
by Kate Jacobs.(Berkley, $14.) A group of women meet weekly at a New York Cityyarn shop.
4
17
LUSH LIFE,
by Richard Price. (Picador, $15.) An aspiring writerbecomes a suspect in a friend’s murder on the Lower East Side.
3
18
TAKE ONE,
by Karen Kingsbury. (Zondervan, $14.99.) Christianfilmmakers engage in a desperate attempt to keep their dreamproject from falling apart.
78
19
THE KITE RUNNER,
by Khaled Hosseini. (Riverhead, $15.95and $14.) An Afghan-American returns to Kabul to learn how achildhood friend has fared.
1
20
THE NO. 1 LADIES’ DETECTIVE AGENCY,
by AlexanderMcCall Smith. (Anchor, $13.95.) In Botswana, a woman looks foran 11-year-old boy who may have been kidnapped by witch doc-tors.
WeeksOn List
TRADE FICTION EXTENDED
21
WORLD WITHOUT END,
by Ken Follett. (New American Li-brary)
22
LOVING FRANK,
by Nancy Horan. (Ballantine)
23
THE MIRACLE AT SPEEDY MOTORS,
by Alexander McCallSmith. (Anchor)
24
CHANGE OF HEART,
by Jodi Picoult. (Washington Square)
25
THE WEDNESDAY LETTERS,
by Jason F. Wright. (Berkley)
26
THE TEN-YEAR NAP,
by Meg Wolitzer. (Riverhead)
27
THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES,
by Sue Monk Kidd. (Penguin)
28
OUT STEALING HORSES,
by Per Petterson. (Picador)
29
SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE,
by Vikas Swarup. (Scribner)
30
FIREPROOF,
by Eric Wilson, Alex Kendrick and Stephen Kend-rick. (Thomas Nelson)
31
THE APPEAL,
by John Grisham. (Delta)
32
MUDBOUND,
by Hillary Jordan. (Algonquin)
33
THE THIRD ANGEL,
by Alice Hoffman. (Three Rivers)
34
SEPULCHRE,
by Kate Mosse. (Berkley)
35
BRIDA,
by Paulo Coelho. (Harper Perennial)
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