What do you like in recent paperbacks and how are those books doing at Amazon and The New York Times? Bestseller lists vary. Amazon's list usually gets high marks since it's updated hourly.

The Quality Paperback Book Club (QPB) is ecstatic about Natsuo Kirino's gritty novel Grotesque, while currently the book is 15,856 on the Amazon list. Dan Poynter notes that a book with a 20,000 rating at Amazon is selling 36 copies a week on Amazon.

The top paperback bestsellers at QPB, as of the October catalogue, include those listed as "early paperbacks" (usually available here first) such as Joe Hill's Heart-Shaped Box, Thomas Cahill's Mysteries of the Middle Ages and Jane Smiley's Ten Days in the Hills

The hardcover version of Smiley's book isn't doing so well on Amazon where its rank is currently a little over 22,000 with an average reader review rating of 2.5 out of a possible 5 stars.

Meanwhile, the hardcover edition of Joe Hill's book is currently 3,790 at Amazon with a reader rating of 4.5

As noted in my post yesterday (Apparently 'everone' is reading "Eat, Pray Love"), Elizabeth Gilbert's memoir is selling briskly.

On top of the New York Times list in paperback fiction are Dear John by Nicholas Sparks, The Boleyn Inheritance by Philppa Gregory, and The Emperor's Children by Claire Messud.

Sara Gruen's Water for Elephants topped the Publishers Weekly trade paperback list for 9/24. She has a nice website here. Reviewer Janice Harayda says that the book has been overpraised, referring to it as "a historical novel that gallops along with a Depression-era traveling circus, saddled with cliches."

Predictions Anyone?

The hardcover edition of Ariana Franklin's novel Mistress of the Art of Death (Putnum, Feb. 2007) is currently at 9,037 on Amazon. QPB has it already in "early paperback," describing it as "CSI Meets The Canterbury Tales as a serial killer takes to Cambridge's leafy lanes."

Of Franklin's novel, author Diana Gabaldon writes "Mistress of the Art of Death is wonderfully plotted, with a dozen twists -- and with final rabbits pulled out of not one hat but two, as both the mystery and the romance reach satisfactorily unexpected conclusions. It's a historical mystery that succeeds brilliantly as both historical fiction and crime-thriller. Above all, though, Franklin has written a terrific story, whose appeal rests on the personalities of the all-too-human beings who inhabit it."

Will this book find its way to a high spot on the New York Times paperback fiction list while also selling well at Amazon?

-
Other conversations:

"Cross Dressing and Disguise on Shakespeare's Stage" at Shelly's Place.

"Reflections on Madeleine L'Engle" at BookFox.

For information about the authors attending the National Book Festival in at the National Mall in Washington, D.C. this Saturdayfrom 10a to 5p, click here

__________________________