One thing is clear in advance of tonight’s National Book Awards ceremony: The list of fiction nominees is the most commercial crop of titles in contention for many years. Kaveh Akbar’s MARTYR! is among the top-selling debuts of the year, with sales of approximately 46,000 hardcovers so far as measured by Circana Bookscan. That puts it well head of the hardcover sales of the last three NBA fiction winners (BLACKOUTS; THE RABBIT HUTCH; and HELL OF A BOOK). Miranda July’s breakout ALL FOURS was one of the summer’s most talked about books, and has sold just over 99,000 hardcovers. And […]
