Bestselling Books of 2008

Oprah says, "Read the Miami Herald!"

 

You read "The Secret"??

Not judging ... well, yeah, kind of judging ...

 

And Twilight is Nos. 2 and 30. Is this a paperback/hardback thing?

 

The two Obama books and the Sedaris are it.

And I read a lot.

 

Yes, paperback/hardback will show up multiple times.

 

None.

Somebody gave me the Grisham but it's not my cup of tea.

Have heard good things about Nora Roberts.

 

I read exhaustively . . . almost exclusively non-fiction, heavy on bio . . . and the divergence between the best-seller list and the worthwhile has never been greater.
And it's scary as hell.

 

She writes like 12 books a year. She has entire series come out in a year. My wife, a voracious reader, cannot keep up with her.

Fuck, I wish I could do that, even if it is standard romance/thriller boilerplate stuff.

 

I think I read about 20-25 books last year. None of those on the list, though. Hell, I just finished the Lombardi bio ("When Pride Still Mattered") for the first time and that came out 10 years ago. Hard to keep up with the new books that come out, when I've got a half-dozen on my nightstand still waiting to be caught up.

 

Maraniss is a god among men.

The list seems skimpy on the nonfiction, and yet for some reason, that's supposedly still the most reliable advance money. My guess is you can probably get more out of fiction - I know Nicholas Sparks' first advance was around $1 million and Stephanie Meyer was $750K, but you're more likely to get a deal with nonfiction because not every housewife with a laptop thinks she can do it.

 

Reading "Rome 1960", now.

It's fantastic.