Yes, my reading friends, book sales for January rose by 7. 2 percent. The largest jump was in adult paperback at nearly 40 percent and the smallest was in religious books at close to 1 percent.
This comes from the Association of American Publishers. With reports of closing bookstores and sluggish sales at Borders and Barnes& Noble, I guess people are buying books at independent bookstores (??) or from online retailers.

Could be that the trade group’s promotion, Get Caught Reading, is working. Above is a poster showing Alicia Keys checking out a book. Others celebrities in the posters are Rosie O’Donnell, Marlo Thomas, George Foreman and Queen Latifah.

Here is what the AAP said in full about January sales — and it shouldn’t go unnoticed that January is often a slow month for sales.

“The adult hardcover category was up by 4.2 percent in January with sales of $94.4 million. Adult Paperback sales rose 37.6 percent for the month ($135.2 million). The adult mass market category rose by 17.3 percent for January with sales totaling $65.3 million. The children’s/YA hardcover category saw a decrease of 21.9 percent for the month with sales of $33.6 million. The children’s/YA paperback category was up by 28.2 percent in January with sales totaling $34.0 million.

“Audio book sales posted an increase of 16.8 percent for January compared to last year’s figures, with sales totaling $13.5 million. E-books sales rose by 26.1 percent for the month ($3.1 million). Religious books rose 1.1 percent for the month with sales of $47.5 million.

“Sales of University Press hardcover books were up by 4.7 percent in January with sales of $7.1 million. University Press Paperback sales posted a slight decrease of 1.5 percent for the month with sales totaling $10.2 million. Sales in the Professional and Scholarly category were up by 0.7 percent in January ($46.9 million).

“Higher Education publishing sales declined by 0.7 percent for the month with sales of $253.1 million, and finally, the net El-Hi (elementary/high school) basal and supplemental K-12 category posted a decrease of 1.6 percent in January with sales of $68.8 million.”