Paper Republic April , The Chinese Book Market December Party Congress Dominates Published materials related to the th National Congress of the CPC, held in November, continue to skew market statistics. The non-fiction charts, in particular, are dominated by political reports and related Party publications, much of which are required reading (or at least required purchasing) for government offices around the country. The People’s Publishing House, sole authorized publisher of these materials, saw a corresponding bump in business. Mo Yan Fever Cools The last few months of saw a huge leap in sales of literature, mostly related to Mo Yan’s Nobel Prize win. Complete sets of his works, published by the Shang- hai Arts & Literature Publishing House and the Writers Publishing House, continued to sell very well, though numbers are falling. Foreign Literature Elements of the fantastic are much in evidence: popular foreign fiction this month includes Life of Pi and The Hobbit, both riding high on movie tie-ins; two older works by Gabriel García Márquez (the newly-authorized translation of One Hundred Years of Solitude is rising on the charts); J.K. Rowling’s non-fantastic novel, A Casual Vacancy, is losing ground. Economy a Hot Topic One particularly strong showing this month was Credit Factory, written by economist and banker Chen Shi. Chen reflects on his experiences making business loans to small and medium enterprises during his years in banking, much of it working for the Hong Kong and Macau branches of the Bank of China. The tendency of Chinese banks to lend only to large state-owned enterprises is a noted stumbling block in the growth of China’s civil-sector economy, and in this book Chen outlines how banks can break this habit and help China’s smaller economic entities flourish. © Paper Republic, Ltd. All rights reserved. Paper Republic April , As Mo Yan Fever Cools, Temperatures Rise for Film/TV and Fantasy Twonew December publications made the overall bestseller list Meaning of Culture rose to th and rd places, respectively. this month, along with eight books published the month before, The reportage work Glorious Suffering re-appeared on the ranks just as November’s top entrants fell sharply. After several at rd place. months of Nobel fever, the market has begun to display Mo Yan Inspirational literature continues to climb: Posi- fatigue. Though the Shanghai Arts & Literature Publishing tive Energy once again led the social-sciences charts, A full volumes of House’s editions of Frog (Collected Works of Nobel Prize-Winner rising six slots this month to make the top three on the Charlie IX chil- Mo Yan) and Big Breasts, Wide Hips (Newly Revised Edition, Col- the general list. Ji Yunxiang’s Time Brings Victory: Let dren’s series made this lected Works of Mo Yan) remained in the top positions with more Time Tell You the Secrets to Success, on the market for month’s charts than , in certified sales each, those figures represent a years, came in at number . The Basics of Four-Color drop of nearly a third on the previous month. Mo Yan’s Col- Personality Analysis: Le Jia Teaches You to See in Color lected Works (16 vols), a new November bestseller, had already rose places to number , while Zhang Defen’s Meeting the dropped to th place by December. Unknown Self – Spiritual Practices for the Urban Soul rose to rd Romance constituted a bright spot in young-adult litera- place. ture: The Unknown Lover: Kevin Tsai’s Love SMS was ranked In the business/economy category, Chen Shi’s new book th. This is the Love you Gave Me II: Yunzhi reappeared on The Credit Factory entered the ranks at number , while Lang the ranks at number . Guo Jingming’s Tiny Times 3.0 – The Xianping’s The Chinese Economy on the Brink of Crisis fell to . Gelded Age and Han Han’s Youth also made comebacks, while Domestic children’s literature made a strong showing: Luo Luo’s Queen Stain II: You Will Never Get the Crown and Rao Dream of the Wolf King (Shen Shixi, King of Animal Fiction – Col- Xueman’s Things Girls Ought to Know remained in the running. lector’s Edition) rose places to make the top ten, while The Jiang Rong’s Wolf Totem, a perennial best-seller, rose Seventh Hunting Hound (Shen Shixi, King of Animal Fiction – Col- spots to number . Liu Zhenyun’s Tales of 1942, newly- lector’s Edition), now on the market for quite some time, was published in November and the basis for the new movie 1942, ranked th. A full volumes of Leo Fantasia’s Charlie IX was at th place, while Chen Zhongshi’s White Deer Plain (20th series made this month’s general rankings, each one of them in- Anniversary Collector’s Edition) was relegated to second-to-last creasing in sales and ranking over last month. Yang Hongying’s place. works performed well: Watermelon Clown Forever (The Laugh- New translations of foreign literature continue to ing Cat’s Diary) rose slots, while three other books from the Life of Pi, published emerge, many of them containing elements of the fan- same series rose on the charts. Wu Meizhen’s I Come From a last month, jumped tastic. Life of Pi, which entered the market in Novem- Lonely Star (Sunny Sister’s Library), published in November, was straight to number ber, jumped straight to number . Gabriel García ranked th, while The Orange Fairy (Tang Sulan’s Fairy Tale Se- seven Márquez’ seminal works of magical realism continue ries) and The Mood Clinic (Pinyin Edition, The Merry Rats Series to sell well: One Hundred Years of Solitude rose No 7) came in at th and th, respectively. places to number , and Love in the Time of Cholera Foreign children’s literature appeared weak by compari- rose to rd place. New entrant The Hobbit came in at th son: Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window rose spots, place. The Casual Vacancy, J.K. Rowling’s departure from the though overall sales declined, and The Story of the Princess’ world of magic, met with a cool reception, falling in both rank- Dream (Barbie Thumbelina) only made th place. There ing and sales to number . were few bright spots among pre-school reading materials: Works by television hosts dominate the non-fiction and es- New Times Press’s edition of Kong Rong and the Pears and say categories. Rui Chenggang’s Between Fiction and Reality con- Guangzhou Publishing House’s Creatures, Vol I (Little Dolphin tinued its ascent from the previous month, doubling its sales Preschool Series) were ranked th and rd. Cartoons and illus- and rising places to number . Gao Xiaosong’s Loss: We’re trated books continued to sell sluggishly: Jiangsu Literature & Finally Old Enough to Talk About the Future rose to th place, Art Publishing House’s Legends from the Roco Kingdom III plum- while Long Yingtai’s The Retreating Gaze and Yu Qiuyu’s The meted places. © Paper Republic, Ltd. All rights reserved. Paper Republic April , December Market Analysis Negative Growth Across the Board, Looking at aggregate figures, the number of books with Education in Particular certified sales remained under ,, though it rose by four thousand over the month previous. All categories besides edu- The overall market index for December fell by . points cation and S&T rose against the month previous, with a partic- from November. Literature remained strongest with an index ularly good showing from children’s literature and art. of . points, followed by lifestyle with . points, and chil- dren’s literature with .. Non-Fiction rose one rank over last month, while both children’s literature and art fell by one High Market Concentration: A Good Month rank, and all others held steady. for People’s Publishing House Overall, science & technology, non-fiction and lifestyle showed growth, while all other categories fell: education by The CR market concentration ratio for December was more than %, literature, art, and children’s literature by less .%, a rise of . percentage points over the month previ- than %. Tracking performance over the last four months, De- ous and the highest figure in the past four months. cember posted the lowest overall index since September, and The top ten publishers in the industry were listed children’s literature, art, and education at their lowest point as controlling .% of the market for non-fiction, since September. Month-by-month comparisons are a little The People’s Publish- as well as .% and .% of the market for ing House is the sole more encouraging: the November-to-December overall drop S&T and literature. Compared with November, non- was less than October-to-November. authorized publisher fiction was the clear leader, with a growth of . of official government percentage points, and a growth of . percentage publications Market Share (Income): Non-Fiction Rises points over the past four months. Of the ten publish- ing houses dominating the general non-fiction cate- While Education Falls gory, the People’s Publishing House occupies a nearly % share, .% more than the month previous, and is single- General non-fiction took the lead this month with .% of handedly responsible for most of the growth in the non-fiction market share in terms of gross income, largely due to the th category. People’s Publishing House is the sole authorized pub- Party Congress. Education took second place with .%, lisher of official Party and government publications. and literature came third with .%. Children’s literature and S&T had .% and .%, respectively, while lifestyle and art posted lower shares: .% and .%, respectively. Engines of Growth? Party and Government Among the seven categories only non-fiction saw a growth in market share.