Unfit For Command to Debut at #1 on New York Times Bestseller List?

[Veto!]

So, do the pre-sales hit all at once when the book becomes "available"? Could that be enough to make it #1? Hopefully, I think they have to ship in order to count.

The NYT bestseller list does not include amazon.com books. I got on the phone with them late one night when I had time to chat up a sales rep, so I know that for sure. I'm not sure about B&N online as B&N could fudge their online sales into the bookstore sales column.

Certain bookstores across the country are "reporting" stores that send their sales figures in every week to the NYT. Your favorite little corner booknook is most likely not on that list, so if you want to help a book succeed, hold your nose and buy from the chains, which all report to the Times.

Between the time books go on the shelves and the day they're reported to the Times, at least a week has to pass, perhaps even two, for enough sales to "report." When bookstores see that a book "has legs," is moving onto the list, they buy more copies for their shelves. Even you local booknook. But their sales still don't count as far as the NYT is concerned.

[Veto!]

The clerk told me that they didn't have any copies available because the release date had been pushed back to September. I was thinking, "huh??".

I had an email exchange with the pr director of Regnery Publishing who told me they had to go back to press for a 200,000-copy run. They didn't print enough in the first place. Perhaps the store you talked with has to wait for more copies to become available from the publisher. If so, Sept 1 would be about right.

[dc27]

Liberals can't read

[Eva]

I think that the NYT still had the Clinton book as #1 on Sunday. I told my husband that people cannot still be buying that book after all the rotten reviews and the length, there has to be more to those numbers than meets the eye.