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Publishing This Week

Hello,

It's another big week for books, both in quality and quantity. Among the two dozen authors with new titles publishing this Tuesday are Jonathan Franzen, Miriam Toews, Claire Vaye Watkins, Amor Towles, Lisa Unger, Xiaolong Qiu (with a new Inspector Chen mystery), and an excellent debut short story collection from Jocelyn Nicole Johnson, My Monticello. You'll find 10 below and all 24 on BookBrowse (click on the link at the bottom of the list).

Talking of Tuesdays, have you noticed how most books are published on Tuesdays?

Some sources say this is to avoid the expense of shipping over the weekend. However, that doesn't seem to make much sense as shipping times vary depending on distance. Also, only the most high-profile books have a firm on-sale date, so many titles get unpacked and shelved soon after arriving, even if that is a few days ahead of the official publication date. Another explanation is that Tuesday is generally a slow day for brick-and-mortar stores, so this drives extra traffic into the store; and is also far enough ahead of the weekend to allow for reorders if sales are looking good.

Perhaps the more credible explanation is that the bestseller charts are tallied based on sales from Tuesday to Monday, so releasing on a Tuesday gives a book a full week of sales.

Of course, that does lead inquiring minds to wonder at what point those that track bestsellers decided to start their week on a Tuesday. The first bestselling book list in the US was published in 1895 in The Bookman, a monthly New York based literary journal. Publishers Weekly started its list in 1913; I cannot find any information on the time time period they tracked. The first New York Times bestseller list was published on October 12, 1931, which was a Monday.

Personally, I've always assumed that the publishing industry settled on Tuesday because it's early in the week and consistently reliable as, unlike Monday which has at least five US federal holidays (thanks to the Uniform Monday Holiday Act, 1968), I don't think poor old Tuesday has any major holiday to call its own.

Whatever the reason, there is no doubt that Tuesday is the big day for new books.

If you have insider information on the Tuesday question, please do email me (just reply to this email) and I will share the knowledge in the future - as I'm sure I'm not the only one to have wondered about this.

Enjoy!

Davina, BookBrowse Publisher


This Week's New and Notable Books
There are too many books published each week for you to read about them all, let alone read them all. So we do the legwork for you, scouring the publishers' catalogs and the pre-publication reviews to pick out what we believe to be among the best and most interesting. For more about our process, see “Picking Books” and “Rating Books”.
Crossroads book jacket
Crossroads: A Key to All Mythologies #1 by Jonathan Franzen

On sale Oct 5 from Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Genre: Novels. 592 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

Jonathan Franzen's gift for wedding depth and vividness of character with breadth of social vision has never been more dazzlingly evident than in Crossroads.

Read More
Fight Night book jacket
Fight Night
by Miriam Toews


On sale Oct 5 from Bloomsbury USA
Genre: Novels. 272 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

From the bestselling author of Women Talking and All My Puny Sorrows, a compassionate, darkly humorous, and deeply wise new novel about three generations of women.

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I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness book jacket
I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness: A Novel
by Claire Vaye Watkins


On sale Oct 5 from Riverhead Books
Genre: Novels. 304 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

A darkly funny, soul-rending novel of love in an epoch of collapse - one woman's furious revisiting of family, marriage, work, sex, and motherhood.

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Tonight We Rule the World book jacket
Tonight We Rule the World
by Zack Smedley


On sale Oct 5 from Page Street Kids
Genre: Novels (Young Adult). 352 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

From the critically acclaimed author of Deposing Nathan comes an explosive examination of identity, voice, and the indelible ways our stories are rewritten by others.

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What Storm, What Thunder book jacket
What Storm, What Thunder
by Myriam J A Chancy


On sale Oct 5 from Tin House Books
Genre: Novels. 320 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

The earth had buckled and, in that movement, all that was not in its place fell upon the earth's children, upon the blameless as well as the guilty, without discrimination.

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The Lincoln Highway book jacket
The Lincoln Highway: A Novel
by Amor Towles


On sale Oct 5 from Viking
Genre: Historical Fiction. 592 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

The bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow and Rules of Civility and master of absorbing, sophisticated fiction returns with a stylish and propulsive novel set in 1950s America.

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My Monticello book jacket
My Monticello: Fiction
by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson


Debut Author
On sale Oct 5 from Henry Holt and Company
Genre: Short Stories/Essays. 224 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

A young woman descended from Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings driven from her neighborhood by a white militia. A university professor studying racism by conducting a secret social experiment on his own son. A single mother desperate to buy her first home even as the world hurtles toward catastrophe. Each fighting to survive in America.

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Shelf Life book jacket
Shelf Life: Chronicles of a Cairo Bookseller
by Nadia Wassef


Debut Author
On sale Oct 5 from Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Genre: Biography/Memoir. 240 pages
Critics' Opinion: 4/5

The warm and winning story of opening a modern bookstore where there were none, Shelf Life: Chronicles of a Cairo Bookseller recounts Nadia Wassef's troubles and triumphs as a founder and manager of Cairo-based Diwan.

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Only the Rich Can Play book jacket
Only the Rich Can Play: How Washington Works in the New Gilded Age by David Wessel

On sale Oct 5 from Public Affairs
Genre: History, Science & Current Affairs. 352 pages
Critics' Opinion: 4/5

In a Winners Take All meets This Town narrative, a New York Times bestselling author tells the story of the creation of a massive tax break, in which political and economic elites attend to the care and feeding of the super-rich, and inequality compounds.

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Truffle Hound book jacket
Truffle Hound: On the Trail of the World's Most Seductive Scent, with Dreamers, Schemers, and Some Extraordinary Dogs
by Rowan Jacobsen


On sale Oct 5 from Bloomsbury USA
Genre: Travel & Adventure. 304 pages
Critics' Opinion: 5/5

A captivating exploration into the secretive and sensuous world of truffles, the elusive food that has captured hearts, imaginations, and palates worldwide.

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Publishing This Week is one of BookBrowse's four free newsletters. We also publish BookBrowse Highlights every Thursday; and Book Club News and Librarian News monthly.

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