In 2024, French-speaking literature has once again shown a tendency for readers to turn to paperbacks. They therefore dominate the ranking of the most popular writings.
The GfK panelist released the statistics of the main works of the year 2024. Here are the 10 best-selling books of the year and the most profitable formats of this year.
Anna Stuart: a top-selling author
With 499,639 copies sold, Anna Stuart’s historical fiction “The Midwife (of Auschwitz)” won this race for the best sellers of the year. The book is about a heroine, Ana, who joins Auschwitz in 1939. While she has no hope of survival, her talents as a midwife promise her a future.
In second place (424,526 sales), we find a completely different genre: the suspense thriller by Swiss Joël Dicker called “A Wild Animal”. It features two burglars who are preparing to steal a major Geneva brand. To close the sales podium, with 415,621 books sold, we find “Angélique”, by Guillaume Musso. For his 20th novel, the man who became a knight of the Order of Arts and Letters in 2012 offers a thrilling story around the character of Mathias Taillefer, in Paris, in 2021.
The French author places a second book in the top 10: his novel “Quelqu’un d’autre” (391,371 copies). The writer and journalist Kamel Daoud takes 5th place with “Houris”, a story which looks back on the civil war which took place in Algeria between 1992 and 2002. Any publication on this subject being illegal in Algeria, the book was therefore censored there. In France, the work earned him the Goncourt Prize.
Inoxtag’s manga ends the year with a bang
In 6th place, a change of scenery with “Instinct”, which we owe to the influencer Inoxtag. This manga tells the story of Haki, who is suffering from an incurable virus and whose hours are numbered. The book, released in week 47, topped the bestseller lists throughout the latter part of the year, ending up with 356,016 total sales.
Finally, “Jacaranda” by Gaël Faye (7th, 344,187 sales), “Les Femmes du bout du monde” by Sophie Da Costa (8th, 325,581 sales), “Les Yeux de Mona” by Thomas Schlesser (9th, 317,535 sales) and “The Secrets of the Housekeeper” by Freida McFadden (10th, 296,778 sales) completes the classification.
