The American bestseller sold 630,000 copies in France last year.
The best-selling book of the year 2024 in France is the first part of “The cleaning lady”thriller by Freida McFadden, according to the GfK ranking published Friday.
Published by J’ai Lu, the work sold 603,000 copies, ahead of “The Midwife of Auschwitz”by Anna Stuart (also at J’ai Lu), with 500,000 sales. The two authors are ahead of the Swiss novelist Joël Dicker, the only French-speaker in the top 3 thanks to “A wild animal” and its 425,000 sales.
Overall, there were fewer buyers of new books in 2024 in France: 23 million people acquired at least one book, a decline of 10% over one year, according to this annual GfK barometer.
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In total, consumers purchased 315 million new books, down 3%. In terms of sales, the sector’s turnover is stable, at 4 billion euros.
Second-hand books still represent more or less one book sale in five (18% in 2024) and the digital book reader remains the rare bird (less than 5% of sales).
Mangas and comics suffered the most after a prosperous year in 2023, marked by the release of bestsellers like the latest Asterix or Gaston Lagaffe. Conversely, romance remains one of the few growing sectors.
