A young woman with a complicated childhood who moves to Boston to get by, opens a flower shop there, and meets love there in the form of Ryle, a young and handsome surgeon… The story of Lily Bloom, the heroine of Never again, by Colleen Hoover, has melted millions of readers and especially female readers around the world since its publication in 2016. It also helped save the French book market in 2023. Between Never again, Hearts and souls And For ever, all published by Hugo Editions, Texan writer Colleen Hoover saw three of her novels rise among the 21 best-selling books in France in 2023.
In its wake, an entire sector has exploded, that of “romance”. The French have flocked to these popular romance novels, long the preserve of Harlequin editions, and today dominated by authors like Colleen Hoover, Sarah Rivens (Captive, at BMR) and the Frenchwoman Morgane Moncomble (A winter to resist you, Hugo). “In one year, the French purchased more than 6 million books of this type, twice as many as the previous year. notes Sandrine Vigroux, from the market research company GfK, whose data is a reference in the profession. Romance is becoming a strategic area for publishing. » Around 100 books in this section exceeded 10,000 copies in 2023, compared to 50 in 2022.
Thanks to the impressive growth of these sentimental novels, the French market as a whole limited the damage in 2023. Overall, the number of books sold fell by 4%, to 351 million new copies, according to GfK. A limited decline, after 2021 and 2022 supported by Covid and the Culture Pass. The number of copies distributed in 2023 thus remains up 4% compared to 2019, the last pre-Covid year.
A very inflationary context
Added to this is a significant price effect. In a very inflationary context, publishers have, on average, increased their prices by 5% in one year. So much so that in value, the new book market grew by 1% in 2023, to 4.4 billion euros, indicates Gfk.
Beyond the success of romance, the best-seller charts remain dominated by comics. In the lead, the 40e Asterix album. The white Iris, whose screenplay was written for the first time by Fabcaro, sold 1.6 million copies in two months (Editions Albert René), a very good score for an Asterix. In second row is The Return of Lagaffe, which marks the awakening by Delaf of another character adored by readers, Gaston Lagaffe (Dupuis).
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