Locus Bestsellers, December 2020
The Locus Bestsellers for December include top titles Piranesi by Susanna Clarke, Dune by Frank Herbert, A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine, Star Wars: Thrawn Ascendancy: Chaos Rising by Timothy Zahn.
| HARDCOVERS | Months on list |
Last month |
|
| 1) | Piranesi, Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury) | 1 | – |
| 2) | Battle Ground, Jim Butcher (Ace) | 1 | – |
| 3) | To Sleep in a Sea of Stars, Christopher Paolini (Tor) | 1 | – |
| 4) | A Killing Frost, Seanan McGuire (DAW) | 1 | – |
| 5) | Peace Talks, Jim Butcher (Ace) | 3 | 2 |
| 6) | The Trouble with Peace, Joe Abercrombie (Orbit US) | 1 | – |
| 7) | A Deadly Education, Naomi Novik (Del Rey) | 1 | – |
| 8) | Harrow the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir (Tor.com Publishing) | 2 | 1 |
| 9) | Mexican Gothic, Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Del Rey) | 3 | 6 |
| 10) | Axiom’s End, Lindsay Ellis (St. Martin’s) | 3 | 5 |
| PAPERBACKS | |||
| 1) | Dune, Frank Herbert (Ace) | 44 | 1 |
| 2) | The Way of Kings, Brandon Sanderson (Tor) | 20 | 2 |
| 3) | Dune Messiah, Frank Herbert (Ace) | 3 | 6 |
| 4) | The Last Wish, Andrzej Sapkowski (Orbit US) | 7 | – |
| 5) | Blood of Elves, Andrzej Sapkowski (Orbit US) | 7 | 5 |
| 6) | The Unkindest Tide, Seanan McGuire (DAW) | 1 | – |
| 7) | Children of Dune, Frank Herbert (Ace) | 1 | – |
| 8) | Emerald Blaze, Ilona Andrews (Avon) | 1 | – |
| 9) | 1984, George Orwell (Signet) | 12 | 7 |
| *) | The Eye of the World, Robert Jordan (Tor) | 3 | – |
| *) | The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin (Ace) | 14 | 4 |
| *) | The Ruin of Kings, Jenn Lyons (Tor) | 1 | – |
| TRADE PAPERBACKS | |||
| 1) | A Memory Called Empire, Arkady Martine (Tor) | 5 | 1 |
| 2) | Season of Storms, Andrzej Sapkowski (Orbit US) | 2 | – |
| 3) | Gideon the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir (Tor.com Publishing) | 2 | 2 |
| 4) | This Is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone (Saga) | 6 | 4 |
| 5) | Exhalation, Ted Chiang (Vintage) | 3 | 5 |
| *) | Fire & Blood, George R.R. Martin (Bantam) | 2 | 8 |
| *) | Parable of the Sower, Octavia E. Butler (Grand Central) | 4 | – |
| 8) | Dune, Frank Herbert (Ace) | 1 | – |
| 9) | The Priory of the Orange Tree, Samantha Shannon (Bloomsbury US) | 2 | – |
| 10) | The Relentless Moon, Mary Robinette Kowal (Tor) | 1 | – |
| MEDIA & GAMING RELATED | |||
| 1) | Star Wars: Thrawn Ascendancy: Chaos Rising, Timothy Zahn (Del Rey) | 1 | – |
| 2) | Star Wars: Thrawn: Treason, Timothy Zahn (Del Rey) | 10 | 5 |
Coronavirus Edition: As of September, most of our bookstores have reopened, although, with consumers still wary of in-person shopping, most bookstores continue to offer books online, by mail order, and via curbside pick-up.
Susanna Clarke’s new book Piranesi swept the hardcover list, with a substantial lead over second place finisher Battle Ground, Jim Butcher’s latest book in his long-running Dresden Files series. There were no new runners-up. We had 26 nominated titles, down from last month’s 35.
Our two top spots on the paperback list copied last month, with Dune by Frank Herbert in first place, followed by Brandon Sanderson’s The Way of Kings. There were no new runners-up. There were 41 titles nominated, down from 43 last month.
In a very close race, A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine held off all challengers to remain in first place on the trade paperback list. Season of Storms, book eight in Andrzej Sapkowski’s The Witcher series, took second. Our new runner-up was A Little Hatred by Joe Abercrombie (Orbit US), the first book in The Age of Madness duology. We had 49 nominated titles, down from last month’s 50.
Only two books received enough votes to make the media- and gaming-related list. Star Wars: Thrawn Ascendency: Chaos Rising by Timothy Zahn received more than twice as many votes as Zahn’s Star Wars: Thrawn: Treason, which came in second. There were no new runners-up. We had 14 nominated titles, down from last month’s 20.
Compiled with data from Bakka-Phoenix Books (Canada), Borderlands (CA), McNally Robinson (Two in Canada), Mysterious Galaxy (CA), Toadstool (NH), White Dwarf (Canada).
Data period: September 2020.
Note: book titles and covers on this page link to IndieBound, a network of independent booksellers, such as those that contribute to this list.
From the December 2020 issue of Locus.
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