Julian Assange memoir sells just 644 copies

Huge publicity last week managed to generate only very modest sales for his ‘Unauthorised Autobiography’ Despite acres of publicity and buckets of scandal, Julian Assange’s unauthorised autobiography sold just 644 copies last week. Created with Assange’s cooperation (according to its publisher Canongate the Wikileaks founder spent more than 50 hours being interviewed for it) but published against his wishes, the book went on sale last Thursday amid widespread coverage and serialisation in the Independent. But in spite of the controversy surrounding the claims and counterclaims flung by Assange and his publisher , figures from book sales monitor Nielsen BookScan reveal that Julian Assange: The Unauthorised Autobiography sold just 644 copies in its first three days in shops. “It was only the 50th bestselling hardback non-fiction book of the week, and only the 537th bestselling book overall, sitting directly behind Julia Donaldson’s Freddie and the Fairy (Macmillan) and Sharon Kendrick’s Satisfaction (Mills & Boon), a £6.99 collection of three short stories featuring ‘three of her sexiest, most intense Greek heroes and glamorous heroines’,” said Philip Stone, charts editor at the Bookseller . But Canongate publishing director Nick Davies told the book trade magazine that the autobiography’s performance was “a marathon and not a sprint”, and that the publisher had “never made any big predictions about the sales of the Assange book – particularly on the first three days of sale”. “There was no build-up for the trade, the media or with the reading public. But we’re proud of the way we handled what has been a difficult and unusual launch, and we are extremely proud of the book,” he said. “Fortunately, the conversation now seems to be moving away from the ‘publishing story’ and focusing on the quality of the book itself. The early reviews – with the exception of a predictable whitewash in the Guardian – have been very positive, particularly in the Times and Independent with many more lead reviews lined up for this weekend. And the early customer reviews on Amazon are extremely positive too.” So far the Assange autobiography has attracted two five-star reviews on Amazon, one saying that the book “was a long long way from the negative view of him presented by a media I now see have an agenda”, the other that it painted “a vivid picture of a man on a mission to make the world a better – a more just – place”. It currently sits in 766th place overall on Amazon’s bestseller charts, and in 70th position on the internet bookseller’s biography list. Whether Assange will be pleased or disappointed by the numbers remains to be seen: although the Wikileaks founder said that Canongate’s publication was “about old-fashioned opportunism and duplicity — screwing people over to make a buck” , the publisher has promised to pay him royalties once it earns back its advance . Publishing Biography Julian Assange Booksellers Alison Flood guardian.co.uk

Posted by on September 28, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.