What's currently the most popular genre?

[Orrex]

I checked out a book sale at a local church the other day and was amazed to discover that what I thought was the main building was in fact just a heap of John Grisham novels. And then I came to the huge Clive Cussler monument, the Tammi Hoag gymnasium, and the Tom Clancy stronghold.

Honestly I'm not really familiar with these authors (or any of the others whose works were on display by the gross), but it got me thinking: Which is the best-selling genre right now?

It would seem that crime drama and similar suspense thrillers hold the prime spot, but these are also the best-represented in the secondary market, suggesting that their fans don't like them enough to hang onto them.

What are your thoughts?

[illinoisprogressive]

1. i use to work in a bookstore a few years ago and I find it depends on where you live

Here the favorites are mystery, suspense and how to books. Self help.
The people like mysteries but, unless it is exceptional they won't hang on due to knowing how it ends.
i am a big non fiction reader but, like some good hard boiled and english mysteries myself.

[Wheezy]

2. I'm an author.

Crime/suspense/thriller are indeed hot.

One of the newer hot sellers is paranormal (often coupled with a bit of romance), which has a sort of nebulous definition if I'm understanding it correctly. Vampire/Succubus/Werewolf characters existing in a normal world as we know it and interacting with "normal" humans fall into this category. So do ordinary characters with one or more extraordinary gifts (think the TV show Heroes). Ghost stuff, too.

Fantasy remains popular.

Above all, though, is straight Romance. Romance novels account for 55% of fiction on the market. All the other genres make up the remaining 45%.

http://lisamcmann.blogspot.com/

[Orrex]

3. Romance novels! Doh!

What I didn't realize is that the entire parking lot, the access road, and most of the property was entirely covered with romance novels. I failed to see the obvious simply because it was everywhere in such abundance.

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

4. A friend owned a used book store & I helped her

out for a few weeks. Romance novels were taking over. They were like those furry little creatures in the old Star Trek series. Or that movie with phoebe cates.

[freesqueeze]

5. I had a professor who swore

mysterys were the best selling. She claimed fantasy had the best selling individual novels but mystery as a genre was king.

[smoogatz]

6. Mysteries tend to dominate the best-seller lists, but I think romance

has the edge in market-share and overall copies sold. Makes sense, given that women buy a huge majority (80% or so, iirc) of the books sold in this country.

[terryg11]

7. Romance novels

AS has been stated here already.

Found this out when I took over the music movies and books section at Target and our Regional supervisor came in for a tour. We got to talking about book sales and he said that Romance novels are by far the biggest sellers out there as a genre.