The Hamilton Review of Books' Independently Published Bestsellers List: May 2023
Take a look at which independently published books Canadians are purchasing from independent bookstores.
June 14, 2023
Fiction
Sleeping Car Porter by Suzette Mayr, Coach House Books
The Marigold by Andrew F. Sullivan, ECW Press
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton, Drawn & Quarterly
Chrysalis by Anuja Varghese, House of Anansi
A Safe Girl to Love by Casey Plett, Arsenal Pulp Press
The Whole Animal by Corinna Chong, Arsenal Pulp Press
Any Other City by Hazel Jane Plante, Arsenal Pulp Press
Places Like These by Lauren Carter, Book*hug Press
Hold Your Tongue by Matthew Tétreault, NeWest Press
East Grand Lake by Tim Ryan, University of Calgary Press
Nonfiction
A Garden for the Rusty-patched Bumblebee: Creating Habitat for Native Pollinators by Sheila Colla, Lorraine Johnson and Ann Sanderson, Douglas & McIntyre
The End of this World: Climate Justice in So-Called Canada by Angele Alook, Emily Eaton, David Gray-Donald, Joël Laforest, Crystal Lameman and Bronwen Tucker, Between the Lines
The Tenant Class by Ricardo Tranjan, Between the Lines
On Class by Deborah Dundas, Biblioasis
On Writing and Failure: Or, On the Peculiar Perseverance Required to Endure the Life of a Writer by Stephen Marche, Biblioasis
We Go Where They Go: The Story of Anti-Racist Action by Shannon Clay, Kristin Schwartz, Michael Staudenmaier and Lady, University of Regina Press
All Things Move: Learning to Look in the Sistine Chapel by Jeannie Marshall, Biblioasis
Reimagining Fire: The Future of Energy edited by Eveline Kolijn, UpRoute
Scoundrels and Shirkers: Capitalism and Poverty in Britain by Jim Silver, Fernwood Publishing
Park Cruising: What Happens When We Wander Off the Path by Marcus McCann, House of Anansi
Kids
We Belong to the Drum / mistikwaskihk kitipêyimikonaw by Sandra Lamouche, Azby Whitecalf and Dolores Greyeyes Sand, Orca Book Publishers
Dark Cloud by Anna Lazowski by Penny Neville-Lee, Kids Can Press
When it All Syncs Up by Maya Ameyaw, Annick Press
A Mist of Memories by Kate Blair, DCB (Cormorant Press)
When We Had Sled Dogs: A Story from the Trapline by Ida Tremblay and Miriam Körner, Your Nickle’s Worth
How I Built This List:
I am very grateful for all the bookstores who generously shared their sales data with me. The information used to create this list was drawn from the sales of Another Story Bookshop in Toronto, Biblioasis Bookshop in Windsor, The City and the City Books in Hamilton, Epic Books in Hamilton, McNally Robinson Booksellers (both the Grant Park and the Forks Locations in Winnipeg), McNally Robinson Saskatoon, Shelf Life Books in Calgary and Wordsworth Books in Waterloo. We’re covering a fair amount of Canada, but I hope to add more stores over time to the process and create a more wide-ranging list. If you are a bookstore who would like to contribute to the list please get in touch with us, we’d love to have more information.
Many of the authors on this list will be new to readers, but what I’ve done here is create a bestseller list drawn only from those books published by Canadian-owned independent presses. Most of the books in the top half of both the fiction and the nonfiction bestseller lists sold well in several of the stores on the list and many of the other titles are books that sold well in only one or two stores who shared information. Sometimes these were strongly regional titles. This month we’re seeing some new titles, even as last year’s bestsellers hold onto their top spots. But there is a lot of change from month to month, particularly in the nonfiction list, which is very driven by current events.
I acknowledge that this list is not at all perfect. It is only a small sampling of the data out there, but it is a fascinating look at what independently published books Canadians are purchasing from independent bookstores across a reasonable amount of Canada.
My deep thanks to the Hamilton Review of Books for publishing this Independent Bestseller List. Please, if you’re looking for something wonderful to read, visit your nearest independent bookstore and ask them what they suggest. The people who work in these stores know an amazing amount about books and will find you your next best possible read.
Noelle Allen