Fox News Dominates Book Bestseller Lists As Jesse Watters — Helped By Bulk Buys — And Mark Levin Top Charts - Forbes

senewsberita.blogspot.com

Topline

Fox News hosts Jesse Watters and Mark Levin topped this week’s book bestseller lists, as Levin’s book American Marxism spent its 11th consecutive week on Amazon’s bestseller chart even before its official release date while Watters became the latest in a string of conservative authors to be buoyed on the New York Times list by bulk orders.

Key Facts

Watters’ book How I Saved the World, a memoir that also features “thoughtful suggestions for overcoming left-wing radicalism,” took the top spot on the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list and Publishers Weekly’s top 10 overall bestsellers.

Watters’ listing on the Times’ hardcover fiction bestseller list is marked with a “dagger” symbol, which indicates the book’s ranking on the list has been influenced by “institutional, special interest, group or bulk purchases”—a common occurrence with books by conservative authors and politicians (Watters’ publisher HarperCollins has not responded to a request for comment on the book’s bulk buys).

The book was No. 2 on Amazon’s nonfiction weekly bestseller list, with American Marxism earning the No. 1 spot.

American Marxism—a book that likens left-leaning concepts like “progressivism” and “social activism” to Marxist ideology—has become a mainstay on Amazon’s bestseller charts despite only being officially released on Tuesday, and its No. 1 spot on the list is based on sales from before the book was publicly released.

American Marxism earning a spot on the Amazon chart before its official release appears to be rare: the book is one of only two on the Amazon nonfiction charts whose sales are based on preorders alone, along with Michael Pollan’s This is Your Mind on Plants.

Levin’s book won’t appear on the New York Times list or other book lists until next week, since with the exception of Amazon, preorders are typically reported as part of a book’s first week sales and books do not appear on the bestseller list until their official release.

Big Number

33,804. That’s how many print copies Watters’ book sold in its first week, according to NPD BookScan data published by Publishers Weekly.

What To Watch For

Watters and Levin’s books and their critical takes on the left may soon be overtaken by books that instead look at the right with a critical eye. Michael Wolff’s Landslide: The Final Days of the Trump Presidency and Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker’s I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year, which feature politically damaging looks at the end of the Trump presidency, are now ranked above Watters’ book on Amazon’s top 100 books ranking, which is updated hourly. As of Thursday afternoon, Leonnig and Rucker’s book was ranked No. 1 on Amazon’s list ahead of its official release on July 20 and Wolff’s book, which was released on Tuesday, was ranked No. 3. Levin’s book was No. 2 on the list, while Watters’ had dropped to No. 5.

Tangent

Trump praised Watters’ book in a statement Wednesday, saying, “Interspersed are his thoughtful suggestions for overcoming left-wing radicalism, maintaining American democracy, moving beyond aging hippies (like his long-suffering, loving parents), saving the world from social justice warriors and the deep state—all while smirking his way through life in only the nicest way.” That praise, however, was lifted wholesale from the official description of Watters’ book, Slate journalist Jeremy Stahl noted on Twitter, though Trump did add it was a “great new book” and encouraged people to “get your copy today.”

Key Background

Watters hosts Watters’ World every Saturday on Fox News and is a co-host of the network’s weekday program The Five, while Levin hosts Life, Liberty & Levin every Sunday on the network in addition to his popular nationally syndicated radio program The Mark Levin Show. Levin’s popular radio program may help to explain his book’s outsized popularity before its release, with talk-radio industry magazine Talkers estimating Levin is the fourth-most-listened-to radio host in the country. “Because he has such a large radio following and a very loyal one at that, he’s valuable to Fox,” Talkers editor and publisher Michael Harrison told the Washington Post. The dagger symbol appearing next to Watters’ book follows books by such conservative figures as Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Donald Trump Jr., Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas), Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) that have similarly been apparently helped by mass purchases. Salon reported in October the Republican National Committee also spent at least $159,000 on bulk purchases of fellow Fox anchor Sean Hannity’s book Live Free or Die.