2013 was a banner year for Square Books, due largely to the
many books by writers connected to Oxford. Our top ten bestselling authors all signed books for us,
only three of whom are not connected to Oxford – Pat Conroy and The Death of
Santini (10), George Saunders’ Tenth of December (7), and David
Sedaris’ Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls (8) – although all three of those
writers have appeared here in past years, too.
Cookbooks and other lifestyle categories were hot: perennial
seller Square Table (11); Are You
Ready? (13) from Ole Miss Department of
Nutrition & Hospitality Management; Treme: the Cookbook (64); An Italian
Palate, by Robert St. John and Wyatt Waters (14); Garden & Gun’s
Southerner’s Handbook (12); Southern Living’s Tailgating Handbook (18); and at
#2, John Currence hit a home run in his first at bat in a big, bad way with
Pickles, Pigs & Whiskey.
Other Oxford and Mississippi writers dominated our list,
some with more than one book: Ace Atkins 
(42, 90); William Faulkner, of course,
Selected Short Stories (31, + 3 other titles); the King twins (52 + 71); John
Grisham, with Sycamore Row at #3 (+ 5 and 99); Julie Cantrell (66 + 95);
Jesmyn Ward (74 + 83); Curtis Wilkie (27); Donna Tartt (24); Michael Henry
(77); Ann Fisher Wirth (98); Sam Haskell (9); William Winter’s biography (45);
Michael Farris Smith’s debut, Rivers (63); Steve Yarbrough (64); Neil White
(34); and Bill Ferris (40). Tom
Franklin’s Crooked Letter Crooked Letter (33) was bested by his collaborative
novel with Beth Ann Fennelly, The Tilted World (5).
For more top 100 Square Books titles, check this blog Monday