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US fantasy author of the Court of Thorns and Roses series. Official site: sarahjmaas.com
Bloomsbury's figure counts preorders plus first-day English-language print and ebook sales in the US, Canada, the UK and Australia. Audiobooks and translations are excluded.
Chain stores had A Court of Splintered Harmony on launch day, but independent shops across the country waited up to two more days. Booksellers have written an open letter to Bloomsbury and Penguin Random House Distribution.
Half-year Adjusted Profit was £16.8 million, against £24.0 million, and consumer revenue fell to £102.8 million. AI licensing continued at a smaller amount. Two Sarah J. Maas novels are still ahead, and the interim dividend rises 5% to 4.28p.
PEN America says manga series are being removed from schools as entire sets. ALA's Banned Books Week list of 150 most-challenged books opens with Gender Queer.
The International Publishers Association gave its first Freedom of Expression Defenders Award to the Media Coalition, the U.S. group that sues to block book-restriction laws.
PEN America recorded 11,982 school book bans in the 2025-2026 school year, its highest one-year count since it began tracking in 2021. Stephen King is again the most banned author.
The Utah State Board of Education told every school district on September 28 that seven more titles, including books by Sarah J. Maas, Ellen Hopkins and V.E. Schwab, must come off shelves statewide.
The midlist — once the backbone of traditional publishing — is disappearing. Major publishers are concentrating advances on celebrity memoirs and proven bestsel…
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