World War II era debut novel The Postmistress has been racking up some strong reviews and comparisons to other blockbuster debuts, like The Help and Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society.

The new issue of People (3/1/10) gives it 3 of 5 stars, saying “…it’s a slam-dunk for book groups and readers who savor shifting through what-ifs.” Why not four stars, then? The reviewer feels there are flaws; “Blake works hard to set up situations involving moral questions and the effort shows.”

What about our prediction that it will appear in the top five on the 2/28 NYT Hardcover Fiction list?

We were wrong, but not by much. Advance word says it lands at #8.

By comparison, The Help first landed on the 3/1/09 NYT list at #29. It was 20 weeks before it rose into the top ten, hitting #9 on the 7/19/10 list. It gradually climbed into the top five, hitting #1 last month.

The Postmistress Sarah Blake Retail Price: $25.95 Hardcover: 336 pages Publisher: Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam – (2010-02-09) ISBN / EAN: 0399156194 / 9780399156199

Audio from Blackstone Audiobooks

• CD: $100; ISBN 9781441725714
• MP3 CD: $29.95; ISBN 9781441725745
• Cassette: $65.95; ISBN 9781441725707

Audio and e-book available from OverDrive

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 18th, 2010 at 8:55 am and is filed under 2010/11 - Winter/Spring, Fiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.