As predicted by library holds (see our first story July 23, thanks to Cuyahoga’s Wendy Bartlett; followed by another alert on 8/1), M.L. Stedman’s debut novel, The Light Between Oceans arrives on the USA Today Best Seller list at #22 and is called “August’s ‘it’ book” in the “Book Buzz” column. The publisher tells USA Today that booksellers are comparing it to Sara Gruen’s Water for Elephants and Kim Edwards’ The Memory Keeper’s Daughter and predicts it will do as well as those books, indicating that it’s not too late to order more.

The book is the #1 IndieNext pick for August and was a big hit with librarians on BEA’s Shout ‘n’ Share panel. It was reviewed in a NYT  “Newly Released” roundup piece, which dunned it for “initial clunkiness” but concluded, “It’s a moving tale, regardless. Prepare to weep.” The 7/31 Oprah’s Book Club 2.0 newsletter featured it with the headline, “The One Book You Must Read Before Summer Ends, Plus 46 More,” linking to O‘s 2012 Summer Reading List.

Expect to see it on the upcoming NYT Best Seller list as well.

Large type coming in November from Thorndike

The Light Between Oceans ML Stedman Retail Price:  $25 Hardcover: 369 pages Publisher: S&S/Scribner – (2012-07-31) ISBN / EAN: 1451681739/9781451681734

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 9th, 2012 at 9:30 am and is filed under Bestsellers, Fiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.