The NYT‘s publishing reporter, Julie Bosman, has pronounced The Silent Wife by A. S. A. Harrison (Penguin, 6/25), the next Gone Girl, now that it has hit best seller lists (debuting on the NYT‘s own combined print and ebook list at #11).

The NYT is a bit late to the party (their reviewer, Janet Maslin, predicted a different novel, Lauren Beukes’s The Shining Girls, Hachette/Mulholland, would be the heir. The NYT has yet to review The Silent Wife). In libraries, holds have been growing steadily (we issued our first holds alert for it on July 2).

The article details the book’s publishing history and points out that Walmart has only just ordered it. Once copies begin selling there, it is likely to reach new heights on best seller lists.

One of our favorite mystery reviewers, Sarah Weinman writes in the New Republic about the appeal of the unlikeable heroine, as exemplified by The Silent Wife. Watch for Weinman’s forthcoming book, Troubled Duaghers. Twisted Wives, (Penguin) an anthology of stories by women crime writers. Her introduction should be required reading for all readers advisors.

Former Bond Girl, Rosamund Pike has accepted the lead role of Amy in David Fincher’s adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl (RH/Crown), opposite Ben Affleck, according to Entertainment Weekly. She most recently starred opposite Tom Cruise in Jack Reacher.

The film is expected to begin production in September, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Meanwhile, production for a film based on the author’s previous title, Dark Places (RH/Crown), starring Chloe Moretz and Nicholas Hoult, is expected to begin in August.

The Washington Post‘s Ron Charles interviewed Flynn last week, who talked about the moment she realized Gone Girl was a hit.

The media has made several stabs at divining what will be the surprise hit of the summer, but a “debut” mystery that was released in April got by everyone, until the author’s true name was revealed.

The ebook version of  The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith (aka, J.K. Rowling) (Hachette/Mulholland) shoots to #1 on the new USA Today best seller list.

Meanwhile, some of the hot books of this summer were actually published last year.

The leader, of course, is Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, (RH/Crown), now at #7 after 58 weeks on the NYT hardcover best seller list (a paperback release date still hasn’t been announced). Most libraries have whittled down the wait time for it to just a few weeks and a couple have practically, but not quite, wiped out holds by buying over 650 copies. Holds also continue on Flynn’s earlier titles, Sharp Objects and Dark Places (the movie adaptation of the latter may make it to screens before Gone Girl. Reports say filming is set to begin next month with stars Charlize Theron, Chloe Moretz, and Nicholas Hoult).

Three other surprise hits from last summer have been on the trade paperback list since their spring release in that format  and continue to show holds in libraries.

Beautiful Ruins, Jess Walter, (Harper Perennial) — Note that the audio (HarperAudio), which was declared the best of the year by Audible, is also showing holds.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette, (Hachette/Back Bay; Hachette Audio; Thorndike)

The Light Between Oceans, M.L. Stedman (S&S/Scribner; Thorndike)

Last year’s debut novel, Tell the Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt, (RH/Dial, 6/19). was a GalleyChat favorite. Now out in trade paperback, it makes its first appearance on the NYT best seller  list at #18, gaining momentum from COSTCO’S influential book buyer, Pennie Ianniciello, who featured it in the COSTCO Connection as the Book Pick for July.

Told from the point of view of a 14-year-old girl, who is not only dealing with the usual torments of becoming a teenager, but also with the death of her beloved uncle, Tell the Wolves I’m Home, says Ianniciello, “is packed with real emotion and characters that, if they don’t tap into someone you used to be, will at the very least make you think of someone you once knew. “

Don’t withdraw those copies yet!

As Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken (Random House, 2010) continues to be a best seller (on the NYT Nonfiction list at #8 after 135 weeks), it was just announced that the film adaptation, to be directed by Angelina Jolie, will be released 12/25/14. Production is set to begin in late September (the New York Daily News reports Jolie is scouting locations in Hawaii).

In a statement, the director said about the 96 year-old man who is the focus of the book, “I’ve had the privilege of spending a great deal of time with Louie Zamperini, who is a hero of mine, and now—I am proud to say—a dear friend. I am deeply honored to be telling his extraordinary story, and I will do my absolute best to give him the film he deserves.”

A film about Zamperini was the works long before Hillenbrand began working on her book or Jolie thought about adapting it. Universal bought Zamperini’s “life rights” in the 1950′s, with plans to star Tony Curtis, which were never realized.

Which is better, the book or the movie? That question takes on new intensity with the opening today of World War Z, starring Brad Pitt and based on the long-running best seller by Max Brooks. The author himself has said that the only thing the movie shares with book is the title, since it completely abandons the beloved faux-oral history style of the novel.

–
Disappointed fans can console themselves with a new audio version, released as a movie tie-in, but much more true to the book. Five hours longer than the original 2006 edition, it is titled World War Z: The Complete Edition and features dozens of new narrators, including director Martin Scorsese, Spiderman star Alfred Molina, The Walking Dead creator Frank Darabont, rapper Common, Firefly star Nathan Fillion, and  Shaun of the Dead’s Simon Pegg, with Brooks serving as The Interviewer as he did in the first audio edition (more details are on the author’s web site).

Holds are heavy in many libraries for The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics
by Daniel James Brown (Penguin/Viking; Penguin Audio; Thorndike). It debuts on the 6/23 NYT NF Best Seller list at #12.

USA Today calls it a “suspenseful tale of triumph” about a rowing crew from the University of Washington, whose student body, “drew from rough-hewn loggers, farm boys and girls not only with great physical gifts but the enormous will to make something of themselves at a time when there was little hope, given the double whammy of the Depression and the Dust Bowl.”

The latest title to hit best seller lists as a result of flash sales by eBook retailers is Teresa Rhyne’s cancer memoir, ‏The Dog Lived (and So Will I), (Sourcebooks, Oct., 2012). It debuts on the new USA Today list at #10, after Kindle and Nook editions were discounted from $14.99 to $1.99.

As the top Nonfiction eBook on the list, it is likely to debut at #1 on the upcoming NYT E-Book Nonfiction list.

The book received strong prepub reviews. Libraries own it in both print and eBook editions.

We’ve written about backlist titles hitting the NYT E-Book and Combined Best Seller lists as a result of sudden discounts by retailers.

The NYT explores the impact of  such “flash sales” in a story that appeared yesterday. Sourcebooks was a recent beneficiary. Their 1994 title, The Oracle Glass, by Judith Merkle Riley, hit the list last week after being featured simultaneously as a Kindle Daily Deal and a Nook Daily Find.

While some of these books quickly return to their former level of sales, for others, it has helped readers discover authors raising the sales of all their titles.

Don’t discount old-fashioned marketing, however. It can still renew sales of print backlist titles. See, for instance, City of Women, by David R. Gillham (Penguin/Putnam/Einhorn), now on the trade paperback list.

The strategy of introducing a new author in less-expensive trade paperback, rather than hardcover, has paid off  for the Maggie Hope series about a British code breaker in WW II. The third novel, His Majesty’s Hope, (RH/Bantam; BOT Audio) hits the NYT best seller list at #18 (tied with #17) this week.

The author, Susan Elia MacNeal was nominated for an Edgar for Best First Novel by an American, with the first in the series, Mr. Churchill’s Secretary. The second,  Princess Elizabeth’s Spy was selected by Oprah.com as one of  seven “Compulsively Readable Mysteries (for the Crazy-Smart Reader).”

We’ve been following some of the changes to best seller lists brought about by e-books; backlist titles making their debuts as a result of Amazon discounts, titles appearing before print publication, and erotic fiction making inroads.

A new twist arrives this week; Until I Break, an erotic fiction title by Michelle Leighton debuts on the 6/2 NYT E-Book Only list at #13. That should be cause for celebration for any author, but in this case, Leighton has already withdrawn the book from publication.

We’ve seen Amazon discounts affect best seller lists before, but never this dramatically. The number one title on the 6/2 NYT Nonfiction E-Book Only best seller list (also #7 on the Combined list) is The Eighty-Dollar Champion, by Elizabeth Letts (Random House). Published in hardcover August, 2011, it was on that list for 2 weeks, hitting a high of #10. After it was released in e-book last year, it appeared on list for 4 weeks.

The sales jump is likely due to Amazon, which recently discounted the e-book edition to $1.99.

Olympic gold medal soccer player Alex Morgan, currently playing for the Portland Thorns, scores with the first book in a planned middle grade series, The Kicks. Book one, Saving the Team (S&S Young Readers), debuts on the NYT Middle Grade Best Seller list at #7 during its in its first week on sale.

The second book in the series, Sabotage Season will be published in September. A third one  is in the works.

Best Seller lists used to be the domain of newly-released titles, but e-books are beginning to change that.

The Oracle Glass, by Judith Merkle Riley, a title originally published in 1994, was released by Sourcebooks last fall in both trade paperback and as a $1.99 e-book. On May 6, it was offered as both a Kindle “Daily Deal” and a Nook “Daily Find.” It debuted at #8 on the NYT Combined Print & E-Books best seller list this week (arriving at #7 on the NYT e-book only list but not on the trade paperback list).

The author, who died in 2010, was not able to enjoy her book’s belated success. Sourcebooks will release another of her historical novels, Master of All Desires, in July. Her books are available from library e-book vendors.

Deadline reports today that film rights to the self-published inspirational 2007 blockbuster (later picked up by Hachette/Grand Central) The Shack have been acquired f by Summit Entertainment.

Gill Netter has signed on as the producer. He most recently produced the Ocsar-winning adaptation of Yan Martel’s Life Of Pi, a project he worked on for over a decade before it became a reality.