Friday, March 14, 2008

Stereotypical readers

Ben Hoyle writes in Times Online that, 'The British buy books by television personalities, Americans are obsessed with self-improvement, French choices are more highbrow, the Germans like holidays while the Japanese have more eclectic tastes.' Only Harry Potter breaks the trend. This survey of global reading habits was done by Amazon.

Amazon has listed the bestselling books on its sites in Britain, the United States, France, Japan and Germany.

The Japanese like health-and-beauty titles: Yukuko Tanaka's Face Massage and Inspiring Exercise are included in a list that consists of a Michelin guide to Tokyo restaurants, a scientific treatise on (human) viruses, a comedian’s autobiography and three volumes of Manga.

The British like celebrity chefs, TV presenters and trivia. There are only three novels in the list: Harry Potter, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Orange Prize-winning Half of a Yellow Sun and Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns.

The French list has seven works of fiction with exotic sounding themes. It has one autobiography in the list is that of Simone Veil, the Auschwitz survivor who became the first female President of the European Parliament.

The American list is dominated by self-improvement: Eat, Pray, Love, Good to Great (business), Now Discover Your Strengths, Deceptively Delicious and The Secret (also on the German and Japanese top tens). Do Americans really feel really that inadequate?

Germans like books about travel and the outdoors.

Malaysians?

Times Online

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