Digital imprint Bookouture says July and August 2022 have been its best two sales months since the company was set up in 2012.
The publishing firm was a trailblazer when it was founded by Oliver Rhodes as a one-person start-up 10 years ago. His marketing expertise pushed the UK firm to the forefront of digital publishing with stellar sales as it focused on genre fiction.
In 2017, Big Five publisher Hachette took over the company, describing it as being ‘the best ebook seller in the world’. Rhodes left Bookouture in 2020.
Audiobooks and rights boosted business
It looks like Bookouture sales have been boosted over the summer by substantial growth in the audiobook market and in rights sales.
The company has announced two promotions, with Richard King, currently Head of Rights, becoming Rights Director; and Alba Proko, currently Audio Manager, to become Head of Audio Publishing.
Bookouture managing director Jenny Geras says, ‘July and August have been, by some way, the best two sales months in Bookouture’s 10-year history. It’s been an incredible year, with a succession of standout bestsellers, combined with major growth in a number of areas of our publishing.
‘Rights and Audio have been two particularly significant growth areas for us this year, and both Richard and Alba have been transformative in this.’
Richard King joined Bookouture from Orion in 2021 and the company says he has made Booktouture commercial fiction a destination list for translation publishers and more than doubled the revenue from sub-rights deals. In 2022, he has agreed a high six-figure deal in Germany for historical fiction author, Soraya Lane – along with 10 other territories – and a high five-figure deal for Freida McFadden in Germany – along with 27 other territories. He has also concluded a major Hollywood deal for McFadden’s stand-out psychological thriller, The Housemaid.
Alba Proko joined Bookouture from Bonnier in 2020 and has increased the firm’s audio title count, studio partnerships, and narrators, and has started to build her own audio originals list. Bookouture has seen its first Audible.com number 1 bestsellers, and audio revenue has grown by 25% year on year.
Deal for best-selling psychological thriller author
Bookouture has also recently signed up Kindle best-selling author Daniel Hurst for two psychological thrillers. Hurst has sold more than 350,000 copies of his stories as well as 127 million Kindle Unlimited pages read.
Hurst has previously been published by indie publisher Inkubator Books. Inkubator specialises in crime fiction and thrillers and was set up in Dublin in 2018. The firm focuses on the Amazon ebook market and offers all its writers 45% royalties on net receipts as well as marketing support.
Publishers open to submissions from authors
Inkubator is accepting submissions of full-length fiction from authors in the genres of crime, mystery, thrillers and suspense. You can find out more details on the submissions section of Inkubator’s website.
Bookouture is also open to submissions and pays 45% royalties on net recipts to authors. You can get more details on the submissions section of Bookouture’s website.