The 2022 Bookdao Book Influence Data Analysis Report is based on the metadata from the Bookdao Book Influence Data Platform and 2022 Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists. This report includes the Top 100 of Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists in 9 categories as well as an overall Top 100 book list across all categories. The approach & methodology adapted, limitations, and analysis on major titles, publishers, and trends with graphs and tables are detailed in this report. There are a total of 203 publishers for 900 listed titles in 2022 Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists. CITIC Press Group, Guangxi Normal University Press, and The Commercial Press are the top 3 publishers with the most titles listed.
The 2022 Bookdao Book Influence Data Analysis Report is：
Researched by Bookdao New Publishing Research Institute and Bookdao Book Influence Data Project Team
Published by Bookdao.com and Bookdao Learning Platform
Produced by Yanhong Kong (CEO, Bookdao)
Written by Li Xingxing (Deputy Chief Editor, Bookdao)
Introduction
The major difference with various other book lists is that Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists are the best pick of all book lists, in other words, the best books recommended by aggregation of data. Bookdao Most Recommended Books come from 4,000 media recommendation sources, a joint review and recommendation effort by over 2,500 organizations and 13,000 professionals. The recommendation sources are a combination of authoritative media that give social benefit assessment through awards and titles, convergent media platforms with social influence, and social media of cultural celebrities, social influencers, experts, scholars, and reading professionals.
Nowadays, book recommendations are all over the Internet, and these various recommendations each with different degrees of influence are tracked and sorted into dissemination chains by the Bookdao Book Influence Data Platform. In this way, combined wisdom from all parties is leveraged in forming a best book selection mechanism with transparency, credibility, and traceability to outline the 9 major categories in 2022 China’s books market and efforts made by Chinese publishers in bringing these good titles to market.
The 2022 Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists have got 900 titles in total, spread across all 9 categories, including the Overall Top 900, Literature Top 100, Arts Top 100, Social Sciences Top 100, Humanities Top 100, Finance & Economics Top 100, Lifestyle Top 100, New Knowledge Top 100, Children Top 100, and Theme Publishing Top 100. All books are published between January 1st and December 31st, 2022.
Approach and Methodology
There are two main features outlined below as principles for both the selection of the Bookdao Most Recommended Books and the research methodology of the Bookdao Book Influence Data Analysis Report.
First, harnessing the wisdom of various recommendation sources from the internet through tracking, data mining, data optimization and integration to form transparent and traceable dissemination chains for book selection.
Both the Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists and the Book Influence Data Analysis Report are the result of Bookdao utilizing online platforms, data, and tools to aggregate the social resources in China that contribute to the promotion of reading for all. Therefore, thanks to Internet technology, it becomes possible to discover and promote books on such a large scale by gathering various scattered recommendations into a condensed database, which provides practical reference data and analysis for publishing peers to promote reading activities, publishing planning, marketing and sales, as well as book influence analysis.
Second, these various recommendation sources with different degrees of influence are tracked and formed into dissemination chains by the Bookdao Book Influence Data Platform.
Take Food is Heaven(《燕食记》), which ranked No. 1 in the overall list of Most Recommended Books of 2022, for example, the book has formed four peaks in dissemination since its publication in July 2022, as detailed in the chart below.
The dissemination chain of Food is Heaven. Image source: Bookdao Book Influence Data Platform
The tracking of the dissemination chains help publishers to actively trigger a series of purchase behavior and shorten consumers’ decision-making time in their daily marketing promotion work. In other words, through active promotion, the publisher can form a burst driving force of dissemination in a short period, and quickly accumulate energy to influence sales channels and end readers. Then, through spontaneous or guided word-of-mouth communication by consumers or key opinion leaders, it spreads, thus generating multiple dissemination peaks and forming continuous media influence.
Limitations and Notes of this Report
Four points need to be highlighted in this report, especially the limitations of the Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists and the 2022 Bookdao Book Influence Data Analysis Report which readers should be aware of.
First, there are nine lists in the 2022 Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists, i.e. Theme Publishing, Literature, Arts, Humanities, Social Sciences, Finance & Economics, Lifestyle, New Knowledge, and Children. The classification is not grouped by genre or literary category, but by subject and content. Each list has 100 titles, ranked by average weight. The so-called average weight refers to the total weight of the book divided by the number of months since its launch, so it gives books with late publication dates a fair chance to be presented.
Second, the Overall Top 100 list takes titles with the highest average weight from the mix of the Top 100 titles across 9 categories.
Third, the selection in the Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists is mainly for trade books, therefore, educational materials for schools and universities, professional technology, and natural science books are excluded. As a consequence, several high-profile and internationally renowned specialized publishers in profession and education are either excluded or ranked low in this report. We hereby would like to apologize for any inconvenience caused to these publishers due to the limitation of the category settings.
Fourth, this report is not intended to rank publishers. We use the 900 titles selected for the 2022 Bookdao Most Recommended Book Lists, not all the books published in 2022, as the base data for analysis, therefore, when presenting the list of publishers, no ranking is marked in front, only the number of books selected by each publisher is indicated.
Overall List: 7.9% more Publishers on the List
In 2022, the number of publishers on the list reached 203, compared with 188 in 2021, an increase of 7.9%. The top five works in the overall list are all literary novels, with Lu Xun Literature Prize winner Ge Liang's Food is Heaven (《燕食记》) published by People's Literature Publishing House, Mao Dun Literature Prize winner Wang Xufeng's Memories of Jiang Nan (《望江南》) published by Zhejiang Literature and Art Publishing House, and famous author Lu Min's The Golden River (《金色河流》) published by Yilin Press ranking among the top three. Literature works are more likely to ferment and form word-of-mouth marketing due to their spreadability, influence, and topicality, plus potential IP development and other factors, which also make it easier to break the circle of marketing. Looking at the annual overall list in 2021, it was also three literary works that occupied the top three positions at that time.
Based on the Overall Top 900 of Bookdao Most Recommended Books, we produced a separate list by weight value across all categories, namely the 2022 Overall Top 100 of Bookdao Most Recommended Books. The Humanities & Social Sciences and Literature categories occupy the top two places in the Overall Top 100 with 39 and 34 titles respectively, followed by 9 titles in Theme Publishing, 8 titles in Children, 6 titles in Lifestyle, and 4 titles in Arts. Ma Boyong became the only author with two works listed in the Overall Top 100, The Litchi Road (《长安的荔枝》) and The Physicians - Breaking Dawn (《大医·破晓篇》).
People's Literature Publishing House has 13 titles listed in the Overall Top 100, while Guangxi Normal University Press, Shanghai People's Publishing House, Shanghai Literature and Art Publishing House, and CITIC Press Group each has 6 titles listed. Other publishers with more than 2 titles listed include People's Publishing House (5 titles), Zhejiang Literature and Art Publishing House (5 titles), Yilin Press (4 titles), Beijing Daily Press (3 titles), Beijing October Literature and Art Publishing House (3 titles), Hunan Literature and Art Publishing House (3 titles), Shanghai Translation Publishing House (3 titles), Changjiang Literature and Art Publishing House (3 titles), Zhonghua Book Company (2 titles), The Commercial Press (2 titles), Jiangsu Phoenix Literature and Art Publishing (2 titles), Jiangsu People's Publishing House (2 titles), Huacheng Publishing House (2 titles), Hainan Publishing House (2 titles) and Guangdong People's Publishing House (2 titles).
From the Overall Top 100 List, the works of famous authors and current affairs are more likely to receive media attention and have a higher weight value. For example, Ten Concepts of Traditional Chinese Culture (《天地人生：中华传统文化十章》) by Wang Meng, Chinese Peach and Plum (《中文桃李》) by Liang Xiaosheng, Chronicles of Qinling (《秦岭记》) by Jia Pingwa, Fate (《命运》) by Cai Chongda, Classical Spring Water: Twelve Lectures on Ancient Poetry (《古典的春水：潘向黎古诗词十二讲》) by Pan Xiangli, Notes on Xihaigu (《西海固笔记》) by Ji Dongliang, and current affairs and politics works such as China's Winter Olympic Games (《中国冬奥》) and Love China All My Life: Isabel Crook’s Stories (我用一生爱中国：伊莎白·柯鲁克的故事》). The media's influence, after all, is still geared toward the mass readership, and what interests the readership is also what the media is interested in reporting.
Analyzing all 900 titles gives a map of word frequency which shows 18 keywords appeared more than 10 times. “China” appears 19 times. The 18 keywords are, in order: China, World, Human, Story, Economy, History, Society, Communist Party of China, Universe, Children, Art, Times, Science, Life, Xi Jinping, Set, Century, and Global.
In the three years during the pandemic, more publishers chose to select domestic titles, with a more pronounced inclination towards domestic culture and content, and books with "China" in them have taken an absolute advantage in terms of marketing and dissemination. At the same time, the listed works’ focus on globalization, human beings, economic and social development, historical thinking, current trends, and on artistic life has also become a hot topic. As the concept of the metaverse continues to rise, the number of works about the universe and science has also increased. The word "Set" also appears 11 times.
203 publishers’ works are listed on the Overall List of Bookdao Most Recommended Books. CITIC Press Group, Guangxi Normal University Press, and The Commercial Press are among the top 3, making CITIC Press Group and Guangxi Normal University Press the top two on the list for the third consecutive year.
123 publishers are selected for more than 2 titles (inclusive), 50 publishers are selected for more than 5 titles, and a total of 24 publishers are selected for more than 10 titles. 10 publishers with more than 20 titles are selected, namely: CITIC Press Group (75 titles, 8.33% of all titles), Guangxi Normal University Press (48 titles, 5.33%), The Commercial Press (28 titles, 3.11%), SDX Joint Publishing (25 titles, 2.78%), Beijing United Publishing (24 titles, 2.67%), People's Literature Publishing House (22 titles, 2.44%), Shanghai People's Publishing House (21 titles, 2.33%), Yilin Press (20 titles, 2.22%), China Translation & Publishing House (21 titles, 2.33%), and New Star Press (20 titles, 2.22%).
From the data for the past three years, the number of publishers on the list has increased from 176 in 2020 to 203 in 2022, which shows that the publishing industry is paying more attention to book marketing and the competition is becoming more intense. Among the Top 20 publishers, Guangdong People's Publishing House rise from 57th in 2021 to 18th, Jiangsu Phoenix Fine Arts Publishing House rise from 47th to 21st, and New Star Press rise from 32nd to 10th, making it faster-growing publishers in 2022. However, the top 3 positions remain unchanged, also indicating that excellent titles and quality marketing resources are still concentrated in the hands of the top players. The number of listed titles of the Top 20 publishers in the Overall List also shows an upward trend, from 44.22% in 2020 to 46.33% in 2022, a further step towards the "20/80" rule. With top publishers' media influence increasing, the competition between ones in the middle and end of the list becoming more intense.
At the same time, the proportion of original titles in the overall list has increased year on year, from 61.77% in 2020 to 68.11% in 2022. In the last three years, due to the impact of the pandemic and the market, communication between domestic and international publishers has become difficult, the process of getting books in and out has become slower and longer, and publishers have increased the development of original titles, which is also ultimately reflected in their media influence. With the end of the pandemic, this ratio may change somewhat in 2023. Meanwhile, there is also an interesting finding. The average price of the 900 titles on the overall list has increased significantly in 2022, from 101.65 yuan (14.97 in USD) in 2021 to 177.24 yuan (26.11 in USD), an increase of 77.41%, with the most expensive title on the 2022 list marked price at 68,000 yuan (10016.5 in USD) and the top three priced titles all exceeding the highest book pricing in 2021.
In terms of the publication date, there is a decreasing trend from January to December 2022, with 153 titles published in January, which is in line with the industry's practice of publishing more new books in Q1. However, from a marketing and promotion point of view, it is also the month in which the competition for the distribution of works is most intense. Therefore, publishers can use this graph to find a slot that best suits the distribution of their new titles.
Category Lists: Breakthrough in Publishing Outreach, Original Titles Hold up Half the Sky
Analysis of the titles in the 9 category lists shows that original titles are overwhelmed in several categories such as Children, Literature, Arts, Humanities, Finance & Economics, and Lifestyle, with original works in Children, Literature, and Arts even exceeding 70%. Due to the large regional cultural differences across all countries, Chinese original works in Literature, Arts, and Humanities are more adaptable to domestic readers and more conducive to dissemination. In recent years, the domestic publishing industry has been calling for the improvement of the originality and dissemination of Chinese children's titles, and it proves effective according to the book list. The introduced overseas titles in New Knowledge and Social Sciences categories account for more than 50%, especially in the sub-genres of financial management and popular science, where the originality and its influence appear insufficient.
I. Literature
Food is Heaven (《燕食记》) is the latest novel by Ge Liang in 2022, the final piece in his China Trilogy series on modern Chinese history, following Paper Hawk (《北鸢》) and Scarlet Bird (《朱雀》). The work has received a lot of attention from the media, and in December 2022, CCTV's Reading program featured a talk show with Ge Liang, which boosted the book to reach the top of the Literary List. Memories of Jiang Nan (《望江南》) is another novel written by Wang Xufeng, winner of the Mao Dun Literature Prize. This novel offers a new narrative of the dramatic changes and constancy of Chinese life and spirit, bearing witness to a century of China in personal, family, and national perspectives. In recent years, literature describing the past few decades has raised attention to the domestic literary circle, as shown in Memories of Jiang Nan (《望江南》), Food is Heaven (《燕食记》), and Lu Min’s The Golden River (《金色河流》). In the Literature List, there is I am Fenfang (《我本芬芳》) by social media influencer Yang Benfen, who only started writing in her 80s with a non-professional background. This is a great encouragement to those new authors: the market has always been there, and the power of literature can be amplified when publishers and new authors build a bridge through the power of marketing. Cai Chongda's novel Fate (《命运》), written eight years after No More Than Skins (《皮囊》), also continues the market success of his previous work.
In 2022, the literary market saw many new masterpieces, including Chronicles of Qinling (《秦岭记》) by Jia Pingwa, From All Corners of the Country(《五湖四海》) by Wang Anyi, Outset (Annals) (《起初·纪年》) by Wang Shuo, Chinese Peach and Plum (《中文桃李》) by Liang Xiaosheng, Crossing the Ocean to Love You (《漂洋过海来爱你》) by Shi Yifeng, Road to Father (《通往父亲之路》) by Ye Zhaoyan, Fountainhead (《不老》) by Ye Mi, Four Harmonies (《四合如意》) by Zhang Yiwei, and Lin Bai (《林白》) by Lin Bai. Authors have been creating endlessly, providing readers with a literary feast and giving more topics and heat to the media influence of literary publishing.
Among the Top 100 titles in the Literature List, China, romance, century, and Tang poetry become the top 4 on word frequency analysis. Original works, literature describing the past few decades, romance, and Chinese traditional culture are perhaps becoming trends in literature. The word analysis shows that the distribution of words in Literary is evenly spread and dispersed, and the word counts do not vary much, which indicates a diverse picture in this category.
There are 35 publishers’ work in the Literature Top 100, where 23 publishers have more than two titles listed and 12 publishers have one title listed. With 15 titles listed in the Top 100, People's Literature Publishing House ranked first in the Literature category, while the Yilin Press (8 titles), Jiangsu Phoenix Literature and Arts Publishing House (7 titles), and Zhejiang Literature and Arts Publishing House (7 titles). People's Literature Publishing House and Yilin Press, as the two leading publishers of original and imported works respectively, led the trends and composition of the titles in the Literature category in 2022.
II. Arts
The founder of Accidental Art, the leading art popularization self-media in China, Yi Gongzi has finally caught fire in the publishing world. Ten years of art popularization to the public, Yi Gongzi has used storytelling to make more people see beautiful works from the past to the present. Her Chinese Art History for Dummies (《大话中国艺术史》) and Western Art History for Dummies (《大话世界艺术史》) have all achieved good reputation and success, and this has led to a number of popular books listed on art history, such as Five Thousand Years of Chinese Art (《中国美术五千年》) by Yang Qi, Chinoiserie: China as Source of Inspiration for European Art from the 13th to the 19th Century (《中国风：13世纪到19世纪中国对欧洲艺术的影响》) by Francesco Molinari, and Wu Hung's Chinese Painting: From Ancient Time to Tang Dynasty (《中国绘画：远古至唐》) and Leopard Tracks: Related to Memory (《豹迹：与记忆有关》).
The role of Yi Gongzi in this list may be reflected in two aspects: firstly, arts need to break the circle. Arts come from life, but they should never be detached from life, and the mass should be allowed to see and understand art to inspire more artworks. Publishing in Arts should take responsibility and carry the banner. Secondly, publishing in Arts needs more dissemination, not just to stay in arts’ own small circle of self-indulgence, but to let more people know about arts and understand arts with the assistance of technology and media, to continue opening up and gain a larger market.
“China” appears the most frequently in word count for all titles in Arts Top 100, indicating a greater focus on domestic arts and the impact from the world in 2022. Art History, Music, Painting, Film, Chinese Painting, Secret, and Story also become popular words. The broader scope of arts, especially with the emergence of the “Story” and “Secret”, has given art publishing more space for imagination and is no longer limited to traditional professional art publishing, but is moving towards more lifelike and popular reading.
The Arts Top 100 list involves 46 publishers, with 17 publishers having more than two titles listed and 29 publishers having one title listed. SDX Joint Publishing topped the list with 10 titles, with Guangxi Normal University Press and Jiangsu Phoenix Fine Arts Publishing House (9 titles each), the Commercial Press (6 titles), and Shanghai People's Publishing House and Shanghai Calligraphy and Painting Publishing House (5 titles each).
There is a 50-50 split in the number of non-specialized publishers and specialized art publishers in the Arts Top 100 List, with the former leveraging more non-art specialist titles and marketing promotions which smashed the latter in media influence.
III. Lifestyle
The 2022 Lifestyle Book List shows more diversity.
In Collected Essays (《寻味东西》), the British author Fuchsia Dunlop uses her usual delicate and humorous writing to vividly depict the differences between the food cultures of the East and the West with wonderful anecdotes about food. It adds an addition to her previous book Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper (《鱼翅与花椒》) by Shanghai Translation Publishing House.
Three years after the pandemic, the public's knowledge of health and attention to disease has become ever-widespread. Patients without Borders (《无国界病人》） is a personal handbook of 10 years of cancer treatment by renowned author Shi Yonggang. This practical and sincere work contains both his own experiences and professional reflections, as well as a large number of real cases as empirical evidence. Similar to it is The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer (《癌症传》) by CITIC Press Group, which, with its informative historical data, professional literature, media reports, interviews with patients, and much other information, explains to readers the origin and development of cancer, the history of mankind's struggle against cancer, and its prevention.
The readers are also paying more attention to their own changes, in terms of thinking and action. A series of similar works are on the list and reflect a common choice from the media to the readers, such as Not in the Earth: The Life of a Knowledge Farmer in the Mountain (《土里不土气: 知识农夫的里山生活》), The 5% Change (《5%的改变》), Statistical Consequences of Fat Tails (《肥尾效应》), Framers: Human Advantage in an Age of Technology and Turmoil (《架思维：高手做事的方法》), and Birth of the Self (《自我的诞生》).
The keywords for Lifestyle Top 100 titles are scattered, with Life, Time, Emotion, Learning, Living, Decision, Children, Education, Reading, Exercise, and Cancer being some of the more prominent words, and once again validates the broader outreach of lifestyle book publishing and its more diverse perspective. After all, reading is a way of lifestyle in itself.
In 2022, the appearance of several words such as Doctor, Self-help, Cancer, and Exercise also once again reflects where readers' concerns and anxieties about their physical health lie during the pandemic. But as COVID-19 gradually becomes a thing of the past, such selections need to be published with more caution.
There are 49 publishers’ works in the Lifestyle Top 100 List, with 17 publishers having more than two titles listed and 32 publishers having one title listed. Among them, CITIC Press Group topped the list with 10 titles, Hunan Literature and Arts Publishing House with 7 titles, Beijing United Publishing Company and Sichuan Literature and Arts Publishing House with 6 titles each, and Posts & Telecom Press and New Star Press with 5 titles each.
As reading becomes increasingly fragmented and integrated into everyday life, the boundaries of lifestyle books are becoming broader. This has also led many publishers to dabble more in the selection of lifestyle books. For example, the top-ranked CITIC Press Group and Hunan Literature and Arts Publishing House are already very specialized in their financial and literature fields.
IV. Children
The original works dominate the Children’s Top 100 List, making it the category with the highest proportion of original books apart from Theme Publishing. Zaxidler of the Three Rivers (《三江源的扎西德勒》) by Yang Zhijun, Birch Skin Boats (《桦皮船》) by Xue Tao, and Mengbao Little Elephant (《勐宝小象》) by Xiang Nü rounded out the top three in the Children's category.
In terms of media influence, children's books outperformed other categories in live-streaming and short-form videos. Data from the e-commerce for children's book market analysis shows that children's book accounts for 16% of overall live-streaming in 2022, up nearly 100% from 2021. Data also shows that the total sales of children’s books via vertical e-commerce channels grew by more than 110% in 2021 compared to 2020. There are over 300 children’s book e-commerce accounts which are capable of making RMB 1 million in sales in a single live-streaming session, and the children's book category grew more than four times in 2021 compared to 2020.
In the past two years, the children's publishing sector has been undergoing major changes. After suffering from the pandemic, “the double reduction”, sales channel transformation, and other multiple factors, the children's book market is facing slow growth, repeated changes, and irregular development in its sub-segments. In 2023, the post-pandemic era, it becomes an urgent issue for the children's book market to boost publishers' confidence, enhance the trust of readers, and improve the market's growth through a series of marketing promotion activities.
The strength of original work in children's book publishing is evident in the word frequency count, with China, Children, and Story being the most prominent words, and “Original” being one of the top-ranking keywords. “Set” has been a much talked about topic for the last two years, as children's books are shorter and can be combined into sets to increase pricing during promotion.
Picture books and children's literature remain the most important segments of children's books, with storytelling being an important indicator of children’s content. Beyond this, the rising proportion of references within children's science works can also be seen through the keywords Geography, Museum, Secret, Universe, Animal, and Space Station.
There are 50 publishers’ works listed in the Children Top 100 category, with 24 publishers having more than two titles listed and 26 publishers having one title listed. 21st Century Publishing House and Phoenix Juvenile and Children's Publishing each have six titles listed and tied for the top spot, while Jieli Publishing House and Anhui Children's Publishing House each have five titles listed, and China Children's Press & Publication Group, Children's Fun Publishing Company, and Zhejiang Juvenile and Children's Publishing House each have four titles listed.
Specialized Children's publishers have steadily maintained their position. Although many non-specialized publishers, such as CITIC Press Group and Guangxi Normal University Press, have also entered the children's book market, readers and the media demand a higher degree of specialism in children's books, which is probably the main reason why specialized children's publishers still hold their influence in the market.
V. Finance & Economics
The world in 2022 is complex and complicated, and the focus on world change has become an important direction in finance and economics. Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail (《原则2：应对变化中的世界秩序》), the sequel to the superb bestseller Principles: Life and Work (《原则》) by CITIC Press, and Double Shock: The Future of the Power Games & Future of the World Economy (《双重冲击：大国博弈的未来与未来的世界经济》) by domestic author Li Xiao were first and third on the list. He Xiao's Variable 4: The Operation of the Great Powers (《变量4：大国的腾挪》), the introduced work Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (《崩溃：社会如何选择成败兴亡》), Essays on the Great Depression (《伯南克论大萧条：经济的衰退与复苏》), and Rogue Waves (《疯狗浪：如何应对突如其来的剧变》) also make the list. In addition, it is a bit of a surprise that The Almanack of Naval Ravikant (《纳瓦尔宝典》), a compiled articles and quotations collected on Twitter and other self-media platforms, become a bestseller, and once again proves that the power of cross-border marketing cannot be underestimated.
This year, AI and the metaverse become two hot topics. Books such as AI Future in Progress (《AI未来进行时》), Quaternary Sector of Economy (《第四产业》), Metaverse and Digital Economy (《元宇宙与数字经济》), and The Metaverse And How It Will Revolutionize Everything (《元宇宙改变一切》) in the list have become hot topics in the technology world as well as drawing eyeballs of the general readership. Digital collectibles, the digital economy, and blockchain are becoming the focus of media attention. It can be expected that these two major topics will also continue to be hot for some time, with similar works continuing to be published and increasing in media influence.
This year also saw the launch of the latest 55th-anniversary edition of renowned management icon Peter Drucker's work, The Effective Executive (《卓有成效的管理者》). A series of events to commemorate and discuss it, bringing this old title sustained sales. The year 2022 saw the death of renowned Japanese entrepreneur Kazuo Inamori, whose works are once again widely disseminated, and raise new questions about the subsequent marketing of these works: how should influence be maintained when the person is gone but the book is still there?
Three years into the pandemic, the global economy has shifted more to a domestic focus, and there has been a spurt in the publication of financial books about China itself, with “China” and “Common Prosperity” being the keywords. At the same time, society's concerns and worries about the economy have also fed into the publication of financial books, with Economy, Wealth, Recession, and Financial Crisis becoming the words focused on.
Several new keywords for financial book publishing are Green, Digital, Innovation, Universe, Great Power, and Competition.
35 publishers’ works are listed in the Finance & Economics Top 100, with 13 publishers having more than two titles listed and 22 publishers having one listed. CITIC Press Group tops the list with 31 titles, while China Translation & Publishing House comes second with 15 titles and China Machine Press comes third with 9 titles.
The specialized nature of financial publishing also makes the number of listed publishers small, but the position of CITIC Press Group and China Machine Press in his field remains hard to shake. China Translation & Publishing House is considered the biggest winner in 2022 thanks to its series of metaverse hits that increased its revenue and media influence.
VI. Humanities
Humanities and history books in recent years seem to have entered a chronological phase of creation, with people concentrating on breaking history down into paragraphs, which are then dissected and interpreted, and finally presented to the reader. For example, in The Long Remains of Life: A Northern Wei Court Lady and Her Times (《漫长的余生：一个北魏宫女和她的时代》), which is number one on the 2022 Humanities Top 100, the book uses historical materials such as tomb records to recount the long and tumultuous life of Wang Zhong'er, as well as more than half a century of Northern Wei history, and of course, the history of many people swept away by the thrilling waves of the times. This leads us to wonder what’s next to be interpreted in Chinese history.
Renowned contemporary Chinese writer Wang Meng has also published his new book, Ten Concepts of Traditional Chinese Culture (《天地人生：中华传统文化十章》), which provides a comprehensive interpretation of 5,000 years of traditional Chinese culture. Famous historian Cho-yun Hsu is becoming more of a world observer, and his book New Decameron (《许倬云十日谈：当今世界的格局与人类未来》) is based on a series of themes such as the characteristics of the times, ideological and cultural changes, the integration of multiple cultures, the progressive transformation of technology and intelligence, and the comparative interaction between Chinese and foreign civilizations. This is a dialogue between the political, economic, social, and cultural aspects of each era and the historical backgrounds of the cases.
The Humanities Top 100 also includes three interesting books: Kafka: The Decisive Years (《卡夫卡传：关键岁月》), the first of a trilogy of biographies of Kafka, the latter also being the most detailed and voluminous set of Kafka's biographies to date. In Xi: A Qin Official and His World (《喜：一个秦吏和他的世界》), the author takes a novel perspective on an unknown character such as the owner of Qin Tomb No. 11 in Shuihudi to present several facets of a humble individual's life. The Feast of the Qin and Han: The Mighty Age of Chinese Cuisine (《秦汉的飨宴：中华美食的雄浑时代》), another book in the series "Sorting the History of China", follows the ancient costumes, the history of business, and the journey of calligraphy, focusing on the table of the Qin and Han dynasties, and exploring the food heritage of the heyday.
Chinese history has always been an important direction for humanities book publishing, and this focus remained unchanged in 2022. Apart from “China”, other keywords in order are World, Society, Century, Global, Era, and Geography. In addition, the frequency word counts in the history category are rather scattered and shall not be further mentioned here.
45 publishers’ works are listed in the Humanities Too 100, with 19 publishers have selected more than two titles and 26 having selected one. Guangxi Normal University Press tops the list with 18 titles, three times as many as Beijing Daily Press (6 titles) and CITIC Press Group (6 titles), which rank second. The Commercial Press has 5 titles listed.
In the Humanities Top 100 List, both Beijing Daily Press and Guangdong People's Publishing House rank higher than the traditional humanities publishers, Zhonghua Book Company and SDX Joint Publishing， which is a big surprise. Beijing Daily Press is listed mainly for The Long Remains of Life: A Northern Wei Court Lady and Her Times (《漫长的余生：一个北魏宫女和她的时代》), which is in cooperation with publishing agent Imaginist. Guangdong People's Publishing House is listed for New Decameron (《许倬云十日谈：当今世界的格局与人类未来》).
VII. Social Sciences
Whether in the publishing industry or media dissemination, focusing on young audiences is a must, as only young people can provide sustainable consumption and markets. On the top list, Bullshit Jobs: A Theory (《毫无意义的工作》) may seem nonsense, but it dissects the contemporary social symptoms that plague the world and is deeply felt by many young readers. The Manufacturing of the Consumer： A history of the commodity society (《制造消费者：消费主义全球史》), the second-ranked book, is also informing and trending the market forward from a consumer perspective for a wider range of industries.
Concern for the female community is another feature reflected in this list. Eight books on the Top 30 list are related to women, such as It Begins at the Limit: A Feminist Book of Reciprocity (《始于极限：女性主义往复书简》), Invisible Women (《看不见的女性》), Regretting Motherhood (《成为母亲的选择》), From Here to Maternity (《初为人母》), and Wives Who Want Their Husbands to Die (《有恨意但不离婚的妻子们》). The topic of women resonates easily with the media, but it can also become a double-edged sword that requires more attention from publishers in their marketing and promotion.
The series of events in the British Royal Family led to The Texture of Hard Times: An Observational Memoir of Life in the UK (《贫穷的质感：王梆的英国观察》) being on the list. Social sciences itself can be a somewhat tedious topic, which requires fitting in with popular conversation and social hot topics in marketing and promotion to gain more readers’ attention and media influence. In addition, several books on the list, including Southern Accent and Norther Tune: Chinese Dialects (《南腔北调：方言里的中国》), The Fate of Food: What We`ll Eat in A Bigger, Hotter, Smarter World (《未来吃什么：人类如何应对食物危机》), The Future of Humans, the Future of AI (《人类的未来， AI的未来》), and Epidemics and Society (《流行病与社会》), all provide readers with serious interpretations of social sciences from a more popular perspective.
As Gu Qing, Director of the Commercial Press, said, academic publishing in the Internet era also needs to have a user mindset. The value of publishing is to pay more attention to the users’ needs, to think like users, and to combine Internet tools and technologies to make academic and social sciences works to reach a broader audience, rather than to stay in a small circle.
China, World, Humanity, and Society are words with higher counts in the Humanities Top 100 list. It is more prominent for the keywords Women, Dunhuang, Family, and Law in 2022, which also indicates that social sciences titles in these directions are receiving more attention, especially books about women.
42 publishers’ works are listed in the Social Sciences Top 100, with 20 publishers having more than two titles listed and 22 publishers having one title listed. Among them, Guangxi Normal University Press, the Commercial Press, Shanghai Translation Publishing House and CITIC Press Group have seven titles listed each, while Beijing United Publishing Company has five titles listed thanks to its cooperation with other publishing agents.
The performance of social sciences publishers remains relatively stable. Traditional social science publishers possess better brand influence, accumulation of titles, and media appeal. Guangxi Normal University Press, the Commercial Press, Shanghai Translation Publishing House, and CITIC Press Group, as the top four players, all held better market positions in both the original and introduced works.
VIII. New Knowledge
There are several features revealed in the New Knowledge Top 100 list.
One is about the universe. With the rapid development of China's space industry, especially manned spaceflight and space stations, there has been a significant increase in the media influence of titles about the universe and space-related topics, such as Diary of an Apprentice Astronaut《成为一颗星：宇航学员日记》, which topped the list despite being a work by a foreign astronaut. Hopefully, there will be a similar book by a domestic astronaut in 2023. Similar books on the list are The Little Book of Cosmology (《宇宙小史》), Human Earth: A History of Human Understanding of the Earth (《人文地球：人类认识地球的历史》), Exploring Aerospace Textiles (《航空航天纺织品探秘》) and Fundamentals： Ten Keys to Reality (《万物原理》).
Secondly, there is a high level of interest in books about the human body, disease, and environmental protection. For example, The Idea of the Brain: A History (《大脑传》), The Code of Life 3: The Biography of the Plague (《生命密码3：瘟疫传》), How to Prevent the Next Pandemic (《如何预防下一次大流行》), Keep Sharp: Build a Better Brain at Any Age (《逆龄大脑：保持大脑年轻敏锐的新科学》), The Brain Communicator: Know Your Neurotransmitters (《大脑通信员：认识你的神经递质》), and Floating Coast: An Environmental History of the Bering Strait (《动的海岸：一部白令海峡的环境史》). The pandemic of the last three years has raised concerns about humanity itself and the pandemic to an unprecedented level. These concerns will remain in 2023, and related books can still leverage this round of attention to achieve greater influence during their marketing promotions.
Thirdly, artificial intelligence. As AI technology continues to advance, the attention of mass readers to technological knowledge and popular science books also continues to rise. For example, There Are Places in the World Where Rules Are Less Important Than Kindness (《物理学家的智性冒险》), Quantum (《量子传》), The God Particle (《上帝粒子：诺奖大师写给所有人的粒子物理趣史》), The Disappearing Spoon (《元素的盛宴》).
Although most of the books listed in the New Knowledge Top 100 are imported works, the frequency word count for “China” is still quite high. “Humanity” is the most frequent word, followed by Science, Universe, Brain, Earth, History, and Story. Globally, there is a greater interest in the future and destiny of humanity and an effort to explore the secrets of humanity itself and to seek answers from history. The word “story” appears in several categories in 2022, indicating the readability and storytelling of books seem to becoming an important factor in marketing promotion and reader recognition.
41 publishers’ works are listed in the New Knowledge Top 100, with 18 publishers having more than two titles listed and 23 having one listed. CITIC Press Group tops the list with 15 titles, while Yilin Press, Science Press, and the Commercial Press each have six titles listed, and Shanghai Scientific & Technological Education Publishing House and Beijing United Publishing Company each have five titles listed.
The CITIC Press Group, Science Press, the Commercial Press, and Yilin Press are the four publishers with more titles listed, especially the CITIC Publishing Group, which has topped the list for three consecutive years through the introduction of oversea works.
IX. Theme Publishing
The 2022 Theme Publishing Top 100 lists show more diversity.
Sun Jingyan, the author of the full-length reportage on the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Olympics in China (《五环旗下的中国》), continued in 2022 with her work China Winter Olympic Games (《中国冬奥》), which is extraordinarily solid, both in terms of media buzz and content creation, with a panoramic record of Beijing's 2022 Winter Olympics from conception, to bid and preparation, a journey full of twists and turns, hardships, challenges and opportunities, and ultimately a top three work on the list.
Love China All My Life: Isabel Crook’s Stories (我用一生爱中国：伊莎白·柯鲁克的故事》) is a reportage on the centenary life of Isabel Crook, an international communist, and recipient of the Order of Friendship of the PRC. As an outstanding work for the Five-One Project award, it was also selected for the Good Books of China in April 2022. Although Isabel Crook is unfamiliar to many people, the marketing of the book has helped to raise the profile of the person and the book together.
Notes on Xihaigu (《西海固笔记》), based on the history of poverty alleviation in Xihaigu, Tianluwan (《天露湾》), which records the long and arduous entrepreneurial history of farmers in the Jianghan Plain, Zhang Guimei (《张桂梅》), a book of the same name that tells the true story of a grassroots teacher, and Village Dreams (《乡村造梦记》), a work that records the road to rural revitalization with characteristics of eastern Fujian, are all thematic publications that highlight the grand topics of the times through more perspectives and depictions from ordinary people.
A work based on online literature, Heavy Truck Breeze (《重卡雄风》), makes the list. The book tells the story of a third-tier heavy truck manufacturing plant, which rose to the challenge, reformed, and innovated on its own, turning from weakness to strength until it became proud of the group and made things happen in China. Online literature suggests a new direction for title selection and dissemination for theme publishing.
The year 2022 was a special year for theme publishing, as China and the Communist Party of China became the two most talked about words due to the successful holding of the 20th National Congress. The various thematic promotion terms that appear frequently in the mainstream media also appear in the published book titles, such as New Era, Modernization, Chinese Style, Common Prosperity, Strong Nation, Poverty Alleviation. However, theme publishing is more time-sensitive than other categories of books, so the keywords for books in 2022 may change significantly in 2023.
There are 70 publishers’ work selected in the Theme Publishing Top 100, with 19 publishers having more than two titles listed and 51 having one listed. Among them, People's Publishing House tops the list with 13 titles, including 5 titles that are in cooperation with other publishers. Guangxi People's Publishing House and SDX Joint Publishing each have 4 titles listed.
Theme publishing, which was a concept in previous years, has gradually become a unique category of publishing, with publishers making theme publishing an important part of their annual work. From all the Top 100 lists, the number of publishers invoved in Theme Publishing Top 100 is also the largest, and their number of books listed is the most dispersed, making theme publishing a more competitive market.
Conclusion: Believe in the power of media influence
In this social media era, the importance of the media’s influence on books has become self-evident.
As we can see from the above lists, no matter what category they are, they have all reflected several very significant dissemination characteristics:
Firstly, they are more closely integrated with current affairs and social hotspots, even in categories like social sciences, humanities, and literature, which rely on literary expression, they need to make more use of hot topics to increase their media influence.
Secondly, the media influence across circles is greatly strengthening, the influence from audio, short-form video, live-streaming, film & TV IP affects not only the marketing strategy but also title selection.
Thirdly, the reading habits and consumption trends of young readers are gradually becoming the new focus of media attention, after all, young people are the mainstream consumers.
Therefore, the media influence on books in 2023 can be summarized in three keywords (phrases): catching social hotspots, cross-circle cooperation, and young readership.
Attachment 1 Overall Top 100 List
Attachment 2 Literature Top 100 List
Attachment 3 Arts Top 100 List
Attachment 4 Lifestyle Top 100 List
Attachment 5 Children Top 100 List
Attachment 6 Finance & Economics Top 100 List
Attachment 7 Humanities Top 100 List
Attachment 8 Social Sciences Top 100 List
Attachment 9 New Knowledge Top 100 List
Attachment 10 Theme Publishing Top 100 List
