November 2022 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Author, Manga, Superhero Graphic Novels

Webtoons, Chainsaw Man, and crossovers are the hot topics on this month’s chart of the Top 20 Author, Manga, and Superhero graphic novels in the book channel, based on NPD BookScan data for November 2022 (10/30/22-11/26/22) provided to ICv2.

The vertical scrolling revolution has arrived on the Author chart, with not only six volumes of Lore Olympus (hardcover and paperback editions of the first three volumes), but nine volumes of Korean webtoons published by Yen Press: Five volumes of Solo Leveling, plus the first volumes of three manhwa series and the second volume of Why Raeliana Ended Up at the Duke’s Mansion.  The last four are all November releases and part of the launch of Yen’s Ize Korean-comics imprint.

As for the other five, Catana Chetwynd’s You Are Home and Volume 10 of Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples’ Saga are back for a second month, Kate Beaton’s Ducks returns for a third, and the other two titles, They Called Us Enemy and Gender Queer, are Author-list perennials.

On the Manga chart, meanwhile, we have nine volumes of Chainsaw Man, three of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, and two apiece of Jujutsu Kaisen and My Hero Academia.  Meanwhile Spy x Family, which filled up a lot of slots on the BookScan top 20 when the anime came out last spring, is back to just one volume on the November chart.  It’s instructive to compare this month’s chart to the top sellers in Japan for 2022 (see “Oricon Reports Top-Selling Manga in Japan for 2022“).  Chainsaw Man, which is probably the hottest manga in the English-language market right now, didn’t make the top five in Japan, while Tokyo Revengers, the number two seller in Japan, only charts in North America when a new volume comes out.

The outlier on the BookScan chart is Shuna’s Journey, a story by the famed director Hayao Miyazaki that has never been published in English before.  Published by First Second Books as a full-color hardcover, it couldn’t be more different from the other manga in the Top 20, but it’s definitely reaching its audience.

Once again, the top seller on the Superhero chart is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin, which has been doing well since it was released in July, and the number two title is Volume 1 of The Sandman, which got a push earlier in the year from the Netflix series.  We’re seeing its popularity slowly wane, though; in September there were seven different volumes of The Sandman on the chart (see “September 2022 NPD BookScan“), and in November there are only three.

What’s particularly interesting about this chart, though, is that it illustrates the evolution of the Superhero category from straightforward capes-and-tights comics toward nontraditional treatment of the material: The Fortnite x Marvel and Batman/Spawn crossovers, Alex Ross’s reimagined Fantastic Four: Full Circle, Jeffrey Brown’s cozy family tale Star Wars: A Vader Family Sithmas, and even the Penguin Classics treatment of The Amazing Spider-Man as a work of serious literature are all new takes on established properties.  The usual IPs are showing up in some unusual configurations these days.

For charts of November 2022 graphic novel sales from NPD BookScan:
November 2022 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Adult Graphic Novels
November 2022 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Kids Graphic Novels

For the charts with the actual sales numbers from NPD BookScan, see these articles on the ICv2 Pro site:
November 2022 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Adult Graphic Novels with Actual Sales
November 2022 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Author, Manga, and Superhero Graphic Novels with Actual Sales
November 2022 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Kids Graphic Novels with Actual Sales

NPD BookScan collects weekly point-of-sale data on print books from over 16,000 locations including e-tailers, chains, mass merchandisers, independent bookstores, and more.  NPD BookScan covers approximately 85% of the U.S. trade print book market.  The ranks on this chart are based on piece sales.  Some publishers classify titles that are primarily text, or art books, as graphic novels; we’ve removed those titles from the ranking above.

For past BookScan Top 20 Graphic Novel lists, see the “BookScan Top 20 GN Index.”

Source: ICv2