A Ray of Japanese Sunlight on China’s Bestseller List

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From Publishing Perspectives:

Once again, we see a words-to-screen connection behind a major hit in our China bestsellers, but this time it’s words-and-pictures-t0-screen.

Makato Shinkai, the Japanese manga artist and filmmaker behind the 2016 film hit Your Name, has landed on Beijing Openbook’s November bestseller charts at an impressive No. 13, with his new title Weathering With You, published by Baihuazhou Literature & Art Publishing House. Expect to see this one climb up the list next month.

Like Your Name, this work is both a film and a book. And the film in China is doing what our OpenBook associates call “breathtaking box office.”

In the book and the film, a boy named Hodaka runs away to Tokyo during his first high-school summer and meets Hina. Her superpower is the ability to make rain stop and sunshine take over with a single prayer. Of course, “her power comes at a price,” as the blurb will tell you, and we won’t spoil things for you here.

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Of course, it’s no surprise to Publishing Perspectives readers to learn that a work of Japanese fiction is gaining fast traction in the Chinese market. You’ll find author Higashino Keigo on the OpenBook overall fiction list six times this month and seven times on the foreign-author bestsellers. And Shinkai’s work has the added draw of anime and of carefully timed film releases.

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The new Weathering With You is said to have been written concurrently with the creation of its anime film. That show was released in July in Japan, and in mainland China on November 1. According to our information, that first weekend gross in China alone was the equivalent of US$22.1 million. Boom. The book is on the November bestseller list, having been published in September so that it would be readily available when the fans walked out of the cinemas.

Link to the rest at Publishing Perspectives