Books: Bestsellers

Heavyweight tomes don't neccessarily mix with sea and sand or the constraints of baggage allowances. This is reflected in the dominance of "summer reading" in the fiction list. Calm's reign at the top of the non-fiction list is being challenged by chaos, with no sign of the The Little Book of Stress. The top three science titles are all small, easily digestible histories - the nation's obssession with numbers, as 2000 approaches, shows no sign of diminishing. Watch out soon for David Ewing Duncan's The Calendar, recounting the struggle to align the heavens with the clock.

Compiled by Bookwatch from sales over seven days ending 9 August.

Copyright Bookwatch Ltd, 1998 Original Fiction

tITLE author/publisher price 1 Filth Irvine Welsh (Cape) pounds 9.99 2 Jemima J Jane Green (Penguin) 5.99 3 Perfect Strangers Robyn Sisman (Penguin) 5.99 4 The Clothes They Stood Up In Alan Bennett (Profile) 3.99 5 Love Song Charlotte Bingham (Bantam) 5.99 6 Rachel's Holiday Marian Keyes (Penguin) 5.99 7 Hitched Zoe Barnes (Piatkus) 5.99 8 The Klone and I Daniel Steele (Bantam) 8.99 9 The Last Continent Terry Pratchett (Doubleday) 16.99 10 Op Centre: Balance of Power Tom Clancy & Steve Pieczenik (HarperCollins) 5.99

Original Non-Fiction

tITLE author/publisher price 1 The Little Book of Calm Paul Wilson (Penguin) pounds 1.99 2 Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus John Gray (Thorsons) 9.99 3 Under the Tuscan Sun Frances Mayes (Bantam) 5.99 4 The Little Book of Chaos Craig Brown (Warner) 1.99 5 In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great Michael Wood (BBC) 17.99 6 The Guv'nor Lenny McLean (Blake) 16.99 7 Round Ireland with a Fridge Tony Hawkes (Ebury) 9.99 8 The Little Book of Dreams Joan Hanger (Penguin) 1.99 9 60 Ways to Feel Amazing Linda Field (Element) 1.99 10 Before I Say Goodbye Ruth Picardie (Penguin) 5.99

Science books

tITLE author/publisher price 1 Longitude Dava Sobel (Fourth Estate) pounds 5.99 2 Fermat's Last Theorem Simon Singh (Fourth Estate) 5.99 3 The Man Who Loved Only Numbers Paul Hoffman (Fouth Estate) 9.99 4 The Human Brain: a guided tour Susan Greenfield (Phoenix) 6.99 5 A Brief History of Time: 10th anniversary edition Stephen Hawking (Bantam) 15.00 6 A Brief History of Time Stephen Hawking (Bantam) 8.99 7 Guns, Germs and Steel Jared Diamond (Vintage) 8.99 8 The Mars Mystery Robert Bauval & Graham Hancock (Michael Joseph) 16.99 9 On Giant's Shoulders Melvyn Bragg (Hodder) 12.99 10 Stephen Hawking: a life in science Michael White & John Gribbin (Penguin) 7.99