OpenBook shares insight into April 2026 book sales across fiction, nonfiction, and children’s titles, with insight into what books by foreign authors are also selling well.

By Erin L. Cox, Publisher | @erinlcox

As readers prepare to head to Beijing for next month’s book fair, the April bestseller lists in China saw a continued love of Fei Zhi’s “If Cats” series on both the fiction and nonfiction lists, and the popular “Comics+” genre continues to thrive on the children’s bestseller list.

Delving into the fiction list, If Journey to the West were a Group of Cats (Volume 2) by Fei Zhi remained in the top spot while Mo Yan’s first new fiction in six years and first flash fiction collection Oh, Human! makes its debut. Mo Yan played into readers’ love of social media scrolling by encouraging them to “scroll through my short stories like you would scroll through short videos.”

Additionally, two different editions of Ye Sou Pu Yan (6 volumes) also performed well with sales driven by labels such as “ancient banned book,” “a marvel banned for a century,” and “an underrated Qing-dynasty encyclopedia.”

On the nonfiction list, the commemorative edition of I and the Temple of Earth by Shi Tiesheng dethroned Zhi’s historical Cats. Originally published in 1991, the autobiographical work centers on disability, life and death, fate, and spiritual transcendence.

Parenting, health, and wellness were key issues for readers this spring. You Are The Prelude To Your Child’s Life, released in April 2026, addresses the pain points of parenting adolescents and immediately went to #4 on the list. Books with practical, easy, and immediately applicable folk remedies and secret recipes performed particularly well, such as The Barefoot Doctor’s Folk Remedies and Folk First Aid Remedies.

In April, essay-writing guides and Comics+ titles both performed well on the children’s bestseller list, with The Festinger’s Law In Comics by Jiang Shiqi reaching number one. The book focuses on the theory of cognitive dissonance created by American psychologist Leon Festinger, using the graphic novel format to help explain these complex ideas to young people.

Many of the Comics+ books on the list analyze common childhood developmental pain points and offer solutions. Though, one challenge for the marketplace is that these titles tend to “blow up fast, get copied fast, and fall fast,” so have short sales cycles.

On the international front, the global release of the film “Project Hail Mary” saw a boost for the eponymous book by Andy Weir. While the popular manga series Demon Slayer saw a sales boost, likely due to the hugely popular film “Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle” which came out last fall and quickly became one of the highest grossing anime films of all time.

See the top ten of each list below:

Fiction Bestsellers

Nonfiction Bestsellers

Childrens Bestsellers

Fiction Bestsellers by an International Author

Nonfiction Bestsellers by an International Author

Notes on the Charts

OpenBook is a privately owned industry-data research firm based in Beijing. It functions somewhat as Nielsen and NDP do from the West, and Nielsen Book Research International has worked with OpenBook in Asian operations.

With authoritative data and information resources, OpenBook is able to deliver consulting service to partners who would like to explore the Chinese book market and identify suitable partners.

At last report, OpenBook monitored more than 26,000 online and off-line bookstores.

The online channel includes digital retailers such as large self-operated online stores, platform stores, and small- and medium-sized stores.

The off-line channels include more than 5,100 bookstores. Coverage includes most of the state-owned and influential privately owned bookstores in 30 provinces, municipalities, and autonomous regions. Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Tibet are not included in OpenBook’s system. In 2024, OpenBook tracked around 82.66 billion RMB in sales (US$11.39 billion). Retail outlets include:

• Traditional bookstores;
• Supermarkets;
• Campus bookstores;
• “Professional” stores, said to be small stores with a specific industrial or trade focus; and
• Airport stores.

In addition, OpenBook is drawing data from online bookstores of three main types:

• The “Tmall” stores of Alibaba (Tmall is described as a marketplace of companies that create storefronts online to sell products including books)
• The “JingDong” Stores of JD.com (similar to Tmall as a marketplace of both individual companies and bookstores operated by JD.com)
• Ten independent online bookselling retailers

Mainland China has 500 or more publishers in operation today. Most of them are government-owned. Private publishers are required to generate ISBNs for their titles from a publishing company that is government-owned—which, in other words, creates a system in which all ISBNs are registered through government channels. The government approves each book published in China.