Neil Gaiman's new prose novel Anansi Boys has topped both the Publishers Weekly and New York Times hardcover bestseller lists in its first week of release.  In what can only be termed an auspicious debut, Gaiman's novel displaced Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince at the top of the PW chart. 

Already in its third printing, there are now 165,000 copies of Anansi Boys in circulation.  Gaiman's previous novels have been increasingly successful, but Anansi Boys may well top them all.  Meanwhile the film Mirrormask, which Gaiman co-created with Dave McKean, has been released; his children's novel Coraline is being made into a film; as his script (written with Roger Avary) for a Beowulf movie is currently getting the Polar Express treatment from director Robert Zemeckis.

For pop culture retailers Gaiman's increasingly high profile success is great news considering the considerable backlist of Gaiman-created graphic novels.