The fact that the new volume of My Hero Academia is only in second place might be ominous if it weren’t for the fact that the release date is actually October 1, so this chart only captures four days of sales. VIZ Media releases its Shonen Jump titles the first week of the month, so this has happened before.
It’s worth noting, while we’re talking about VIZ, that they have 11 volumes on the chart and only six are My Hero Academia. Even more than in previous months, VIZ’s top sellers are a mixed bag, including the most recent volumes of Dragon Ball Super, Demon Slayer, and Splatoon, the Junji Ito one-shot Uzumaki, and the first volume of a new series, The Way of the Househusband, which is very different from the Shonen Jump titles: It’s a comedy manga about a notorious yakuza who has married a career woman and is now a stay-at-home husband, but can’t help bringing a certain gangster flair to chores like shopping and laundry.
Komi Can’t Communicate has vanished from the chart, but another volume is due out in October, and it will be interesting to see if that volume makes the top 20, as the other two have.
George Takei’s They Called Us Enemy is still riding high on the chart, in third place. It’s a July release so it definitely has momentum.
The graphic adaptation of The Handmaid’s Tale is back on the chart, perhaps spurred by the release of The Testaments, Margaret Atwood’s sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale, in September.
DC Comics has just two slots in the top 20, and both are September releases: Brian Azzarello’s Batman: Damned, from their Black Label imprint, and Scott Snyder’s The Batman Who Laughs.
There are three new creator-owned releases at the bottom of the chart: The latest volume of The Walking Dead at number 17, Chris Brown’s long-anticipated Rusty Brown at number 18, and the new volume of Marjorie Liu’s Monstress (another October 1 release) at number 19.
NPD BookScan Top 20 Adult Graphic Novels – September 2019 (9/1/19 - 10/5/19) |
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Rank |
Title |
Author |
Publisher |
1 |
THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY VOL. 3: HOTEL OBLIVION |
GERARD WAY |
DARK HORSE COMICS |
2 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 21 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
3 |
THEY CALLED US ENEMY |
GEORGE TAKEI |
TOP SHELF PROD. |
4 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 1 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
5 |
BATMAN: DAMNED HC |
BRIAN AZZARELLO |
DC BLACK LABEL |
6 |
THE BATMAN WHO LAUGHS HC |
SCOTT SNYDER |
DC COMICS |
7 |
THE ADVENTURE ZONE: MURDER ON THE ROCKPORT LIMITED! |
CLINT MCELROY |
FIRST SECOND BOOKS |
8 |
DRAGON BALL SUPER VOL. 6 |
AKIRA TORIYAMA |
VIZ MEDIA |
9 |
UZUMAKI HC |
JUNJI ITO |
VIZ MEDIA |
10 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 20 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
11 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 2 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
12 |
THE HANDMAID'S TALE: THE GRAPHIC NOVEL HC |
MARGARET ATWOOD |
NAN A. TALESE |
13 |
DEMON SLAYER: KIMETSU NO YAIBA VOL. 8 |
KOYOHARU GOTOUGE |
VIZ MEDIA |
14 |
SPLATOON VOL. 7 |
SANKICHI HINODEYA |
VIZ MEDIA |
15 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 3 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
16 |
THE WAY OF THE HOUSEHUSBAND VOL. 1 |
KOUSUKE OONO |
VIZ MEDIA |
17 |
THE WALKING DEAD BOOK 16 HC |
ROBERT KIRKMAN |
IMAGE COMICS |
18 |
RUSTY BROWN HC |
CHRIS WARE |
PANTHEON BOOKS |
19 |
MONSTRESS VOL. 4 |
MARJORIE LIU |
IMAGE COMICS |
20 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 4 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
Source: The NPD Group/BookScan |
For charts of September graphic novel sales from NPD BookScan:
September 2019 NPD BookScan - Top 20 Kids Graphic Novels
September 2019 NPD BookScan - Top 20 Superhero, Manga, Author Graphic Novels
For the charts with the actual sales numbers from NPD BookScan, see these articles on the ICv2 Pro site:
September 2019 NPD BookScan - Top 20 Adult Graphic Novels with Actual Sales
September 2019 NPD BookScan - Top 20 Kids Graphic Novels with Actual Sales
September 2019 NPD BookScan - Top 20 Superhero, Manga, Author 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."