Sales of periodical comics through Diamond Comic Distributors in January inched up by one percent versus January of 2009, but for the tenth straight month graphic novels declined.  Traditionally January is not a very strong month for comic book sales and the total sales of periodicals was the lowest since last May, but comics did manage to post a gain, although it was 8% below January of 2008 and 7% below that of January 2007.

Graphic novels suffered a substantial 13% decline versus sales in January of 2009, making it four straight months of double digit declines.  Declines in graphic novel sales could moderate after the first quarter is over since sales of the Watchmen graphic novel, which had been huge in the last half of 2008 and the first quarter of 2009 dropped off after Q1 in the direct market (though they continued at a very strong pace in the bookstore market through all of 2009).

The increase in sales of periodicals was enough to mitigate the overall decline in sales of comics and graphic novels, which fell just 2% for the month.