Topping the list is Volume 25 of My Hero Academia, the first new volume of that series to be released since June. The continued popularity of this series is evident from the fact that the first and second volumes are in second and third place, respectively.
Then we have volume 17 of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba, a series that has been gaining readers at such a rate that VIZ Media boosted its release rate to once a month, instead of once every two months, which is typical for a Shonen Jump series.
Next up, in fifth place, is the first volume of Chainsaw Man, a series that has been getting a lot of buzz thanks to the new chapters released on VIZ’s Shonen Jump app and also because who doesn’t love chainsaws? The lead character is Denji, a young man who is not only depressed but so broke that he has sold some of his organs and now does errands for the yakuza (gangsters) along with his devil-dog, Pochita, who is basically a canine chainsaw. When Denji is killed, Pochita merges with his body and he becomes a human chainsaw. The combination of over-the-top violence and dark humor has attracted fans, and VIZ moved the series to print because it was doing so well digitally. The series made a lot of top-ten lists in Japan. There is no anime as of yet.
Volume 21 of One-Punch Man, another October debut, is in sixth place. This is another series that has been coming out less frequently: The previous volume was published in July, and before that it was on a four-month schedule. This story of an overpowered superhero battling preposterous villains has been a best-seller for years, and every new volume makes the chart.
Two other October debuts are on the chart, and one is not from VIZ: Volume 4 of Wotakoi: Love Is Hard for Otaku, a rom-com about nerdy co-workers, one a fan of yaoi manga and otome games, the other a hardcore gamer. Although the top selling manga are usually shonen series, this one is josei, which targets adult women, and the fact that it is on the Adult Top 20 for the first time suggests that the audience for this series is growing (Volume 2 was on the manga chart in 2018; see "June 2018 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Superhero, Manga, Author Graphic Novels"). Wotakoi is published by Kodansha Comics.
The new volume of Komi Can’t Communicate is the final October title on the chart. This is another manga that sort of came out of nowhere but has been consistently popular, with the new volume typically making the Manga Top 20 chart every other month, although it hasn’t been on the Adult Top 20 since last April.
Overall, 17 of the 20 titles in the top 20 were manga, 16 of them from VIZ. Several are first volumes of series that are a year or more old, so readers are still diving into the backlist. The non-manga series are all hardy perennials: March (Book One and the box set) and Nathan Pyle’s Strange Planet.
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NPD BookScan Top 20 Adult Graphic Novels – October 2020 (10/4/20 - 10/31/20) |
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|
Rank |
Title |
Author |
Publisher |
|
1 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 25 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
2 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 1 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
3 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 2 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
4 |
DEMON SLAYER: KIMETSU NO YAIBA VOL. 17 |
KOYOHARU GOTOUGE |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
5 |
CHAINSAW MAN VOL. 1 |
TATSUKI FUJIMOTO |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
6 |
ONE-PUNCH MAN VOL. 21 |
ONE |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
7 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 24 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
8 |
UZUMAKI HC |
JUNJI ITO |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
9 |
DEMON SLAYER: KIMETSU NO YAIBA VOL. 1 |
KOYOHARU GOTOUGE |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
10 |
MARCH (TRILOGY SLIPCASE SET) |
JOHN LEWIS |
TOP SHELF PROD |
|
11 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 3 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
12 |
WOTAKOI: LOVE IS HARD FOR OTAKU VOL. 4 |
FUJITA |
KODANSHA COMICS |
|
13 |
TOKYO GHOU, VOL. 1 |
SUI ISHIDA |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
14 |
STRANGE PLANET HC |
NATHAN W. PYLE |
MORROW GIFT |
|
15 |
KOMI CAN'T COMMUNICATE VOL. 9 |
TOMOHITO ODA |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
16 |
THE PROMISED NEVERLAND VOL. 1 |
KAIU SHIRAI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
17 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 4 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
18 |
DEMON SLAYER: KIMETSU NO YAIBA VOL. 2 |
KOYOHARU GOTOUGE |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
19 |
MARCH: BOOK ONE |
JOHN LEWIS |
TOP SHELF PROD |
|
20 |
MY HERO ACADEMIA VOL. 5 |
KOHEI HORIKOSHI |
VIZ MEDIA |
|
Source: The NPD Group/BookScan |
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For charts of October graphic novel sales from NPD BookScan:
October 2020 NPD BookScan – Top 20 Kids Graphic Novels
October 2020 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:
October 2020 NPD BookScan - Top 20 Adult Graphic Novels with Actual Sales
October 2020 NPD BookScan - Top 20 Kids Graphic Novels with Actual Sales
October 2020 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."