JK Rowling has been toppled as the UK’s bestselling author by Julia Donaldson.
overtook the Harry Potter writer to become Britain’s bestselling author since accurate records began.
Donaldson’s lifetime book sales exceed Rowling’s by 600,000, according to Nielsen BookData.
in terms of monetary value, her sales to the consumer market of 48 million books were surpassed by Donaldson’s 48.6 million, Nielsen BookData said.
in recent years.
However, Rowling remained the highest-earning author, having made £150 million more than Donaldson through printed books in the UK, despite selling fewer copies.
Jamie Oliver, the celebrity chef and restaurateur.
The Bookseller magazine credited the success of Donaldson, 76, to her “slow and steadier” sales, compared to Rowling’s “fastest-selling titles in history and a string of the biggest publishing events of the 21st century”.
and has since sold more than one million copies each of 13 different titles in the UK.
While Donaldson has written more than 210 books since 1993, she has only sold more than one million copies of three. Her sales surged with the release of The Gruffalo in 1999.
She has published numerous editions of her different children’s titles, including finger puppet and felt flap versions.
Rowling achieved financial success bringing the world of Harry Potter to life on the big screen for eight films that took nearly $8 billion in cinemas worldwide.
, including Emma Watson and Daniel Radcliffe.
since 2020, when she said: “Erasing the concept of sex removes the ability of many to meaningfully discuss their lives.”
Donaldson, one of the world’s most-renowned children’s authors, is best known for the bear-like monster in The Gruffalo. More than eight million copies of that book – and The Gruffalo’s Child, its sequel – have been sold in the past 25 years. It has been translated into 107 languages and dialects.
Based on an old Chinese folk tale, it is the story of a mouse who uses his imagination to outsmart predators in the woods including a fox, a snake, an owl and finally, the Gruffalo.
, with whom she first worked on the 1993 picture book A Squash and a Squeeze.
There has been a BBC film version of The Gruffalo, part of a near-annual series of star-studded animations based on the author’s books. There are also stage versions, plush toys, costumes, and even Gruffalo-themed biscuits.
, Prince George, 11, and Princess Charlotte, nine.
The Prince of Wales told Donaldson and Scheffler in 2018 that The Gruffalo was “a big hit in our household”.
It is also a favourite of Michelle Obama, the former US first lady, who chose to read it aloud on PBS Kids in 2020 as part of her Mondays With Me series.
”, adding: “To be honest, what I like is when people single out one of my other books as their favourite as I think The Gruffalo’s a bit spoilt.”
In the past decade, she has routinely outsold every British author to become one of the first writers to earn more than eight figures in consecutive years.
In 2023, she earned £15.6 million in sales, the 14th consecutive year her work earned more than eight figures, something The Bookseller called an “unrivalled achievement”.
In September, Malcolm Donaldson the academic, Donaldson’s husband of 52 years, died aged 75.
that the couple spent their weekends foraging for mushrooms, taking long walks in Sussex and singing at home together while Donaldson played the piano.
Donaldson served as children’s laureate from 2011 to 2013 and her net worth from book sales has previously been estimated at £85 million.
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