The Non/fiction fair, held at the Merchant Exhibition Center in Moscow from April 4 to 7, showed increased interest among Russian readers in comics, Young Adult and Asian graphic publications. . Industry insiders predict that this trend will continue in the coming years and the number of children reading will decrease.
Focus on young adults
This year's "documentary/Fiction" Spring Fair brings together more than 250 exhibitors, including publishing houses, cultural institutions (Hermitage Museum, Pushkin Museum, Tretyakov Gallery, etc.), book traders, etc. Exhibitions are not only an opportunity for publishers to showcase new works and market them to readers, but are also important indicators of market trends. A recent trend is that literature is increasingly attracting attention to young adults, the so-called "young adults." This was undoubtedly evident at the expo, where in addition to the traditional categories of adult and children's books, a third important category emerged.
The growth of "comic" books also proves this point. In the past, there were 15 to 20 publishing houses participating in the exhibition, but this time there were 25. For the first time, the organizers decided to have a cartoonist appear permanently at the booth, with the aim of allowing the author to communicate directly with readers and obtain feedback. Asian works play an important role in the Russian comics market, including Japanese comics and Korean comics. Last year, AST Holdings established the "Paper Lantern" editorial department to be responsible for work in this direction. Olga Muraveva, editor-in-chief of Malysh publishing house, said: "Comics are very popular among teenagers and they know this field very well. This is why we hire young people to the professional editorial department, because they "We are like a duck in water in this field," she said. In the past year, the entire children's and young adult book editorial department of AST Holdings published a total of 3,352 books, more than before. The 2024 numbers are likely to be even higher. Although classic works by authors such as Eduard Uspensky, Yuri Entin, Sergey Mikhalkov and others remain in high demand, contemporary works are the fastest growing segment of literature for young adults.
Pay attention to the age changes of readers
Sergey Tishkov, director of the "Childhood Planet" department of AST Company, said: "5 to 9 years old is one of the main age groups for children's book sales. In the next five years, their number will decrease by more than 2 million. This is affected by the impact of our country's The impact of overall demographic conditions. At the same time, the proportion of young readers and the demand for books for teenagers above 14 years old is expected to increase by 17% by 2027. In addition to "Paper Lantern", AST also established. Established the editorial department of "NoSugar Books", which mainly produces domestic youth books. In less than a year, the new editorial department published more than 45 new books in different genres. Among them, the most popular ones at the exhibition were Alexander Richter's fantasy series with Christopher Kling as the protagonist, and Alice Podler's adventure thriller series "Escape".
Fantasy novels are popular
Other market players also report that the Russian youth book market is growing. Polina Vlastovskaya, project manager of publishing projects "Rosman" and "Oxygen" said: "Youth literature has been the main growth driver of the book market in the past few years. According to data from RosIndex, reading volume The largest age groups of readers are 16 to 19 and 20 to 24, and it was the young adult segment that saw the most professional editorial launches last year. “Interestingly, young adult literature is not only popular with teenagers, but also with millennials. Also like it because they miss their teenage years so much. In addition, many books have strong connections with other popular cultural phenomena, such as video games, anime, and pop music. "Today we will not only discuss movies and books, but also history and society and the people who grew up around it," Vlastovskaya said.
For the first time this year, Rothman Publishing House let its "Oxygen" professional editorial department participate as an independent exhibitor at the "documentary/Novel" exhibition. This is an independent project that brings together works by Russian and foreign authors. The best-selling books at its booth include "Golden Binding: Until the Last Light Goes Out" (ancient Japanese mythology) by Russian newcomers Angelina and Veronika Shin Suspense and fantasy novels with settings), Rebekah Jarosz's global bestseller The Fourth and Nadja Sava's Immortelle (Slavic folk fantasy literature). Russian industry insiders believe that there will be more and more exciting works in the field of young adults.