Peter James wins at Nielsen BookData Bestseller Awards

Photo credit: Isobel Dixon

Already a Nielsen Bestseller Platinum Winner, this year Peter James took home four Silvers from the Nielsen BookData Bestseller Awards – the highest number of awards awarded to a single author this year.

Based on UK sales volumes, the awards honour authors whose books have surpassed sales thresholds – Silver (250,000 sales), Gold (500,000 sales), and Platinum (1,000,000 sales).

This year’s prize-giving ceremony was held in Ham Yard Hotel with awards presented by comedian Shaparak Khorsandi. Nielsen said 199 million print books were bought in the UK in 2023, with a value of £1.83bn, with around seven in every 10 books purchased in print formats.

Peter’s silver winning titles were DEAD AT FIRST SIGHT, DEAD IF YOU DON’T, FIND THEM DEAD, and LEFT YOU DEAD, all published in the UK by Pan Macmillan. As reported in Bookbrunch, Peter joked  ‘I'm glad I've been doing some strength work in the gym’ as he accepted the framed certifications.

Other authors to have their work celebrated by the awards include Elif Shafak, Sally Rooney and Richard Osman. You can view  the full list of winners and prizes here.

Andre Breedt, managing director of Nielsen BookData, said: ‘We are thrilled to be able to host these awards once again in person and celebrate the success of authors and the teams that support them… The Bestseller Awards are unique, recognising the achievement of any author across all genres by the ultimate measurement, book sales.’

Peter received an Honorary Platinum Award in 2018, for selling over five million copies of his Roy Grace series in the UK over ten years.

The latest instalment of the Roy Grace series, STOP THEM DEAD, was published in September 2023 and went straight to Number 5 in the Sunday Times Bestseller chart after just three days on sale.It will be out in paperback on 25 April 2024. Peter’s next novel, THEY THOUGHT I WAS DEAD, will be published as a lead hardback in May 2024 by Pan Macmillan and reveals the astonishing reasons behind Sandy Grace’s sudden disappearance.

About Peter James

Photo credit: Mark Dixon

Peter James is the international bestselling author of many award-winning novels, repeatedly occupying the Number One slot on the Sunday Times bestseller charts in both hardback and paperback. Peter writes both thriller standalones and the hugely popular Brighton-set GRACE series, now adapted for ITV. Peter was featured in the launch podcast of the Queen’s Reading Room in January 2024, having had the Grace series featured on the Royal Reading Room previously.

Peter’s books have been translated into thirty-eight languages, with worldwide sales of over twenty-one million copies and his Detective Superintendent Roy Grace series, set in Brighton, has given him nineteen Sunday Times Number Ones. In 2015 WH Smith customers voted him the Greatest Crime Author of All Time and in 2016 he was awarded the coveted CWA Diamond Dagger, a lifetime  achievement award for sustained excellence. Peter James has also written two books based on true crime stories, with former senior detective Graham Bartlett, with a newly expanded edition of BABES IN THE WOOD re-issued in January 2024.

Successful nationwide tours of the stage plays of THE PERFECT MURDER (2014), DEAD SIMPLE (2015), NOT DEAD ENOUGH (2017), THE HOUSE ON COLD HILL (2019), LOOKING GOOD DEAD (2022), and WISH YOU WERE DEAD (2023) have packed theatres in dozens of British cities, and garnered magnificent reviews. Several other Peter James novels are optioned for film and in further development.

Praise for Peter James

‘Peter James is one of the best crime writers in the business’ – Karin Slaughter

‘Probably the closest we’ll get to a British Stephen King’ – The Financial Times

‘Meticulous research gives his prose great authenticity’ – Sunday Express

‘Peter James has penetrated the inner workings of police procedures, and the inner thoughts and attitudes of real detectives, as no English crime writer before him.’ – The Times

‘Peter James is one of the most fiendishly clever crime fiction plotters’ – Daily Mail

‘In my thirty-four years of policing, never have I come across a writer who so accurately depicts “The Job’’ – Detective Investigator Pat Lanigan, Office of the District Attorney, NYPD

‘One of the most consistently readable crime writers.’ – Daily Mail          

‘A master plotter’ – The Bookseller

Visit Peter’s website

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ROY GRACE TAKES THE BESTSELLER LISTS BY STORM: DEAD IF YOU DON’T REACHES NUMBER ONE

Internationally acclaimed author Peter James has his thirteenth consecutive number one as the latest novel in his riveting Roy Grace series, DEAD IF YOU DON’T, shot to the top of the bestseller lists in its first week of sales. DEAD IF YOU DON’T was published in hardback and ebook by Pan Macmillan on 17 May. The launch was held at the Amex Brighton and Hove Football stadium, a fitting location, as the novel begins right there… In Heat magazine, Isabelle Broom praised DEAD IF YOU DON’T as ‘a galloping riot of entertainment and action’ and it grips from the very first pages.

Kipp Brown, successful businessman and compulsive gambler, is having the worst run of luck of his life. He’s beginning to lose, big style. However, taking his teenage son, Mungo, to their club’s Saturday afternoon football match should have given him a welcome respite, if only for a few hours. But it’s at the stadium where his nightmare begins. Within minutes of arriving at the game, Kipp bumps into a client. He takes his eye off Mungo for a few moments, and in that time, the boy disappears. Then he gets the terrifying message that someone has his child, and to get him back alive, Kipp will have to pay.

Defying instructions not to contact the police, Kipp reluctantly does just that, and Detective Superintendent Roy Grace is brought in to investigate. At first it seems a straightforward case of kidnap. But rapidly Grace finds himself entering a dark, criminal underbelly of the city, where the rules are different and nothing is what it seems . . .

Peter was a guest on various radios shows in the run up to the publication of DEAD IF YOU DON’T and appeared on London Live TV’s arts news programme to discuss his new novel and his time out with the Met. He was a featured author for this year’s Crimefest and visited Waterstones on Jersey’s Queen Street to talk about DEAD IF YOU DON’T in conversation with BBC presenter Cathy Le Feuvre. He’ll be appearing at the Jersey Festival in September, among other festivals in the year ahead. Visit The Bookseller’s Pictures of the Week to see Peter hosting booksellers in Brighton ahead of the DEAD IF YOU DON’T launch.

DEAD IF YOU DON’T has already been snapped up in Russia by Eksmo and Minerva in Finland. Rights to Peter’s riveting thriller ABSOLUTE PROOF, in which a mysterious phone call pulls an investigative journalist into the search to find proof of God’s existence, have also been bought by international publishers. ABSOLUTE PROOF is set to be published by Macmillan in October, with a major campaign. Fans of Peter James can look forward to more compelling Roy Grace cases as Pan Macmillan have also acquired rights for three further titles.

Peter James is one of the UK’s most treasured crime and thriller novelists. He has won numerous awards for his gripping crime novels, including the coveted 2016 CWA Diamond Dagger for sustained excellence, and an Honorary Platinum Award at the Specsavers Bestseller Awards, powered by Nielsen Book.  He was publicly voted by WH Smith – Britain's biggest book selling chain – The Best Crime Author of All Time. The Roy Grace detective novels have sold over 19 million copies worldwide and are now published in 37 territories. His last Roy Grace NEED YOU DEAD went straight in at No. 1 in the paperback bestseller charts in October 2017 and stayed in the top 10 for nine weeks. Many of his books have also been adapted for the stage, with his standalone chiller THE HOUSE ON COLD HILL up next in 2019 – see more and book here!

Visit Peter’s website

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Praise for DEAD IF YOU DON’T:

‘Chief superintendent Roy Grace is back – and we think this could be his most exciting storyline yet…a galloping riot of entertainment and action, with heaps of dark humour thrown in.’ — Isabelle Broom, Heat

‘As ever, James may be dealing with familiar material, but always manages to render it afresh, his narrative (here involving the kidnapped son of a successful businessman) is made tauter by the adroit characterisation of the principal participants.’ — Barry Forshaw, Crime Time

‘I love the Roy Grace series of books and have read every single one of them…I loved the storyline…It’s absolutely wonderful to have Roy Grace back and is like welcoming back an old friend! …it is fantastic when the action is forefront as it is so cleverly written.  The plot was well researched and well described and it was nail-bitingly filled with suspense and tension! I completely and utterly loved it.  It is Roy Grace and, of course, Peter James at his best.  It had me hooked from page one to the very end.  Highly, highly recommended!  Roll on Roy for book number 15!’ — Stardust Book Reviews

ROY GRACE IS BACK: DEAD IF YOU DON’T BY PETER JAMES OUT TOMORROW!

Roy Grace is about to be tested as he faces his most complex case yet in DEAD IF YOU DON’T, the fourteenth novel in the gripping series by CWA Diamond Dagger award-winning author Peter James, published tomorrow in hardback and ebook with Pan Macmillan. Tonight the launch of the much-anticipated new Roy Grace novel will be celebrated at the Amex Brighton and Hove Football stadium, a venue particularly relevant to the novel…

When the son of a high profile businessman is kidnapped at a football stadium, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace is pulled into the city’s dark dealings as he searches for the culprit.

Kipp Brown, successful businessman and compulsive gambler, is having the worst run of luck of his life. He’s beginning to lose, big style. However, taking his teenage son, Mungo, to their club’s Saturday afternoon football match should have given him a welcome respite, if only for a few hours. But it’s at the stadium where his nightmare begins.

Within minutes of arriving at the game, Kipp bumps into a client. He takes his eye off Mungo for a few moments, and in that time, the boy disappears. Then he gets the terrifying message that someone has his child, and to get him back alive, Kipp will have to pay.

Defying instruction not to contact the police, Kipp reluctantly does just that, and Detective Superintendent Roy Grace is brought in to investigate. At first it seems a straightforward case of kidnap. But rapidly Grace finds himself entering a dark, criminal underbelly of the city, where the rules are different and nothing is what it seems . . .

In the run up to the release of DEAD IF YOU DON’T Peter has been a guest on various radio shows including BBC Radio Northampton, BBC Radio Jersey and BBC Radio Devon, and yesterday appeared on London Live TV’s arts news programme to discuss his latest novel and his experiences out with the Met. He will be attending signings at various stores in England on May 17 and 18 to celebrate the publication of DEAD IF YOU DON’T.

DEAD IF YOU DON’T has already been snapped up in Russia by Eksmo and Minerva in Finland. Rights to Peter’s riveting thriller ABSOLUTE PROOF, in which a mysterious phone call pulls an investigative journalist into the search to find proof of God’s existence, have also been bought by international publishers. ABSOLUTE PROOF is set to be published by Macmillan in October, with a major campaign. Fans of Peter James can look forward to more compelling Roy Grace cases as Pan Macmillan have also acquired rights for three further titles.

Peter James is one of the UK’s most treasured crime and thriller novelists. He has won numerous awards for his gripping crime novels, including the coveted 2016 CWA Diamond Dagger for sustained excellence, and an Honorary Platinum Award at the Specsavers Bestseller Awards, powered by Nielsen Book.  He was publicly voted by WH Smith – Britain's biggest book selling chain – The Best Crime Author of All Time. The Roy Grace detective novels have sold over 19 million copies worldwide and are now published in 37 territories. The best-selling detective series has dominated the charts, with 12 consecutive Sunday Times No.1s.  His last Roy Grace NEED YOU DEAD went straight in at No. 1 in the paperback bestseller charts in October 2017 and stayed in the top 10 for nine weeks.

Visit Peter’s website

Follow Peter on Twitter

Subscribe to Peter’s Youtube channel

Praise for Peter James:

‘As with all Peter James novels, it is not just an individual cop or storyline that impresses but the excellence of the ensemble’ — The Times

‘Peter James is one of the best crime writers in the business’ — Lee Child

‘Peter James is one of the most fiendishly clever crime fiction plotters.’ — The Daily Mail

‘Fast-paced and gripping...’ — Jessica Hamzelou, New Scientist

‘Peter James is one of the best crime writers in the business’ — Karin Slaughter