Just a shuffle of titles on the overall bestseller list - nothing new that captures the interest of Chinese readers this week.

It's not that there's nothing out there - major literary authors from Yu Hua and Wang Anyi to A Lai and Jia Pingwa have all released new novels this year - but none of them are selling as well as international blockbusters and collections of edifying anecdotes.

The general non-fiction list, however, has seen some movement since the last time Danwei took a look at it. Pictured above is a new title on list this week. Porn for Panda (#10) by Shen Hongfei, is a collection of 80 essays originally written over several years for Shen's popular "Ideological Work" column in the magazine Sanlian Life Weekly. The titular essay discusses the "educational videos" shown to a panda in order to get her in the mating mood (see Danwei's post on the subject).

Also having to do with pandas is the series PandaMonium. This series of children's adventure stories is not on the bestseller list, but it is currently being advertised on the same page of The Beijing News. Essentially print versions of a popular television show now showing on CCTV's children's station, these books tell the story of the impending destruction of panda planet in far-off galaxy, some "magic beans", and a panda-angel who arrives to look for the "savior of the world." The pandas (watch the symbolism) are the product of joint venture between a Taiwanese company and a Japanese company, and the show is reportedly the first domestic Chinese cartoon to break through the Japanese market (most animation goes the other way).

No doubt this series will be appearing on the children's list in coming weeks.

Is it the summertime? Is it piracy? For whatever reason, "serious literature" is not selling well. The Beijing News quotes figures provided by the Beijing Book Building, one of the major bookstores in the city, showing daily sales of "literary novels." Yu Hua's new Brothers sells an average of 29 copies per day, while other novelists sell considerably less. Jia Pingwa's Shaanxi Opera (published in April) sells 15 copies per day, Pipi's Love Full Stop (pictured, July) and A Lai's Empty Mountain (April) sell 9, and Wang Anyi's new novel, published in May, sells just 2 copies per day despite the impending release of the movie adaptation of the author's bestselling Song of Everlasting Sorrow.

A Lai, whose award-winning The Dust Settles went from a first printing of 50,000 copies to current annual (legit) sales of 100,000, is philosophical about his new novel's prospects:

When Secret Shame, The Devil Soldiers I Know, and The Dust Settles were published, I said, "Don't talk to me about rankings. I want to see how influential they'll be in a decade." ..."I need the long term, not the short term."

His view of the market is, "China is a publishing superpower but not a reading superpower."

---

The general non-fiction list for the week of 8/13--8/19:

1. (1) My Normandy by Tang Shizeng: New work of photojournalism commemorating the 60th anniversary of victory in the war against fascism. (唐师曾, 《我的诺曼底》)
2. (2) About Going to Work by Zhu Deyong: See Overall List. (朱德庸,《关于上班这件事》)
3. (3) A Pitcher of Wine Among the Flowers by Li Ling. More anecdotal history. (李零, 《花间一壶酒》)
4. (5) Li Shutong Talks About Buddhism by Li Shutong: Early 20th century scholar, poet, oil painter, and musician. He lived in Tianjin, and became a Buddhist monk in 1918. (李叔同, 《李叔同说佛》)
5. (6) True Stories of the 12 Qing Emperors by Yan Chongnian: Popular history. (阎崇年,《正说清朝十二帝》)
6. (7) The Man Who Changed China by Lawrence Kuhn: The authorized bio of Jiang Zemin. (库恩,《他改变了中国》)
7. (4) Looking at the Moon From Honglou by Liu Xinwu: Essays on Dream of the Red Mansions. Serialized on Sina. (刘心武,《红楼望月》)
8. (9) Read Zen, Learn How to Live edited by Jin Yuejun. (金跃军,《读禅学做人》)
9. (10) 84 Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff. Newly translated this year. Serialized on Luyuan Study. (海莲·汉芙, 《查令十字街84号》)
10. (-) Porn for Panda by Shen Hongfei. Chinese title is "Pandas watch movies." (沈宏非, 《大熊猫看小电影》)

The overall bestseller list for the week of 8/13--8/19:

1. (1) Modern Chinese Dictionary (fifth edition), published by The Commercial Press. (《现代汉语词典》)
2. (3) The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown: For the past few months this novel has been a best-seller shared by the mainland, Taiwan, and the United States. Digital Fortress is a perennial on the fiction list, too. (丹·布郎,《达·芬奇密码》)
3. (2) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J. K. Rowling: British version. (J.K. 罗琳, 《哈利·波特与混血王子》)
4. (4) Wolf Totem by Jiang Rong: Another long-running best-seller, this loosely-plotted novel is being made into a movie (mentioned earlier on Danwei). (姜戎,《狼图腾》)
5. (8) A Night With No Adults edited by Liu Haitao. (刘海涛, 《没有大人的夜晚》)
6. (9) Light for a Book-Dream edited by Liu Haitao: subtitled One hundred stories to motivate middle school students. (刘海涛, 《书梦的灯》)
7. (5) My Normandy by Tang Shizeng: New work of photojournalism commemorating the 60th anniversary of victory in the war against fascism. (唐师曾, 《我的诺曼底》)
8. (7) About Going to Work by Zhu Deyong: The author is a cartoonist from Taiwan whose earlier work was the inspiration for the incredibly popular television series Pink Ladies. A sample of Work is available on Sina. (朱德庸,《关于上班这件事》)
9. (10) Rush to the Dead Summer by Guo Jingming (Danwei previously translated the title as 1995-2005 Not Yet Summer Solstice): Novel is serialized on Sina. (郭敬明,《1995-2005夏至未至》)
10. (6) Short Stories, Great Truths complete set. Classic parables with wisdom for today. (《小故事大道理全集》)

Bestseller rankings are taken from the Friday Book Review section in The Beijing News, which compiles its data from the city's major online and brick & mortar bookstores.