Literature Brand, Capus and Suter sold best in 2024
Crime thrillers and novels by Swiss authors were the most frequently purchased books in the 2024 book year. In the top 10 are Christine Brand, Alex Capus, Martin Suter, Silvia Götschi, Zora del Buono and Philippe Gurt. These are the bestsellers of 2024.
03.01.2025, 10:58
SDA
The fate of a mother who disappeared without a trace on her son's fifth birthday was the most popular story among the Swiss reading public in 2024. "Vermisst - Der Fall Anna" by Christine Brand is the first volume in her new cold case series and is number one in the hardcover fiction category of the annual bestseller list presented by the Swiss Booksellers and Publishers Association (SBVV) for German-speaking Switzerland at the turn of the year.
Following the publication of her crime novel on April 24, Christine Brand from Bern went straight to number one on the weekly bestseller list, displacing Martin Suter from Zurich and his "Allmen und Herr Weynfeldt" in second place. Brand then remained in the top ten for 18 weeks and among the best-selling twenty books for a further eight weeks.
Christine Brand is followed in the annual bestseller list by Alex Capus from Olten with "Das kleine Haus am Sonnenhang", in which he incorporates a great deal of autobiographical material. The first-person narrator deals with questions about writing in an amusing way and philosophizes about the small and big happiness in life.
Swiss books very popular
The 2024 reading public was generally impressed by authors from their own country: seven of the top ten places on the annual bestseller list were occupied by Swiss books. They were written by six authors. Martin Suter is represented twice: "Melody", the number one from 2023, makes it to eighth place in 2024, while his crime thriller "Allmen and Mr. Weynfeldt" takes fourth place in the annual bestseller list. "We are very pleased that the public is turning to literature written in this country given the huge selection on the book market, and even more pleased to see this year's Swiss Book Prize at the top of the annual bestsellers," says Tanja Messerli, Managing Director of the SBCA, to the Keystone-SDA news agency.
After all, while crime novels, especially those with local color, are a sure bet with the reading public and thus in the bestseller lists year after year, the Swiss Book Prize is no guarantee of good sales. In 2024, however, the opinion of the Book Prize jury and the public's taste seem to overlap. Zora del Buono is in seventh place among the year's bestsellers. In her novel "Seinetwegen", she processes her own family history and the early accidental death of her father into a novel that impresses with its essayistic and nuanced reflections.
In the previous year 2023, "only" four Swiss made it into the top ten. They secured top places again in the following year, 2024: In addition to Suter, these are the prolific writers Silvia Götschi, Christine Brand and Philipp Gurt. The two German authors Sebastian Fitzek and Jean-Luc Bannalec were also in the top ten in 2023. Fitzek's psychological thriller "The Calendar Girl" has now made it into third place; Bannalec's latest installment in his Brittany crime series, "Breton Desire", secured fifth place in 2024.
Two Swiss publishers in the top ten
Three of the ten best-selling books were published by Swiss publishers: Diogenes secured two places with Martin Suter, while Oktopus bei Kampa landed in ninth place with Philipp Gurt. In eleventh to twentieth place are two more Diogenes titles, Donna Leon and Martin Walker, and Kampa Verlag with another crime novel by Philipp Gurt.
And a small publisher surprisingly joins the big names: Zurich-based Bilgerverlag made it to 17th place in the annual bestseller rankings with Margrit Schriber's historical novel "Die Stickerin. "*
*This text by Maria Künzli, Keystone-SDA, was realized with the help of the Gottlieb and Hans Vogt Foundation.
