In the past decade, Sweden has become synonymous with crime fiction. But, according to Jonas Axelsson, founder and CEO of Stockholm’s Partners in Stories Literary Agency, the market has shown encouraging and not-so-encouraging developments in recent months. One dark spot has been layoffs at two of Sweden’s major houses, as roughly 25 employees were let go at both Bonniers and Norstedts. However, Sweden’s largest book chain, Akademibokhandeln (which is part of the same media group as Norstedts), reported earnings for the year, which, Axelsson notes, marks the first time the company has been profitable in a number of years.

The slow emergence of e-books and the absence of Amazon remain two oft-discussed topics among book professionals. “Since we don’t have Amazon in Scandinavia, we are almost waiting for them to turn up,” Axelsson says. Also, as sales of the paperback format have declined steadily, Axelsson says people are concerned about how e-books will fit into the equation. The question, he says, comes down to: “How do we create the boost for the e-book, since we know that we can’t do much at all for the paperback?”

While crime fiction is still the top-selling category in Sweden, Axelsson notes that some big-name crime authors—like Liza Marklund and Camilla Lackberg—are seeing a slight drop in sales. A genre of fiction referred to as “feel good” is generating massive sales, however. Jonas Jonasson’s The Hundred Year Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared has sold nearly seven million copies worldwide. Fredrik Backman’s A Man Called Ove, a book which is represented by Axelsson, has sold more than 1.5 million copies worldwide.

Looking ahead to London, Axelsson says that, for the first time, Partners in Stories will attend the fair with a fully translated manuscript in English.

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