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Kathryn Stockett and Janet Evanovich become Kindle million-sellers

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Kathryn Stockett, author of ‘The Help,’ and Janet Evanovich, known for her popular mystery series, have both joined the Kindle million-seller club, Amazon announced Tuesday.

The Kindle million-seller club are those authors whose books have sold more than 1 million Kindle e-book copies.

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So far, it’s a pretty small club. Steig Larsson was the first to cross the 1-million Kindle ebook mark first, followed by thriller-writer James Patterson and romance maven Nora Roberts. Then came Charlaine Harris, author of the Sookie Stackhouse books, which are the basis for the HBO vampire series ‘True Blood.’ Lee Child, Suzanne Collins and Michael Connelly are also million-sellers. Independent author John Locke was the first to become a Kindle million-seller without the support of a major publisher.

For Stockett, joining the Kindle million-seller club means just one thing: ‘The Help’ has sold that many Kindle ebooks. It’s her only book -- Stockett had a hard time finding a publisher -- and it has been a long-lived bestseller in both hardcover and paperback. Last week, the film adaptation was released; the movie came in second at the box office over the weekend and, apparently, sparked the interest of Kindle owners who hadn’t yet purchased the book.

Evanovich has many more books behind her: The Stephanie Plum novels are numbered -- ‘One for the Money, ‘ ‘Two for the Dough,’ up to ‘Smokin’ Seventeen,’ and she’s written a number of other books, too. It may make for a difficult schedule for a writer to be wrapped up in a popular series, publishing a book a year or more, but it also makes for a big body of popular work. That’s what’s helped Lee Child and James Patterson make the million-seller list: a deep backlist of books readers want to have on the Kindle, books they might have missed the first time around or have in another format.

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Notably absent from the Kindle million-seller club is Stephenie Meyer. The ‘Twilight’ author was among the first five authors to reach 500,000 Kindle ebook sales last July, but the other authors have continued on to sell more than 1 million, while she has not. At least, not yet.

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Charlaine Harris sells 1 million Kindle ebooks

-- Carolyn Kellogg

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