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As for the UK, The Bookseller compiled and compared printand ebook charts by volume for 2012, resulting in a detailedoverview of the top 50 titles. For the first ten monthsof the year, ebooks accounted for some 13% to 14% of allbook sales in terms of units, but given their significantlylower retail prices, they accounted for a more modest 6%to 7% of revenues. The really interesting findings from thechart come not from the very top segment, which is, asexpected, dominated by the Fifty Shades of Grey (withebook volumes between 1.6 and 1 million units) and HungerGames (between 300,000 and 400,000 units), but fromthe following ranks. J.K. Rowling sold a comparatively low59,413 digital copies (and slightly fewer than 400,000 inprint) in the 52 weeks to 29 December. How much ebooksales differ by genre and by reader age is well illustratedby romantic fiction author Jojo Moyes, whose new book,Me Before You (ranked 22 in print), sold 279,349 copies inprint against a stunning 207,000 in digital. By contrast,266,177 print copies of the autobiography of rock legendRod Stewart, ranked 23 in print, were shipped to fans,compared to 19,057 in digital (“Bestselling books of 2012,”The Bookseller, January 11, 2013).Still, with all the possible oddities caused by the limiteddata pool behind this analysis, it becomes clear that, atleast in the early stages of an emerging ebook market, asmall number of smash hits can exert incredible control.However, the exceptions to this rule should not escape theobserver.In Germany, for instance, self-published author Jonas Winnermanaged to get two of his Berlin Gothic titles in the top20 and in several markets, a few companies (some reposiitionedold houses and some newly created specificallyfor the digital challenges ahead) are succeeding in thetough game.Some medium-sized houses opted early to have a role indigital publishing, such as Gallimard in France, Oetinger inGermany and Grupo editoriale Mauri Spagnol (GeMS) inItaly. In the Netherlands, De Arbeiderspers | A.W. Bruna Uitgeversdeveloped a relevant (and in various regards innovative)role in the ebook sector for its old brand.2012 has also seen the ascent of several new brands or oldhouses with a new, decidedly innovative emphasis on digitalpublishing, which is again reflected by the presence oftheir titles in the top segment. Examples include BasteiLübbe in Germany, a publishing company founded in1949, mostly known for their pulp literature in the subgenresof romance, crime, and the Wild West but recentlytransformed into one of the leading digital houses for variouskinds of popular literature in digital formats —a conversioncomparable to that of Canadian Harlequin.In Spain, the literary press Ediciones B of Barcelona optedto create a new company in 2011, B de Books, a digital-onlypublisher that releases 300 ebooks (of which 250 are newreleases) plus four apps per year, aggressively priced between€1.99 and a maximum of €9.99, without DRM.The rejection of DRM aligns B de Books with the FrenchNumeriklivre, another 100 percent digital publisher, specializingin romance, science fiction, fantasy, young adultliterature, and essays.For nonfiction, the French Marabout, founded in 1949 anda leader in gardening, practical advice, and self-help books,is committed greatly to extending its reach into digitalmarkets.All three companies have found a way to compete directlyand successfully with the big houses for the nascent e-reading audiences in languages other than English, and itwill be of high interest to follow the market presence ofthese and similar innovative ventures in the near future.Self-publishingAs recently as the summer of 2011, a headline such as thefollowing could still appear: “German Self-Publishing,Where Innovation Meets Angst,” pointing to the country’saversion to risk (Amanda DeMarco, Publishing Perspectives,August 4, 2011). A year later, an initially self-publishedtitle, Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James (albeit now in anedition published by Random House) was by far the definingbook event of 2012 in Germany just as almost anywhereelse, and a German self-published author made theheadlines with Liebe, Sex und andere Katastrophen—Meineabenteuerliche Suche nach dem Mann fürs Leben (Love, Sexand Other Catastrophes—My Adventurous Quest for the Manof My Life), a book that blends well in the current flood ofromance fiction. A mere 20,000 ebook copies sold at €3.49were enough to generate broad media coverage exploringthe new model for success. “Never had it been easier topublish a book” was the new gospel sung by mainstreammedia such as Der Spiegel (Mein Verlag und ich July 17,2012).The Angst article and the bestselling Love, Sex, and OtherCatastrophes book originated at epubli, the print-ondemandand self-publishing platform of the Holtzbrinckgroup, Germany’s second-largest publishing venture, butThe Global eBook Report 93