I recently stated that I believe that interest in series books is on the decline. I see less interest in the books I sell, and I must price them lower and lower to get them to sell.
I looked at the traffic statistics to series-books.com for the last 10 years. I took screen captures of the graphs of total monthly traffic to the main page of the site and to some of the major series sections. Some sections were added to the site years later, which is why some graphs show nothing towards the left side. Click on any image to see a larger version.
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| Main Page of Series-Books.com |
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| Nancy Drew Section |
The main page of the Nancy Drew section has had a sharper drop in traffic than any other page on the site. This actually surprised me, especially the drop that has occurred in the last six to seven months. Look at the right edge of the graph. This is deeply concerning. I have been correct to be worried about the future longevity of Nancy Drew.
I find it curious that the drop in interest began at about the time that the Nancy Drew Diaries series debuted. In my opinion, the mismanagement of the Nancy Drew Diaries has damaged the Nancy Drew franchise. The last new Nancy Drew game was released in 2015, and the lack of new games has also caused a decrease in interest in Nancy Drew.
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| Beverly Gray Section |
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| Cherry Ames Section |
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| Connie Blair Section |
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| Dana Girls Section |
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| Page with List of Nancy Drew Titles |
People still need to look at lists of Nancy Drew titles, so this page has not seen a sharp drop.
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| Judy Bolton Section |
2 comments:
I'm one of the people switching to e-books. I just don't have the storage space for print books. But I've found the Series Books website a really valuable source of information. So, thank you very much, Jennifer. I appreciate your efforts. I was recently, for example, delighted to complete my e-book collection of Linda Carlton. Without your website, I don't think I'd have known the titles of all the Linda Carlton books, or even how many books there are in the series.
Jennifer, I don't know if you have been told this, but sometimes, there is a page when I have tried to enter the website, saying it is a risk, and I have to click a button to continue. However, since I got a new computer a couple of months ago, I have not seen that page. I don't know if anyone else has seen that, or if it just stopped, but I'm not sure why it would do that.
I have also been viewing your blog for a while, and completely agree with you about the mismanagement of the Nancy Drew series. I believe it began to start being mismanaged when they ended the original series in 2003, and began the Girl Detective series. But I don't believe any damage was done until the trilogies began. I think that the Diaries' inconsistent tone and direction has also been a problem (although I hear there is a new editor, so maybe there's hope it will change). I think the games are beginning to come back into the public eye - I've seen more and more articles about them online, and I think the trend of the YouTube walkthroughs have given them some more attention. But I think the CBS pilot (which I did not care for anyway) was another blow.
I love your website, though, and it has brought me to the attention of a wide range of series books. I particularly became fond of the Dana Girls and Ken Holt series. My mother gave me her Trixie Belden collection, and both of us were surprised to find out there were 39 in the series (she had #1-10 and 15 in the 70s paperback). I - and many others - are very thankful for your time and dedication to the website.
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