Hello,

I am doing book research and need a list of books that have been
best-sellers, maybe 10-20 books total. Here are the parameters:

1. They must have been non-fiction. Specifically, there can be no
fiction books, at all.

2. They MUST have been best-sellers only. Best-seller can mean in the
top 100 or so on a list, and not lower than 100.

3. Lists used can include LA Times, NY Times, USA Today, as well as
lesser-known lists. However, lists used must be credible, must reflect
US national popularity and sales of the books, and cannot be just some
non-expert's opinion of likes/dislikes.

4. The lists used should be within the last 10-15 years.

5. The subject is very narrow. The books MUST be substantially about
catastrophism, future earth changes, apocalyptic predictions for
Earth, Biblical visions of the end-times, cataclysmic events, etc.

6. The books may be secondarily about prophets like Edgar Cayce,
Nostradamus, John in the Book of Revelation, Gordon-Michael Scallion,
etc. If they are, they still should be primarily about catastrophism,
as in 4 above.

7. The books can be either scholarly or religious, or both. 

8. They may be either for or against the subject matter.

9. If possible, but not required: Please include estimates of number
of books sold for a given title, if you find such information during
the search.

Thank you,
Allen7633

I'm writing a book on this topic, so I have a fairly extensive
collection. Numbers of books sold is a very rare figure to find, and I
think answering your question in general is too difficult - there just
haven't been many best-sellers in your category. Some may have sold
well over a long-period of time, without ever peaking enough to be a
best-seller.

Here are some possibilities:

"Fingerprints of the Gods" by Graham Hancock was a No. 1 on the New
York best seller list, past cataclysms are the conclusion, but not
always the focus. The same can be said for the follow-up "Underworld",
which I believe sold well in the UK.

Richard W. Noone's - "5/5/2000 : Ice : The Ultimate Disaster" is
mentioned online as a best-seller. It has been on sale since 1980.

Rand and Rose Flem-Ath "When the Sky Fell"

DS Allan & JB Delair - "Cataclysm : Compelling Evidence of a Cosmic
Catastrophe in 9500 BC"

Fred Warshofsky - "Doomsday - The Science of Catastrophe"

John White - "Pole Shift"

Zecharia Sitchin - "The Twelfth Planet" 

Immanuel Velikovsky's - "World's in Collision" was a best-seller in 1950. 


Books on asteroid collisions or non-scientific prophecies don't
interest me much, so there could be one or two of those that sold
well.


robertskelton-ga
Google Answers Researcher

To: robertskelton-ga

Thanks for the info. It is clear that you have researched this already
on your own behalf somewhat. However, I'm not sure if I am reading
between your lines correctly. Several questions:

1. Is it possible that there are 10-15 best-sellers that you have not found?

2. Or are you quite certain that they do not exist?

3. Since the question is now unlocked, does that mean others cannot answer it?

I don't think evidence of being a best-seller (and on those topics) is
findable online. I doubt there have been 10 in the time period you
specified. The possibilities I listed are mostly that - the probable
highest selling on that topic that I have come across, but mostly they
are unlikely to make any general top 100.

Paperbacks that were best-sellers tend to proclaim it on the cover.
The only book I own (or have seen) on those topics with such a
proclamation is Hancock's "Fingerprints of the Gods".

There could be some best-selling books on asteroid collisions or
non-scientific prophecies, but none spring to mind. A search of Amazon
finds the following, but I've never seen it on a shelf in a bookstore:

Rogue Asteroids and Doomsday Comets : The Search for the Million
Megaton Menace That Threatens Life on Earth
by Duncan Steel (Author), Arthur C. Clarke 

I believe that there is plenty of potential for bestsellers on those
topics, with the right marketing combined with making the news with a
new theory. Books like 5/5/2000 can sell very well over a long period
of time without making best-seller lists.

Books most likely to sell well in the near future would be
sensationalist in nature (think Erich von Daniken) and focus on:

- an asteroid that has a chance of hitting Earth in our lifetime
- a super "earth changes" event featuring volcanoes, earthquakes and floods
- killer diseases like SARS (probably need a conspiracy theory)
- the Mayan doomsday of 2012

Nielsen Bookscan appears to be the best way to see best-sellers sorted
into categories:
http://www.bookscan.com/about.html

A book called "The Jupiter Effect" caused a sensation in the '70s. I
do not know what position it occupied on the bestseller lists, but I
remember that it was very widely discussed on radio and television and
around water-coolers.

"In 1974, John Gribbin and Stephen Plagemann published their book The
Jupiter Effect, which stated that in 1982 'all the planets will be
aligned on the same side of the Sun' (p. 101). As a result of a
complicated chain of related events, the authors predicted for 1982 a
very high sunspot maximum and great earthquakes affecting principally
the Los Angeles region."

http://www.csicop.org/si/8804/doomsday.html