A debut novel by a ferry clerk sits at the top of the city’s weekly fiction list. The book is set on the early boat, among commuters who know each other by their seats. The first printing sold through in nine days.
Booksellers said they had ordered cautiously, which is why several shops spent the week taking names for a second batch. The publisher has sent that batch to the printer and will not call it a bestseller until the reorder actually arrives.
What happens next
The author kept the morning shift. In a short note read at a bookshop off the landing, the writer said the novel was finished in a notebook between crossings, and that leaving the job to promote it would remove the only reason the book exists.
Reviews have been warmer about the passengers than about the plot. The author, asked about that, said the passengers were the plot.
Taj Today will update this report if the official numbers or the timetable change. Related coverage stays on the Entertainment page.
