Reading the trends

USA TODAY, January, 2006 by Jacqueline Blais and Anthony DeBarros

Young readers had a huge influence on USA TODAY's Best-Selling Books list during 2005. And so did two imports from Japan: sudoku and manga. Jacqueline Blais and Anthony DeBarros take a look at five trends that helped define books in the year just past.

Youth will be served

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince led a charge of children's and youth titles that helped the category take 20% of sales tracked by USA TODAY in 2005, the highest percentage since the list began 12 years ago. That's probably not surprising, given America'sbaby boomlet of the late 1980s and 1990s.

Particularly hot: books with movie tie-ins.

Top five kids' books that became movies in 2005: 1 The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe C.S. Lewis 2 The...