‘Something magical is happening’: sales boom for children’s comics creating young readers of the future

Publishers and analysts say popularity of genres like manga and superhero comics is a gateway into reading

The best route to learning to love words in print could well be pictures. This, at least, is the hope of the publishing industry this spring, as it welcomes news that sales of children's comics and graphic novels have reached an all-time peak of almost 20m in Britain.

While publishers and editors are celebrating this boom for its own sake, the popularity of these titles is also being hailed as a good omen for novels, ahead of the London Book Fair at Olympia this week. Over the last decade we've seen a significant rise in sales of graphic novels for both the adult and children's markets," said Philip Stone, media analyst at NielsenIQ BookData, as he revealed details of the latest trends, hits and flops this weekend.