Richard Osman’s The Last Devil to Die has thundered into the UK Official Top 50 number one spot, selling 146,919 copies in its first week of publication. Not only is this the author’s biggest single week of sales for any title to date, it is also the highest for any Adult Fiction title since Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman in July 2015. Only four fiction titles—Lee’s sequel, E L James’ Grey, and Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol and Inferno —have sold more copies in their launch weeks.

The Last Devil to Die is also the fastest-selling hardback fiction title by a British author since records began, surpassing The Bullet that Missed —which itself outsold J K Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy last year.

This comes as The Thursday Murder Club series’ global total crosses 10 million copies sold across all formats, according to the publisher’s own figures.

For The Bookseller, Richard comments: "All I can say is an enormous thank you to readers and to booksellers. I am absolutely blown away by this news, and I need to have a sit down now."

Juliet said: “The global success of Richard shows just how special this series is—combining fiendishly clever mysteries with humour and heart has proven to win over countries all over the world where he has hit numerous bestseller lists.”