Viral Bestsellers

Every few years this book goes viral again and we sell thousands in the span of a month and a half. It all started when a grandmother purchased copies for her grandchildren, only to come home and discover swear words, taking her outrage to the internet!

We published this book just as we went on tour and it suddenly went viral and sold out within three weeks, with posts everywhere from Entertainment Weekly to MTV but mostly being tweeted about daily. When the real Henry Rollins sold his LA home, comments in the LA Times joked that he was finally moving in with Glenn Danzig.

In the past four years, need for this title have gone through the roof and it's discovered everywhere from reproductive activists to preppers to people who still believe in freedom.

A topic that is very effective at making people uncomfortable, whispered about in far corners, this book has been sought out on the far corners of the underground for over three decades.

At the state fair, a browser declared this book offensive, turned it over, and declared the back even more inappropriate than the front. It's not for everyone but you know it when you see it.

Our first viral bestseller. We sold the first 6,000 copies one at a time via mailorder! Nearly 30 years later, we still see spates of this every few years as another viral post causes it to go viral all over again.

Nobody tells you when your author wins a James Beard Award, but the thousands of sudden orders were an indication that something was up.

In a time where it's easier to find misinformation than reliable facts, this book might be the most crucial one on this list.

In 2009, a non-political RFK Jr had written a blurb for this book. Boy are we glad that we cut it at the last minute. It was the following year that he began attacking vaccinations and science.

Once part of a micro community of back-to-the-land mobilists, our protagonists rose to infamy due to their suggestions of reading their "simplified spelling" with your handy magnifying glass and sharing their views on just about any social or practical circumstance they came across. Picked up immediately by Cool Tools (Whole Earth Catalog), these volumes have created wonder for thousands of readers.

A fascinating foray into the inner workings of the Strand union workers, confusingly showcased on display at Strand.

Featured on NPR Weekend Edition, our then-distributor failed to supply any outlets with books, causing it to sell out within minutes and creating the perception—to this day—that the book was out of print upon publication. An emotional nonfiction comic set in Ukraine.

A tool of speaking truth to power, this book takes a scientific art form and breaks it down into comics. Or as one author said recently "Every politician should be afraid of anyone with a silkscreen and a squeegee."

Organically emerging from the first "conference" for nonprofit bike repair coops, we've found greasy copies of this manual in hundreds of these repair shops and it always warms out hearts.

When this book came, it was like we pointed out something so obvious that nobody had noticed and the media maelstrom lasted for years and years, with many people still discovering it for the first time today.

A reverse astro-turfing campaign asking readers to write outrageous, negative reviews was wildly successful, enticing people into checking out this book.

The first edition sold out, moving one copy at a time. The authors went on to considerable success with larger publishers but this first book is a powerful capsule of their views on food and cycling.

Sometimes the concept is too awesome for your mind.

Unlike the protagonist, this book is wildly misunderstood. It's about our shared plight of appreciating Moz's work while finding each new revelation about the person more painful.

Championed by some awesome stores, this book was controversial for its view on an event that most Americans didn't even know had happened.

If you were there, you want to nitpick and find something you either didn't know or don't agree with.

A book about jazz for punks was inevitable to be a lightning rod. We are just mostly confused that the reviews are so largely positive. What gives?

When this book came out, hundreds of teachers flocked to our store to buy copies...to see if they were mentioned. Followed by posts and endorsements by Patton Oswalt and Jack Black!

To this day, I receive too many inquiries about what this bird is up to and people who say this is their favorite book.

A touching, charming winner of the Lambda Literary Award!

We can't figure out what is notable about it but the internet keeps asking if this book really exists or not.

One author served on a school board and was trolled and targeted for suggesting that you might make choices about how best to raise your own child. The conservatives want to sleep on it, so they claimed the word "Woke."

Never afraid to tackle sensitive topics, this real story of the American Splendor Family figuring out how to reclaim a child's self-image after an assault.