Julia Child Book Sales Sizzle After 'Julie & Julia' Movie

Aug. 12, 2009— -- Julia Child's boeuf bourguignon will likely debut on more and more dinner tables long bereft of the culinary legend's French cuisine recipes. And booksellers -- not to mention Child's charity -- couldn't be happier.

Seeing the film "Julie & Julia" -- about Child, played by Meryl Streep, and the blogger who tried to cook all 524 recipes in Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" -- has stirred legions of new fans to send copies of Child's seminal culinary tome and related books flying off store shelves.

"Mastering the Art of French Cooking," which was co-authored by Louisette Bertholle and Simone Beck and first published in 1961, and now in its 49th printing, shot to the No. 1 spot on Amazon.com's list of Top 100 best-sellers over the weekend and held the top spot on Barnes & Noble's online best-seller list Tuesday.

"She seemed much more real to me after I saw the movie," said James Kittredge, 29, who plans to buy Child's memoir, "My Life in France."

The Arizona man already owns "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" -- an old edition passed on by his parents -- but the film, he said, inspired him to take a new interest in its recipes, including that now-famous beef dish.

In the film, he said, "the food just looked so beautiful."

In the week ending on Aug. 9 -- the movie's opening was Aug. 7 -- 11,000 copies of "Mastering" were sold while sales for "My Life in France", which was co-written with Alex Prud'Homme, totaled 25,000, according to data released this morning by Nielsen BookScan. "My Life" now ranks at No. 5 on BookScan's list of top ten selling adult nonfiction books.

To keep up with demand, the publisher Random House has ordered three new printings of the hardcover cookbook in the last three weeks as well as new printings of "My Life" and the cookbook "Julia's Kitchen Wisdom," for a total of about a million books.

Royalties from book sales will go to the Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts, which supports culinary education programs and scholarships, among other causes. Since Child's death in 2004, the foundation has accrued roughly $250,000 in royalties but the spike in book sales should mean a new windfall for the group.

Foundation coordinator Susy Davidson, who met Child in France some 30 years ago, said she's thrilled not just with the prospect of more revenues, but with the "breathtaking" idea that more people will be following Child's advice on cooking.

"The numbers would say that people sense relevance in their own lives now," she said.