Iraq report selling slowly

“The Iraq Study Group Report: The Way Forward -- A New Approach,” published by Vintage last week, has sold 35,000 copies so far, according to Nielsen BookScan, a book-industry group that collects weekly sales data from chain stores, online sites, mass merchandisers and independent bookstores.

A Vintage spokesman said the publisher had 250,000 copies in print, but declined to say whether there were plans for further editions.

Retail sales of the slim, $10.95 paperback may be affected by the fact that more than 300,000 copies of the report were reportedly downloaded last week from the United States Institute of Peace website within hours of its release.

By comparison, the “9/11 Commission Report” issued in 2004 by W.W. Norton and Co. sold 1.5 million copies, according to the publisher. There were an estimated 1 million copies in print of Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr’s 1998 report on President Clinton within weeks of its release.