So you want to write a book that will sell

I've mentioned PaperBackSwap.com before. Today it crossed my mind to do a little comparison of the used books that are for trade. Here are the figures: Romance, 20,000 - Mystery, 10,000 - Religion and Science Fiction both around 5,000 - Westerns and History and horror all around 1,000, and science at 600. Just thought it interesting. The most widely read genre is romance by far.

My mom and my aunt read these by the dozen. I think they are just soft porn (heh,heh). My aunt was telling me about this one writer who spoke 7 languages, grew up in Scotland, went to Swiss boarding school and now was a fashion designer in Brazil (in addition to turning out 4-5 books a year). I'll bet $5 that this writer is some old man in Cleveland with a fat bank account writing as fast as his fingers can fly.