iPL2, a merger of the Internet Public Library (IPL) and the Librarians’ Internet Index (LII) has published a list of All-Time Bestselling Books and Authors. Visitors to this site are reminded that questions about bestselling books are basically unanswerable, since no one really knows which books have sold the most copies in history, as there are no records that cover all of history!

As such, any answer to questions like “What are the bestselling books of all time?” (or in our case, “What are the best selling audiobooks of all time?“) will essentially just be a “best guess” based upon estimates made by historians and other experts.

Nonetheless, we thought we’d include here the iPL2 list of All Time Bestselling Books and Authors, and add a link to all of the titles listed below that have an audio book equivalent listed in the www.AudioBookOne.net audio book catalog.

All Time Best Selling Books And Authors (source: iPL2)

1. The Bible

“No one really knows how many copies of the Bible have been printed, sold, or distributed. The Bible Society’s attempt to calculate the number printed between 1816 and 1975 produced the figure of 2,458,000,000. A more recent survey, for the years up to 1992, put it closer to 6,000,000,000 in more than 2,000 languages and dialects. Whatever the precise figure, the Bible is by far the bestselling book of all time.”

2. Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung (Little Red Book)

“Chairman Mao’s Little Red Book could scarcely fail to become a bestseller: between the years 1966 and 1971 it was compulsory for every Chinese adult to own a copy.”

3. American Spelling Book by Noah Webster

“First published in 1783, this reference book by the American man of letters Noah Webster (1758-1843) remained a bestseller in the U.S. throughout the 19th century.”

Note: Audio book listeners might be interested in The Meaning Of Everything by Simon Winchester, which serves up a lightning history of the English language and pays homage to the great dictionary makers from Samuel Johnson to Noah Webster before turning his unmatched talent for storytelling to the making of the most venerable of dictionaries – The Oxford English Dictionary.

4. The Guinness Book of Records

“First published in 1955, The Guinness Book of Records stands out as the greatest contemporary publishing achievement. There have now been 37 editions in the UK alone (it was not published annually until 1964), as well as numerous foreign-language editions.”

5. The McGuffey Readers by William Holmes McGuffey

“Published in numerous editions from 1853, some authorities have put the total sales of these educational textbooks, originally compiled by American anthologist William Holmes McGuffey (1800-73), as high as 122,000,000. It has also been claimed that 60,000,000 copies of the 1879 edition were printed, but – since this is some 10,000,000 more than the entire population of the U.S. at that time – the publishers must have been extremely optimistic about its success.”

6. A Message to Garcia by Elbert Hubbard

“Now forgotten, Hubbard’s polemic on the subject of labor relations was published in 1899 and within a few years had achieved these phenomenal sales, largely because many American employers purchased bulk supplies to distribute to their employees.”

7. The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care by Dr. Benjamin Spock

“Dr. Spock’s 1946 manual became the bible of infant care for subsequent generations of parents. Most of the sales have been of the paperback edition of the book.”

8. World Almanac

“Having been published annually since 1868 (with a break from 1876 to 1886), this wide-ranging reference book has remained a constant bestseller ever since.”

9. The Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann

“This tale of sex, violence, and drugs by Jacqueline Susann (1921-74), first published in 1966, is perhaps surprisingly the world’s bestselling novel. Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind, which has achieved sales approaching 28,000,000, is its closest rival.”

10. In His Steps: “What Would Jesus Do?” by Rev. Charles Monroe Sheldon

“Although virtually unknown today, American clergyman Charles Sheldon (1857-1946) achieved fame and fortune with this 1896 instructive religious treatise on moral dilemmas.”