Stephenie Meyer

Two of the largest publishing houses have demonstrated again that when authors like Stephenie Meyer or Stieg Larsson become big phenomenons, big sales -- and big profits -- are the result.

Digital books have reached a tipping point. Today Amazon reported that for the first time, sales of Kindle e-books vastly surpassed hardcover books during the last quarter.

Most authors would kill to have 350,000 copies of a book sell in their lifetime, let alone within two days of publication. Stephanie Meyer isn't most authors, so that's why the concern for Bree Tanner's "slow" start.

Profits at Lagardere, the parent of the Hachette Book Group, have been buoyed for years by Stephenie Meyer's Twilight novels, but with no new books from Meyers, first-quarter earnings have taken a hit.

Of all the people who have been surprised by the success of the Twilight series of books, about a romance between a young heroine named Isabella "Bella" Swan, and a young vampire named Edward Cullen, no one is more surprised than the author. In a statement on her website, Twilight creator Stephanie...