Sandra Brown has first No. 1 debut

Here's a look at what's new on Paste BN's Best-Selling Books list…

Hitting the jackpot: Romantic suspense writer Sandra Brown has had 62 Paste BN best sellers, but she's never had a No. 1 debut until this week, as her new thriller Friction (Grand Central) lands in the top spot. (The full list will publish on Thursday.) She has had one other No. 1 best seller, Chill Factor, about a serial killer stalking women. But that book took a different path to No. 1, making its hardcover debut at No. 7 in August 2005. Factor hit No. 1 the following year, in July 2006, when the paperback was released.

Of course Friction arrives in a different world, in which e-books comprise a large part of sales. It's the story of Texas Ranger Crawford Hunt, whose battle for his 5-year-old daughter takes a dramatic turn when a gunman barges into the courtroom during a custody hearing. Our complicated hero saves Judge Holly Spencer from taking a bullet.

Run, Rabbit!: Two children's picture books are standing tall amid all the titles for grownups this week: The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep at No. 8, and The Day the Crayons Came Home at No. 17. The self-published Rabbit book, by Carl-Johan Forssén Ehrlin, is creating near-hysteria among shut-eye-deprived parents with its enticing subtitle: A New Way of Getting Children to Sleep. Roger the Rabbit and Uncle Yawn promise to provide true "bedtime" reading. (Does it work for adult insomniacs?)

The Day the Crayons Came Home by Drew Daywalt and Oliver Jeffers (Penguin) is a sequel to the colorful best seller The Day the Crayons Quit, which peaked at No. 34 last December. Home continues the adventures of a boy named Duncan and his not-always happy collection of Crayons. Timed to the publication of the sequel, Penguin Young Readers is partnering with the Crayon Collection, a charity initiative for repurposing millions of Crayons for children in need. Meanwhile, film rights for the first Crayons kids' book have been acquired by Universal.