The Size of the World

Jay Caselberg links to a RWA compilation of industry statistics:

SF/Fantasy is 6.4% of popular fiction sales
Mystery/Detective/Suspense is 29.6%
Romance is 39.3%

Of course, the site doesn't define "popular fiction" anywhere, or state its size relative to unpopular fiction. It also doesn't say anything about non-fiction, which (depending on how its defined -- do you include college texts and elhi books?) is either somewhat larger than the universe of fiction or massively larger.

Still, it puts us in perspective.

(Oh, and Fantasy is about 2/3rds of that 6.4%, if you're keeping notes.)