IT MAY only have been October 1 to you.

But for Britain’s bookworms it was Super Thursday, the day when 800 new novels, biographies and celebrity musings hit the nation’s bookshops.

Constant readers – and you’d have to be to get through that lot – can take their pick from Peter Kay (new biography Saturday Night Peter), The Lost Symbol (Dan Brown’s everyday story of Masonic folk) and a new story about Winnie The Pooh.

Katherine Jennings, manager of Waterstone’s Bournemouth arcade branch, has spent days ripping the packaging off all the new releases.

“I’ve known about some of these since July, obviously, but it’s great to have them here in store,” she says.

But why are they all coming now?

According to Katherine – and the Nielsen monitoring service BookScan – over a third of all books sold in the UK will be purchased in the 12-week run-up to Christmas.

“It’s an important time for buying books, the nights start getting longer and people like to imagine curling up in front of the fire with a good story or the biography of someone they’re really interested in,” she says.

So what, or who, will we be curling up with?

According to the William Hill bookies – which has teamed up with Waterstone’s to allow the public to bet on which book they think will be the Christmas number one – Dan Brown’s Lost Symbol is still the favourite at 5/2.

Spokesman Graham Sharpe said: “ If there is to be a shock result, maybe Peter Kay, the second favourite, will provide it.”

Dan and Peter haven’t got it all to themselves, though.

Katherine says: “We’ve already had people coming in, saying they are starting their Christmas shopping and today one of the first books sold was Chris Evans’ autobiography It’s Not What You Think.”

She believes Ant and Dec’s book Ooh! What A Lovely Pair will be a giant hit, mainly because relatively little is known about the Geordie twosome and their fans will be interested to find out.

But supposing you want a real story?

Obviously there is Dan Brown but Katherine tips Stieg Larsson’s The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets’ Nest as a big seller.

“It’s the third one in his Millennium trilogy and will be brilliant,” she says.

And then, of course there is Stephenie Meyer’s New Moon, part of her Twilight vampire series and David Benedictus’s Return To The Hundred Acre Wood.

Katherine predicts that this new, authorised Winnie The Pooh story will be a major hit with nostalgic mums and dads. And news that William Hill rates it higher than the new Katie Price will surely gladden the traditional reader’s heart.