Alta Journal’s California Bestsellers List (October 12, 2022)

Alta Journal, with reporting from the California Independent Booksellers Alliance, brings you a handy list of the bestselling titles at independent bookstores across Northern and Southern California for the week ending October 9, 2022.

Celeste Ng’s highly anticipated dystopian novel, Our Missing Hearts, debuts on our list just one week after it was published. The book follows Bird Gardner as he confronts economic instability and anti-Asian sentiment. If you’re drawn to these topics, you may also like Your House Will Pay, by Steph Cha, one of our California Book Club’s recent selections. And Nobelist Annie Ernaux’s book of diary entries, Getting Lost, makes its first appearance in this week’s rankings. In it, the French author shares passages that she wrote while having a secret love affair with a Russian diplomat. You can read more about her writing and her winning the Nobel Prize in Literature from Alta books editor David L. Ulin in the Los Angeles Times.

For a full list of titles and categories, visit the California Independent Booksellers Alliance.•

Southern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

Alta

1. Our Missing Hearts, Celeste Ng, Penguin Press, $29
2. The Golden Enclaves, Naomi Novik, Del Rey, $28
3. Lucy by the Sea, Elizabeth Strout, Random House, $28
4. Less Is Lost, Andrew Sean Greer, Little, Brown, $29. Read the Alta review
5. Horse, Geraldine Brooks, Viking, $28

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

Alta

1. Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America, Maggie Haberman, Penguin Press, $32
2. I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette McCurdy, Simon & Schuster, $27.99
3. Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Henry Holt and Co., $28.99
4. Life’s Work: A Memoir, David Milch, Random House, $28
5. Crying in H Mart: A Memoir, Michelle Zauner, Knopf, $26.95

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

Alta

1. Cloud Cuckoo Land, Anthony Doerr, Scribner, $20
2. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Washington Square Press, $17
3. It Ends with Us, Colleen Hoover, Atria Books, $16.99
4. The Thursday Murder Club, Richard Osman, Penguin Books, $17
5. The Man Who Died Twice, Richard Osman, Penguin Books, $17

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

Alta

1. My Body, Emily Ratajkowski, Metropolitan Books, $16.99
2. Getting Lost, Annie Ernaux, Alison L. Strayer (translator), Seven Stories Press, $18.95
3. The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom, Don Miguel Ruiz, Amber-Allen Publishing, $12.95
4. Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law, Mary Roach, W.W. Norton & Company, $16.95
5. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99

Northern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

Alta

1. Our Missing Hearts, Celeste Ng, Penguin Press, $29
2. Lucy by the Sea, Elizabeth Strout, Random House, $28
3. Less Is Lost, Andrew Sean Greer, Little, Brown, $29. Read the Alta review
4. Horse, Geraldine Brooks, Viking, $28
5. Fairy Tale, Stephen King, Scribner, $32.50

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

Alta

1. Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America, Maggie Haberman, Penguin Press, $32
2. I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette McCurdy, Simon & Schuster, $27.99
3. What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions, Randall Munroe, Riverhead Books, $30
4. Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Henry Holt and Co., $28.99
5. Solito: A Memoir, Javier Zamora, Hogarth Press, $28

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

Alta

1. Cloud Cuckoo Land, Anthony Doerr, Scribner, $20
2. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Washington Square Press, $17
3. It Ends with Us, Colleen Hoover, Atria Books, $16.99
4. The Sentence, Louise Erdrich, Harper Perennial, $18
5. Where the Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, $18

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

Alta

1. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
2. Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law, Mary Roach, W.W. Norton & Company, $16.95
3. The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, Bessel van der Kolk, MD, Penguin Books, $19
4. Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Milkweed Editions, $20
5. Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest, Suzanne Simard, Vintage, $17

Source: California Independent Booksellers Alliance

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