Alta Journal’s California Bestsellers List (May 17, 2023)

With reporting from the California Independent Booksellers Alliance, Alta Journal brings you a list of the bestselling titles at independent bookstores across Northern and Southern California for the week ending May 14, 2023.

Tom Hanks’s novel, The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece, illustrated by R. Sikoryak, debuts on the list this week. Hanks opens his book in 1947, when a troubled war veteran meets his five-year-old nephew and leaves a lasting impression on him. In 1970, the child has become a successful Oakland-based artist drawing comic books of his heroic uncle (one of which is picked up by a successful movie director, who brings it to life). Another book making its first appearance on the list this week is Bay Curious: Exploring the Hidden True Stories of the San Francisco Bay Area, by Olivia Allen-Price, the editor and host of KQED’s podcast of the same name. With 49 entries, Bay Curious answers all your Bay Area–related questions, from why ships are buried in downtown San Francisco to where the word hella was created.

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

Southern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. The Covenant of Water, Abraham Verghese, Grove Press, $32
2. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin, Knopf, $28
3. Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus, Doubleday, $29
4. Happy Place, Emily Henry, Berkley, $27
5. Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver, Harper, $32.50

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Doubleday, $30
2. The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin, Penguin Press, $32
3. I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette McCurdy, Simon & Schuster, $27.99
4. Walking with Sam: A Father, a Son, and Five Hundred Miles Across Spain, Andrew McCarthy, Grand Central Publishing, $28
5. Don’t Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You: A Memoir, Lucinda Williams, Crown, $28.99

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Trust, Hernan Diaz, Riverhead Books, $17
2. The Last Thing He Told Me, Laura Dave, Marysue Rucci Books, $17.99
3. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Washington Square Press, $17
4. Daisy Jones and the Six, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Ballantine Books, $17
5. The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, V.E. Schwab, Tor Books, $19.99

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. Crying in H Mart: A Memoir, Michelle Zauner, Vintage, $17
2. The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, Bessel van der Kolk, MD, Penguin Books, $19
3. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
4. The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, David Graeber and David Wengrow, Picador, $25
5. Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Milkweed Editions, $20

Northern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver, Harper, $32.50
2. The Covenant of Water, Abraham Verghese, Grove Press, $32
3. The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece, Tom Hanks and R. Sikoryak (illustrator), Knopf, $32.50
4. Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus, Doubleday, $29
5. Happy Place, Emily Henry, Berkley, $27

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Doubleday, $30
2. The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin, Penguin Press, $32
3. Poverty, by America, Matthew Desmond, Crown, $28
4. The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times, Michelle Obama, Crown, $32.50
5. Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World, Malcolm Harris, Little, Brown, $36. Read the Alta review

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Trust, Hernan Diaz, Riverhead Books, $17
2. The Last Thing He Told Me, Laura Dave, Marysue Rucci Books, $17.99
3. The Midnight Library, Matt Haig, Penguin Books, $18
4. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Washington Square Press, $17
5. The Candy House, Jennifer Egan, Scribner, $17.99

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. Crying in H Mart: A Memoir, Michelle Zauner, Vintage, $17
2. Bay Curious: Exploring the Hidden True Stories of the San Francisco Bay Area, Olivia Allen-Price, Chronicle Books, $15.95
3. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
4. The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, David Graeber and David Wengrow, Picador, $25
5. The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, Bessel van der Kolk, MD, Penguin Books, $19

Source: California Independent Booksellers Alliance

Elizabeth Casillas

Elizabeth Casillas is an associate editor at Alta Journal. A graduate of California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, she has previously written for the Poly Post and Enspire Magazine.