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 October 29, 2023.
This week, the bestsellers list features the highly anticipated memoir The Woman in Me, by Britney Spears. The pop icon discusses her most difficult years and, with unflinching honesty, sheds light on the reality of her conservatorship. Also on the list is Let Us Descend, by MacArthur Fellow Jesmyn Ward. The novel, a combination of historical fiction and magical realism, traces a young girl’s journey from a rice field in the Carolinas to a plantation in Louisiana as she simultaneously forges her own rich, spiritual world.
For a full list of titles and categories, visit the California Independent Booksellers Alliance.•
Southern California
HARDCOVER FICTION
- The Exchange: After The Firm, John Grisham, Doubleday, $29.95
- Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus, Doubleday, $29
- Tom Lake, Ann Patchett, Harper, $30
- Let Us Descend, Jesmyn Ward, Scribner, $28
- Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver, Harper, $32.50
HARDCOVER NONFICTION
- The Woman in Me, Britney Spears, Gallery Books, $32.99
- How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen, David Brooks, Random House, $30
- Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism, Rachel Maddow, Crown, $32
- The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin, Penguin Press, $32
- Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things, Adam Grant, Viking, $32
TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION
- A Court of Thorns and Roses, Sarah J. Maas, Bloomsbury Publishing, $19
- Trust, Hernan Diaz, Riverhead Books, $17
- Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology, Shane Hawk (editor) and Theodore C. Van Alst Jr. (editor), Vintage, $17
- The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Washington Square Press, $17
- The Thursday Murder Club, Richard Osman, Penguin Books, $18
TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION
- Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI (movie tie-in edition), David Grann, Vintage, $18
- Crying in H Mart: A Memoir, Michelle Zauner, Vintage, $17
- An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us, Ed Yong, Random House, $20
- Stay True: A Memoir, Hua Hsu, Anchor, $17. Read Alta’s coverage here.
- All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
Northern California
HARDCOVER FICTION
- Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus, Doubleday, $29
- Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver, Harper, $32.50
- Tom Lake, Ann Patchett, Harper, $30
- The Exchange: After The Firm, John Grisham, Doubleday, $29.95
- The Secret, Lee Child and Andrew Child, Delacorte Press, $28.99
HARDCOVER NONFICTION
- The Woman in Me, Britney Spears, Gallery Books, $32.99
- How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen, David Brooks, Random House, $30
- Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism, Rachel Maddow, Crown, $32
- Enough, Cassidy Hutchinson, Simon & Schuster, $30
- Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America, Heather Cox Richardson, Viking, $30
TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION
- Trust, Hernan Diaz, Riverhead Books, $17
- The Best American Short Stories 2023, Min Jin Lee (editor), Mariner Books, $18.99
- A Court of Thorns and Roses, Sarah J. Maas, Bloomsbury Publishing, $19
- The Way Forward, Yung Pueblo, Andrews McMeel Publishing, $16.99
- The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Washington Square Press, $17
TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION
- Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI (movie tie-in edition), David Grann, Vintage, $18
- Solito: A Memoir, Javier Zamora, Hogarth, $18
- All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
- Stay True: A Memoir, Hua Hsu, Anchor, $17. Read Alta’s coverage here.
- The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human, Siddhartha Mukherjee, Scribner, $21
Source: California Independent Booksellers Alliance
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.
