Alta Journal’s California Bestsellers List (April 4, 2024)

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 March 31, 2024.

This week features two new nonfiction books: In The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness, writer and social psychologist Jonathan Haidt examines patterns in childhood development and their eventual effect on adolescents’ mental health. And from Fareed Zakaria comes Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present, an investigation of the three movements that the author considers to have profoundly shaped present-day geopolitics.

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

Southern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
2. The Women, Kristin Hannah, St. Martin’s Press, $30
3. The Hunter, Tana French, Viking, $32
4. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, James McBride, Riverhead Books, $28
5. Wandering Stars, Tommy Orange, Knopf, $29. Read the Alta review.

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin, Penguin Press, $32
2. Atomic Habits: An Easy and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones, James Clear, Avery, $27
3. The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness, Jonathan Haidt, Penguin Press, $30
4. Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present, Fareed Zakaria, W.W. Norton & Company, $29.99
5. I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette McCurdy, Simon & Schuster, $27.99

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Dune, Frank Herbert, Ace Books, $18
2. Happy Place, Emily Henry, Berkley Books, $19
3. The Three-Body Problem, Cixin Liu, Tor Books, $18.99
4. The Midnight Library, Matt Haig, Penguin Books, $18
5. Pineapple Street, Jenny Jackson, Penguin, $18

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
2. Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI (movie tie-in edition), David Grann, Vintage, $18
3. The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, Julia Cameron, TarcherPerigee, $19
4. Crying in H Mart: A Memoir, Michelle Zauner, Vintage, $17
5. Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World, Malcolm Harris, Back Bay Books, $22.99. Read the Alta review.

Northern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
2. The Women, Kristin Hannah, St. Martin’s Press, $30
3. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, James McBride, Riverhead Books, $28
4. Wandering Stars, Tommy Orange, Knopf, $29. Read the Alta review.
5. The Hunter, Tana French, Viking, $32

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin, Penguin Press, $32
2. Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present, Fareed Zakaria, W.W. Norton & Company, $29.99
3. The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness, Jonathan Haidt, Penguin Press, $30
4. Burn Book: A Tech Love Story, Kara Swisher, Simon & Schuster, $30
5. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Doubleday, $30

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Dune, Frank Herbert, Ace Books, $18
2. The Three-Body Problem, Cixin Liu, Tor Books, $18.99
3. A Court of Thorns and Roses, Sarah J. Maas, Bloomsbury Publishing, $19
4. Circe, Madeline Miller, Back Bay Books, $18.99
5. A Court of Mist and Fury, Sarah J. Maas, Bloomsbury Publishing, $19

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI (movie tie-in edition), David Grann, Vintage, $18
2. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
3. The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017, Rashid Khalidi, Picador, $19.99
4. The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, Bessel van der Kolk, MD, Penguin Books, $19
5. Poverty, by America, Matthew Desmond, Crown, $20

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.