Alta Journal’s California Bestsellers List (November 14, 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 November 10, 2024.

As you gear up for the holidays ahead, take a moment to reflect with these nonfiction titles on this week’s bestsellers list. In Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, author and Citizen Potawatomi Nation member Robin Wall Kimmerer describes her relationships with the natural environment and encourages readers to take care of the planet. Similarly, in The Backyard Bird Chronicles, Amy Tan shares her connections with the natural world via an illustrated essay collection. Using daily journal entries and sketches, Tan explains how she found solace in her backyard by spending time observing native birds.

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

Southern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. Intermezzo, Sally Rooney, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $29
2. The Grey Wolf, Louise Penny, Minotaur Books, $30
3. The Waiting: A Ballard and Bosch Novel, Michael Connelly, Little, Brown and Company, $30. Read Alta’s coverage of Connelly’s work here.
4. All Fours, Miranda July, Riverhead Books, $29. Read the Alta review.
5. Tell Me Everything, Elizabeth Strout, Random House, $30

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. Be Ready When the Luck Happens: A Memoir, Ina Garten, Crown, $34
2. The Message, Ta-Nehisi Coates, One World, $30
3. Patriot, Alexei Navalny, Knopf, $35
4. War, Bob Woodward, Simon & Schuster, $32
5. Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering, Malcolm Gladwell, Little, Brown and Company, $32

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. North Woods, Daniel Mason, Random House Trade Paperbacks, $18. Read the Alta review.
2. The Best American Short Stories 2024, Lauren Groff (editor) and Heidi Pitlor (editor), Mariner Books, $19.99
3. Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver, Harper Perennial, $21.99
4. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin, Vintage, $19
5. The Vegetarian, Han Kang and Deborah Smith (translator), Hogarth, $17

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession, Michael Finkel, Vintage, $18
2. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
3. Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Milkweed Editions, $20
4. The Backyard Bird Chronicles, Amy Tan, Knopf, $35
5. The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, Julia Cameron, TarcherPerigee, $20

Northern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. The Grey Wolf, Louise Penny, Minotaur Books, $30
2. Intermezzo, Sally Rooney, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $29
3. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
4. Playground, Richard Powers, W.W. Norton & Company, $29.99
5. Tell Me Everything, Elizabeth Strout, Random House, $30

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Message, Ta-Nehisi Coates, One World, $30
2. Be Ready When the Luck Happens: A Memoir, Ina Garten, Crown, $34
3. Patriot, Alexei Navalny, Knopf, $35
4. Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI, Yuval Noah Harari, Random House, $35
5. Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering, Malcolm Gladwell, Little, Brown and Company, $32

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver, Harper Perennial, $21.99
2. A Court of Thorns and Roses, Sarah J. Maas, Bloomsbury Publishing, $19
3. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin, Vintage, $19
4. The Vegetarian, Han Kang and Deborah Smith (translator), Hogarth, $17
5. North Woods, Daniel Mason, Random House Trade Paperbacks, $18. Read the Alta review.

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. The Backyard Bird Chronicles, Amy Tan, Knopf, $35
2. Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America, Heather Cox Richardson, Penguin Books, $18
3. The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession, Michael Finkel, Vintage, $18
4. Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Milkweed Editions, $20
5. All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me, Patrick Bringley, Simon & Schuster, $18.99

Source: California Independent Booksellers Alliance

Elizabeth Casillas

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