Alta Journal ’s California Bestsellers List (March 6, 2025)

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 2, 2025.

This Saturday is International Women’s Day—the perfect time to pick up a book by a female author. Here are two bestseller suggestions: Octavia E. Butler’s novel Parable of the Sower, first published in 1993, remains eerily relevant today. Set in 2024, the book depicts a dystopian world gripped by social inequality and climate change, as seen through the eyes of Lauren Olamina, a young woman navigating a Los Angeles ravaged by fires. In bell hooks’s All About Love, the author explores the concept of love in 13 thought-provoking chapters, each offering a meditation on the value of a different relationship common to many of our lives.

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. All Fours, Miranda July, Riverhead Books, $29. Read the Alta review.
3. Three Days in June, Anne Tyler, Knopf, $27
4. The Wedding People, Alison Espach, Henry Holt and Company, $28.99
5. Intermezzo, Sally Rooney, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $29

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can’t Stop Talking About, Mel Robbins, Hay House, $29.99
2. Golden State: The Making of California, Michael Hiltzik, Mariner Books, $32.50
3. How We Learn to Be Brave: Decisive Moments in Life and Faith, Mariann Edgar Budde, Avery, $28
4. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, Omar El Akkad, Knopf, $28
5. I’ll Have What She’s Having, Chelsea Handler, the Dial Press, $32

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Martyr!, Kaveh Akbar, Vintage, $18. Watch the author speak at a California Book Club event.
2. Parable of the Sower, Octavia E. Butler, Grand Central Publishing, $19.99. Read Lynell George’s reflection on the novel.
3. The Frozen River, Ariel Lawhon, Vintage, $18
4. Orbital, Samantha Harvey, Grove Press, $17
5. Fourth Wing, Rebecca Yarros, Red Tower Books, $20.99

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy Snyder, Crown, $12
2. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Vintage, $21
3. The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession, Michael Finkel, Vintage, $18
4. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
5. The Backyard Bird Chronicles, Amy Tan, Knopf, $35

Northern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
2. Onyx Storm (deluxe limited edition), Rebecca Yarros, Red Tower Books, $32.99
3. Small Things Like These, Claire Keegan, Grove Press, $20
4. All Fours, Miranda July, Riverhead Books, $29. Read the Alta review.
5. Three Days in June, Anne Tyler, Knopf, $27

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can’t Stop Talking About, Mel Robbins, Hay House, $29.99
2. The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World, Robin Wall Kimmerer and John Burgoyne (illustrator), Scribner, $20
3. How We Learn to Be Brave: Decisive Moments in Life and Faith, Mariann Edgar Budde, Avery, $28
4. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, Omar El Akkad, Knopf, $28
5. I’ll Have What She’s Having, Chelsea Handler, the Dial Press, $32

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Martyr!, Kaveh Akbar, Vintage, $18. Watch the author speak at a California Book Club event.
2. Orbital, Samantha Harvey, Grove Press, $17
3. Fourth Wing, Rebecca Yarros, Red Tower Books, $20.99
4. Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver, Harper Perennial, $21.99
5. The Frozen River, Ariel Lawhon, Vintage, $18

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy Snyder, Crown, $12
2. The Backyard Bird Chronicles, Amy Tan, Knopf, $35
3. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Vintage, $21
4. Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Milkweed Editions, $20
5. The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession, Michael Finkel, Vintage, $18

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.