Alta Journal ’s California Bestsellers List (March 20, 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 16, 2025.

Fans of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale will enjoy these two chilling works of speculative fiction. In The Dream Hotel, by the California Book Club’s March 2024 author, Laila Lalami, a governing body collects data from individuals’ dreams, surveilling visions for potential threats. A mother and a historian, Sara is sent to a retention center when her dreams are flagged as dangerous. The fragile order of the facility is soon upended when a new resident arrives, and Sara must face the corporations that control her life. In I Who Have Never Known Men, by Jacqueline Harpman, translated by Ros Schwartz, 39 women are imprisoned underground, with no memory of how they arrived or any sense of time. Soon, their survival hinges on a young girl—the 40th of them—who is able to navigate an unfamiliar world.

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

Southern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. Dream Count, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Knopf, $32
2. All Fours, Miranda July, Riverhead Books, $29. Read the Alta review.
3. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
4. The God of the Woods, Liz Moore, Riverhead Books, $30
5. The Dream Hotel, Laila Lalami, Pantheon, $29. Read the Alta review.

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism, Sarah Wynn-Williams, Flatiron Books, $32.99
2. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, Omar El Akkad, Knopf, $28
3. The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can’t Stop Talking About, Mel Robbins, Hay House, $29.99
4. The Tell: A Memoir, Amy Griffin, the Dial Press, $29
5. How to Love Better: The Path to Deeper Connection Through Growth, Kindness, and Compassion, Yung Pueblo, Harmony, $27

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. Orbital, Samantha Harvey, Grove Press, $17
4. The Handmaid’s Tale (series tie-in), Margaret Atwood, Anchor, $18
5. I Who Have Never Known Men, Jacqueline Harpman and Ros Schwartz (translator), Transit Books, $16.95

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Vintage, $21
2. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy Snyder, Crown, $12
3. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
4. The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, Julia Cameron, TarcherPerigee, $20
5. Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland, Patrick Radden Keefe, Vintage, $20

Northern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
2. Dream Count, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Knopf, $32
3. The God of the Woods, Liz Moore, Riverhead Books, $30
4. The Antidote, Karen Russell, Knopf, $30
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. Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism, Sarah Wynn-Williams, Flatiron Books, $32.99
3. The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World, Robin Wall Kimmerer and John Burgoyne (illustrator), Scribner, $20
4. The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin, Penguin Press, $32
5. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, Omar El Akkad, Knopf, $28

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. North Woods, Daniel Mason, Random House Trade Paperbacks, $18
4. Fourth Wing, Rebecca Yarros, Red Tower Books, $20.99
5. Funny Story, Emily Henry, Berkley, $19

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 Backyard Bird Chronicles, Amy Tan, Knopf, $36
4. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
5. Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Milkweed Editions, $20

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.