Alta Journal ’s California Bestsellers List (August 21, 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 August 17, 2025.

Our September California Book Club pick, The Backyard Bird Chronicles, is on the list this week. In this nonfiction work, author Amy Tan documents her bird-watching through journal entries and sketches that celebrate the wonders of the natural world. Be sure to tune in on September 18 to watch book club host John Freeman in conversation with Tan. If you’re in the mood for a high-stakes thriller, pick up Not Quite Dead Yet, by Holly Jackson. After surviving an attack on Halloween night, Jet Mason learns she has just one week to live owing to an aneurysm caused by the assault. Mason spends her final days tracking down the person responsible.

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

Southern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. The Emperor of Gladness, Ocean Vuong, Penguin Press, $30
2. Atmosphere: A Love Story, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Ballantine Books, $30
3. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
4. The Wedding People, Alison Espach, Henry Holt and Company, $28.99
5. My Friends, Fredrik Backman, Atria Books, $29.99

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can’t Stop Talking About, Mel Robbins and Sawyer Robbins, Hay House, $29.99
2. Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, Robert B. Reich, Knopf, $30
3. The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin, Penguin Press, $32
4. Everything Is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection, John Green, Crash Course Books, $28
5. A Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession, and Shipwreck, Sophie Elmhirst, Riverhead Books, $28

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Martyr!, Kaveh Akbar, Vintage, $18. Watch the author speak at a California Book Club event.
2. Project Hail Mary, Andy Weir, Ballantine, $20
3. Remarkably Bright Creatures, Shelby Van Pelt, Ecco, $19.99
4. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho, HarperOne, $17.99
5. I Who Have Never Known Men, Jacqueline Harpman and Ros Schwartz (translator), Transit Books, $16.95

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy Snyder, Crown, $12
2. Didion and Babitz, Lili Anolik, Scribner, $20. Read the Alta interview.
3. All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me, Patrick Bringley, Simon & Schuster, $18.99
4. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Vintage, $21
5. The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, Julia Cameron, TarcherPerigee, $20

Northern California

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. Atmosphere: A Love Story, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Ballantine Books, $30
2. James, Percival Everett, Doubleday, $28. Read an excerpt in Alta.
3. The Emperor of Gladness, Ocean Vuong, Penguin Press, $30
4. My Friends, Fredrik Backman, Atria Books, $29.99
5. Not Quite Dead Yet, Holly Jackson, Bantam, $28

HARDCOVER NONFICTION

1. Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, Robert B. Reich, Knopf, $30
2. Abundance, Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, Avid Reader Press, $30
3. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, Omar El Akkad, Knopf, $28
4. Everything Is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection, John Green, Crash Course Books, $28
5. King of Kings: The Iranian Revolution; A Story of Hubris, Delusion and Catastrophic Miscalculation, Scott Anderson, Doubleday, $35

TRADE PAPERBACK FICTION

1. Martyr!, Kaveh Akbar, Vintage, $18. Watch the author speak at a California Book Club event.
2. Remarkably Bright Creatures, Shelby Van Pelt, Ecco, $19.99
3. Project Hail Mary, Andy Weir, Ballantine, $20
4. All Fours, Miranda July, Riverhead Books, $19. Read the Alta review.
5. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, James McBride, Riverhead Books, $19

TRADE PAPERBACK NONFICTION

1. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy Snyder, Crown, $12
2. The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession, Michael Finkel, Vintage, $18
3. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, David Grann, Vintage, $21
4. All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks, William Morrow, $16.99
5. The Backyard Bird Chronicles, Amy Tan, Knopf, $36. Register for the California Book Club event.

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.