.What’s on your next-door neighbor’s nightstand this month?

Recommendations from the East Bay's independent booksellers.

East Bay Bestsellers lists this month’s top-selling books as reported by independent bookstores in the East Bay, including Avenue Books, Black Oak, Cody’s, Collected Thoughts, Diesel, Pegasus, and Walden Pond.

NONFICTION

1. 9/11, by Noam Chomsky (Seven Stories, $8.95). Chomsky out-Chomskys himself, blaming America for 9/11.

2. [new] STUPID WHITE MEN, by Michael Moore (Regan Books, $24.95). Iconoclast Moore skewers, barbecues, and gleefully humiliates the Washington power elite.

3. FAST-FOOD NATION, by Eric Schlosser (Harper Collins, $13.95). Feces in the meat and the unsavory secret of Secret Sauce are but two of the revelations sizzling herein.

4. A BEAUTIFUL MIND, by Sylvia Nasar (Touchstone, $16). Beloved of the Academy, that film about schizophrenic genius John Nash got its start with this biography.

5. THE TIPPING POINT, by Malcolm Gladwell (Back Bay, $14.95). It’s The Hundredth Monkey all over again as the author re-examines the causes of fads and trends.

6. [new] FOUNDING BROTHERS: THE REVOLUTIONARY GENERATION, by Joseph J. Ellis (Vintage, $14). A behind-the-scenes glimpse into little-known intrigues and secret triumphs that helped create the US.

7. [new] JIHAD: THE RISE OF MILITANT ISLAM IN CENTRAL ASIA, by Ahmed Rashid (Yale University Press, $24). The -stan republics along Afghanistan’s northern border are a hotbed of oppression and extremism, warns a Pakistani journalist.

8. ME TALK PRETTY ONE DAY, by David Sedaris (Little, Brown & Co., $14.95). The NPR autobiographer’s comic essays poke fun at life as an expatriate in Paris.

9. [new] THE UNIVERSE IN A NUTSHELL, by Stephen Hawking (Bantam, $35). Hawking does his darnedest to cram everything humankind knows about the cosmos into one brainbusting volume.

10. THE WRINKLE CURE, by Nicholas Perricone (Warner, $13.95). The doctor’s antioxidant plan has already helped many Hollywood stars; maybe cosmeceuticals can fix your face, too.


FICTION

1. [new] MY DREAM OF YOU, by Nuala O’Faolain (Riverhead Books, $14). A lonely Irish expatriate living in London reconnects to life when she researches a centuries-old love affair.

2. THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER AND CLAY, by Michael Chabon (Random House, $26.95). Berkeley author’s swashbuckling tale of two cousins who create a comic-book hero.

3. [new] ATONEMENT, by Ian McEwan (Doubleday, $26). Booker Prize-winner McEwan’s latest epic examines the nature of perception in this intimate character study that spans the decades.

4. BALZAC AND THE LITTLE CHINESE SEAMSTRESS, by Dai Sijie (Knopf, $10). During China’s Cultural Revolution, two boys whose lives have been turned upside down discover literature and love.

5. THE CORRECTIONS, by Jonathan Franzen (Farrar Straus & Giroux, $26). Dysfunctional family values and the sad trajectories of sex made this a smash hit.

6. WHEN WE WERE ORPHANS, by Kazuo Ishiguro (Vintage, $14). A noted British detective returns to Shanghai to search for his parents, who disappeared there long ago.

7. THE BLIND ASSASSIN, by Margaret Atwood (Anchor, $14). When the car containing one of two sisters sails off a cliff, her sibling enters a dark world of wondering.

8. [new] VINE OF DESIRE, by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni (Doubleday, $23.95). Sister of My Heart’s sequel keeps up with its two heroines, one of whom settles in Berkeley.

9. THE BONESETTERS DAUGHTER, by Amy Tan (Ballantine, $7.99). Local fave Tan sticks to her reliable themes of mothers/daughters, China/America, past/present.

10. [new] THE LAST TIME THEY MET, by Anita Shreve (Back Bay Books, $13.95). A chance meeting of two ill-fated lovers sets off this romantic mystery with a surprise twist.

WHAT’S HOT

at the PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE BOOKSTORE,
2626 Bancroft Way, Berkeley; 510-642-1475.

1. 100 YEARS OF JAPANESE FILM, by Donald Richie (Kodansha, $30). Get the dirt on Kurosawa and company.

2. BOLLYWOOD CINEMA: TEMPLES OF DESIRE, by Vijay Mishra (Routledge, $24.95). It sings, it dances; it’s Indian film.

3. CLOSE UP: IRANIAN CINEMA, PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE, by Hamid Dabashi (Verso, $20). It might be the next big thing.

4. EXTREME CAMPUS: HAND-PAINTED MOVIE POSTERS FROM GHANA, by Ernie Wolfe III (Dilettante, $45). The stars never looked so good.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

East Bay Express E-edition East Bay Express E-edition
19,045FansLike
14,611FollowersFollow
61,790FollowersFollow
spot_img