Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold by independent booksellers in Alberta during the week ended Sunday, Oct. 24, 2021.
The lists are compiled by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta, and include sales at Audreys Books and Glass Bookshop in Edmonton.
Last week’s celebrity murder mysteries are back for a second week at the top of the fiction bestseller list, while the transcript of a 2005 commencement speech by novelist David Foster Wallace leads the non-fiction list. The transcript was first published in 2009, a year after the author’s death. The essay was published in The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2006, but this makes one wonder if someone somewhere in Alberta has put in on a required reading list.
ALBERTA FICTION BESTSELLERS
1. State of Terror – Louise Penny and Hillary Rodham Clinton (Simon & Schuster)
2. The Apollo Murders – Chris Hadfield (Random House Canada)
3. Dune – Frank Herbert (Ace Books)
4. Avenue of Champions – Conor Kerr (Nightwood Editions) *
5. Five Little Indians – Michelle Good (Harper Perennial)
6. Cloud Cuckoo Land – Anthony Doerr (Scribner)
7. The Lincoln Highway – Amor Towles (Viking)
8. Silverview – John Le Carré (Viking)
9. The Midnight Library – Matt Haig (HarperCollins)
10. Crossroads – Jonathan Franzen (Bond Street Books)
ALBERTA NON-FICTION BESTSELLERS
1. This is Water – David Foster Wallace (Little, Brown & Company)
2. Braiding Sweetgrass – Robin Wall Kimmerer (Milkweed Editions)
3. Moon Lists – Leigh Patterson (Clarkson Potter)
4. “Indian” in the Cabinet – Jody Wilson-Raybould (HarperCollins)
5. Praying to the West – Omar Mouallem (Simon & Schuster) *
6. Whitewater Cooks Together Again – Shelley Adams (self-published)
7. The Dawn of Everything – David Graeber and David Wengrow (McClelland & Stewart)
8. Calgary Through the Eyes of Writers – Shaun Hunter (Rocky Mountain Books) * +
9. The Storyteller – Dave Grohl (HarperCollins Canada)
10. Driven – Marcello Di Cintio (Biblioasis) *
* Alberta Author + Alberta Publisher
The independent bookstores contributing to this weekly list are:
Audreys Books, Edmonton
Cafe Books, Canmore
Drawn to Books, Edmonton
Glass Bookshop, Edmonton
Monkeyshines Books, Calgary
Owl’s Nest Books, Calgary
Pages on Kensington, Calgary
Shelf Life Books, Calgary
The Next Page, Calgary
Three Hills Books, Three Hills
I am less likely to buy a book if Ms. Clinton’s name is on it. So there!