Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold by independent booksellers in Alberta during the week ended Sunday, Jan. 16, 2022.
The lists are compiled by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta, and include sales at Audreys Books and Glass Bookshop in Edmonton.
I don’t have much to say about any of the books on these bestseller lists tonight, I’m afraid. I will say this, though, type is art, and the cover art of Ms. Yanagihara’s To Paradise is among the most beautiful I’ve seen on a new book in several years. This combination of an engaging portrait, beautiful type, and unexpected colours is at once arresting and inviting. So much better than the blobs of colour recently favoured by so many publishers. One imagines this fine work signals the beginning of the end to the colour blob trend, which is now growing long in the tooth.
ALBERTA FICTION BESTSELLERS
1. To Paradise – Hanya Yanagihara (McClelland & Stewart)
2. Jurassic Park – Michael Crichton (Ballantine Books)
3. Five Little Indians – Michelle Good (Harper Perennial)
4. Circe – Madeline Miller (Little Brown and Company)
5. The Song of Achilles – Madeline Miller (Ecco)
6. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo – Taylor Jenkins Reid (Washington Square Press)
7. Something to Hide – Elizabeth George (Viking)
8. What Strange Paradise – Omar El Akkad (McClelland & Stewart)
9. The Lincoln Highway – Amor Towles (Viking)
10. A Gentleman in Moscow – Amor Towles (Penguin)
ALBERTA NON-FICTION BESTSELLERS
1. Storying Violence – Gina Starblanket and Dallas Hunt (ARP Books)
2. Atlas of the Heart – Brené Brown (Random House)
3. Finding the Mother Tree – Suzanne Simard (Knopf)
4. People Change – Vivek Shraya (Penguin Canada) *
5. Braiding Sweetgrass – Robin Wall Kimmerer (Milkweed Editions)
6. Embers – Richard Wagamese (Douglas & McIntyre)
7. All About Love – bell hooks (William Morrow Paperbacks)
8. Those Who Know – Dianne Meili (NeWest Press) * +
9. 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act – Bob Joseph (Page Two Books)
10. Entangled Life – Merlin Sheldrake (Random House)
* 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