The winter weather has me dreaming of warmer climes, like those found in much of California. How I’ve enjoyed my (very limited!) time there in the past; how I’m still lamenting the cancelled 2020 California work trips that have yet to be rescheduled! I don’t anticipate making my way to the West Coast in the immediate future, which makes me especially grateful I can travel vicariously through the pages of a good book.
The California literary scene has so much to offer, whether it’s the many authors who count it as home or the sheer number of fantastic independent bookstores, including The Last Bookstore in LA and City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco. I loved my limited time at Rakestraw Books in Danville, way back in 2018. Readers can enjoy the Bay Area Book Festival and Los Angeles Times Festival of Books or go on pilgrimages to the National Steinbeck Center in Salinas, Jack London State Historical Park in Glen Ellen, and the storied Los Angeles Public Library. (What else belongs on my must-visit list?)
To send you off on your literary adventure, I’m sharing twenty-six books that I’ve read and loved or that are high on my To Be Read list. Whether these titles call to mind memories of your own time in California or you hope to travel there someday, I hope this list will make you even more excited about your next trip or provide an accessible and affordable means of escape via armchair travel in the meantime.
I could never come close to including all the books set in California. The number of books set in Los Angeles or San Francisco alone! I hope you’ll help us further load up our list with your own recommendations in the comments.
Literary Tourism: California
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Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table
Ruth Reichl is one of our greatest food writers and it all started with this 1998 coming-of-age memoir. She chronicles her chaotic upbringing, in the home of a workaholic father and a mother living with undiagnosed bipolar disorder. Her mother’s penchant for serving rotten food led to Reichl learning how to cook. She went on to become a part of the 1970s organic food revolution in Berkeley and document her continuing cooking adventures in memoirs, essays, and novels. More info →
The Nature of Fragile Things
The deadly 1906 earthquake in San Francisco changes the fate of three women in this historical novel. Sophie is a mail-order bride and Irish immigrant who agrees to marry widower Martin, despite her misgivings, and care for his mute five-year-old daughter Kat. Belinda is pregnant and looking for her husband. Meanwhile, another woman grieves hundreds of miles away. As the devastation from the earthquake unfurls, the women must do their best to not only survive, but discover the truth connecting them all. More info →
The Buddha in the Attic
Written in first person plural, this slim historical novel embodies the collective voices of a group of young Japanese women traveling to San Francisco as mail-order brides. Over the course of thirty years, we follow them on the boat to their first night as young brides and through the difficulties of assimilating to the US and raising children, culminating in their families being sent to internment camps after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. More info →
The House of Broken Angels
Considered to be Urrea’s masterpiece, this Mexican-American immigrant story follows the De La Cruz clan as they gather for patriarch Big Angel’s final birthday party at his home in San Diego. He has cancer and won’t live to celebrate another year. But before the party happens, his mother Mama America dies and he must plan her funeral. These two events occur on the same weekend, giving the family a chance to reconnect, mourn, reflect, and remember. More info →
East of Eden
Steinbeck's most ambitious novel has it all: love, poverty, wealth, war, betrayal, abandonment, murder. An epic tale of the Trasks and Hamiltons, two families doomed to reenact the fall of Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel’s rivalry across generations. Set in California’s dusty Salinas Valley, Steinbeck examines class, identity, and what happens when we are denied love. More info →
A is for Alibi
Grafton is best known for her Kinsey Millhone Alphabet Mysteries. In the first series installment, Kinsey sets up a new detective agency in Santa Teresa, California. She's a classic noir detective—twice-divorced, a loner, fond of the underdog—and she finds herself drawn in by a woman out on parole for her own husband's murder. As the twists keep coming (and the bodies stack up), Kinsey finds herself in more and more danger. Kinsey is a great character: rough around the edges, tough and motivated. If you enjoyed Veronica Mars, check out this series. It has enough installments to keep you happily occupied for ages! More info →
Parable of the Sower
This series—a planned trilogy that was never completed—is the most realistic of Butler's fiction. The setting is outer Los Angeles, 2026, where a Black teenager named Lauren struggles for survival in a world gone to pieces, ravaged by climate change and drug abuse of epidemic proportions. Despite the overwhelming and terrifying obstacles she faces, Lauren isn't ready to give up yet, and bands together with a group of fellow travelers to head north in search of rumored safety, with the hopes of founding a colony for her Earthseed religion. Utterly gripping, and a great introduction to Butler's work. More info →
Tell Me Three Things
This YA novel is a crowd-pleaser; it's one of the books I most often recommend. When a girl-next-door type suddenly finds herself in an elite Los Angeles prep school, she has to figure out how to navigate her new privileged world while still grieving her mother's death. When she gets an email from an unidentified boy who calls himself "Somebody Nobody" offering to be her guide to her new school, she doesn't want to say yes—but she really needs his help. A sweet and fun teen romance, but also a pitch-perfect portrayal of the grieving process. I couldn't stop myself from cheering for Jessie as she put her life together again. More info →
The Mothers
Not an easy read, but so good, and one that I still think about even though I read it many moons ago. In this coming-of-age story, debut author Bennett shows us how grief predictably consumes a 17-year old girl growing up in a tight-knit community in San Diego County, and how two friends get pulled into the tangled aftermath during that tumultuous summer. Bennett tells the story through the eyes of the community's mothers: though we may expect these community pillars to show up with casseroles when someone is sick, in this story the mothers' vicious gossip causes nothing but trouble. More info →
The Mistress of Spices
Divakaruni's 1997 debut tells the story of Tilo, a young Indian girl trained in the magical powers of spices and their blends. She disguises herself in a run-down spice shop in Oakland, California, where she uses her powers to improve the lives of the immigrant Indians who come to her for spices, but her longing to find a love of her own tempts her to leave her magical post in search of her own fate. More info →
The Joy Luck Club
Amy Tan’s 1989 National Book Award Finalist for Fiction multi-generational saga follows four mothers and four daughters, examining complicated family dynamics, gender, race, class, and more. In 1949, four recent Chinese immigrants meet every week to play mahjong and discuss their new lives in San Francisco. They call themselves the Joy Luck Club. While the women share their personal stories with each other, they don’t tell their daughters and their daughters in turn disregard their advice, thinking it won’t apply to their second generational American lives. Their interpersonal relationships are complex and ever changing, which means there’s so much to talk about here. More info →
Slouching Towards Bethlehem
Didion’s first work of nonfiction, this essay collection published in 1968, remains a classic. She writes about figures like John Wayne and Howard Hughes, her experience growing up in California, and the birth of the 1960s counterculture movement in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury. Didion drew her title from the W.B. Yeats poem “The Second Coming” (“things fall apart; the centre cannot hold”) and wrestles throughout with the disruption and unease she sees at work in the culture around her. More info →
Goodbye, Vitamin
This 2018 slim debut got all kinds of buzz when it released. Through a series of her diary entries, we enter the story of 30-year-old Ruth: her father has recently been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and his condition is rapidly worsening. Ruth decides to help her struggling family by moving back in with her parents in Los Angeles for a year, where she is forced to closely confront both her father's deteriorating health and the troubled history of their relationship. More info →
There There: A Novel
Orange's multigenerational, multi-voiced novel offers a nuanced glimpse into contemporary Native American life in Oakland, California through the experiences and perspectives of twelve wide-ranging characters. As they prepare for the city's first Big Oakland Powwow at the Oakland Coliseum, the lives of Orange's characters become intertwined: an aspiring filmmaker, a man who's taught himself traditional Native dance with YouTube videos, a woman traveling to meet her grandchildren for the first time—on the condition that she remains sober. I'm amazed at how each distinct voice rings true, and how he weaves the disparate storylines together. It's also full of triggers, so sensitive readers be aware. More info →
A Place for Us
Mirza's slow-burning debut skillfully probes themes of identity, culture, family, and generational change through an Indian-American Muslim family living in California. "I am to see to it that I do not lose you," reads the epigraph (Whitman), and the story wonders if, despite our best intentions, one might nevertheless wound someone they love deeply enough to lose them forever. The story opens with the oldest daughter’s wedding: the bride scans the crowd for her beloved yet rebellious brother, hoping he'll appear despite being estranged from the family for years. Through a series of flashbacks, and in rotating points of view, Mirza examines the series of small betrayals that splintered the family, skillfully imbuing quotidian events—a chance meeting at a party, a dinner conversation about a spelling test, a seemingly run-of-the-mill sibling spat—with deep significance, showing how despite their smallness, they irrevocably alter the course of the family’s life. More info →
The Other Americans
My husband Will is a longtime fan of Pulitzer Prize finalist Lalami; this 2019 novel was the first of her now-many works I’ve read. The story begins when a Moroccan immigrant is hit and killed by a speeding car not far from his home in a small town in the Mojave Desert. What follows is part procedural, part family saga, part love story, and part American origin story, intriguingly told from nine different perspectives. More info →
The Library Book
On April 29, 1986, a fire consumed part of the Los Angeles Public Library, destroying four hundred thousand books and damaging seven hundred thousand more. All these years later, it remained a mystery as to whether someone purposefully set the fire and, if so, who did it. Staff reporter for the New Yorker Susan Orlean puts her considerable talent toward unearthing the culprit, while also providing a deep dive into libraries and librarianship. It’s as much a love letter to books and the institutions that provide access to them as it is an account of arson and LA history. More info →
The Guncle
Grief and the potential for new life and love sit side by side in Rowley’s fan favorite novel. When Patrick aka Gay Uncle Patrick aka GUP is called in to take care of his nine-year-old niece Maisie and six-year-old nephew Grant after the death of their mother (and his best friend) at his brother’s request, he tries to get out of it. What does a former actor know about raising kids? But needs must and so to Patrick’s Palm Springs home they go. In the process, Patrick has to take stock of his fading career and finally grieve the past loss of his partner, all while shepherding Maisie and Grant through their new normal. While this book contains moments of heartbreak, lighthearted moments abound courtesy of GUP’s constant barrage of both innuendo and dad jokes. If you enjoy this, be sure to check out the sequel The Guncle Abroad. More info →
Last Night at the Telegraph Club
This coming-of-age tale for mature YA readers (and grown-ups!) is set at a lesbian bar in 1950s San Francisco Chinatown. When seventeen-year-old Lily Hu meets Kathleen Miller outside the Telegraph Club, her world tilts on its axis. This isn’t a safe time for two girls to fall in love, especially given the Red Scare and Lily’s father’s looming deportation. Her parents urge her to do whatever she can to stay safe, but Lily believes some risks may prove to be worth it. This book reads as a celebration of romantic and familial love, and a love letter to the city of San Francisco. More info →
The Ex Vows
Joyce's latest romance centers on Eli and Georgia, a couple who met and fell in love when they were teenagers, but who broke up five years ago under painful circumstances. Now they're back home to celebrate the Napa Valley wedding of their mutual best friend Adam, and for his sake, they've resolved to pretend that everything is fine and they're both at peace with how things ended. But the truth is they never got over each other, and when they're brought back into each other's lives for a week because of the wedding, sparks fly. This was a delightful, smartly-written read with heart and depth; I flew through it. (Open door.) More info →
Colored Television
This darkly comic satire centers on a Los Angeles-based novelist named Jane who is tired of pouring herself into her work only to barely make ends meet. L.A. is expensive—especially with two kids—and novel writing just doesn't pay. Jane decides she wants to "sell out" like her friend Brett and become a screenwriter, with its predictable hours and paychecks. But when Jane makes one tiny lie in order to secure a gig, it leads to a bigger one, then a bigger one—and it's only a matter of time before her precarious house of cards comes crashing down. This was smart, funny, and packed with insider-y publishing mischief. Fun fact: Senza is married to novelist Percival Everett, and she draws on her own life experience in so many ways in this (fictional) story. I initially tried this in print and it just didn't stick but once I switched to the audiobook narrated by Kristen Ariza, I breezed right through it. More info →
What Kind of Paradise
This thrilling family tale (and 2025 MMD Summer Reading Guide selection) wrestles with questions of identity, loyalty, and our complicated relationship with technology. Jane grew up in rural Montana with only her father for company. She loves him unquestioningly, and eagerly absorbs everything he teaches her about self-reliance (good) and technology (bad). But one day when she’s seventeen, he surprises Jane by bringing home a computer that she stealthily uses to connect to the outside world. What she learns—about the world and her own existence in it—shakes her faith in the father she loves. Jane longs to break free, but even as she takes big steps to build her own life, she can’t turn her back on him until she realizes what this devotion has cost her and she flees to San Francisco. This central tension had me racing though the pages, as did the complex family dynamics and irresistible 90s nostalgia. More info →
Bug Hollow
Huneven’s kaleidoscopic latest (and 2025 MMD Summer Reading Guide selection)) begins with a road trip: in 1970s Northern California, eldest son Ellis heads up the coast with his friends to celebrate their high school graduation. He doesn’t return on schedule. His parents set off to find him and bring him home, and the aftershocks of that misguided attempt then echo through four fraught decades of family life. Through the years, Huneven takes us inside the minds of Ellis’s family members—his sisters, prickly mother, and easy-going father—plus other key figures in their lives. Even across wildly disparate timelines the themes remain steady and universal: love and grief, art and solace, alcoholism and abandonment. The story unfolds primarily in California, with brief interludes in Saudi Arabia and Oaxaca. I was constantly surprised at the leaps and pivots Huneven took while laying out their history, but enjoyed every stop along the way. More info →
Stars in Your Eyes
When bad boy Logan Gray and new talent Mattie Cole are cast as lead actors in a romantic film, they get off to a rough start. So rough, they wind up having to fake date to save the film’s publicity. Logan tends to push people away before they can get too close, while Mattie worries he could lose himself while trying to save Logan. But as they slowly get to know each other, real feelings develop. With epistolary elements like entertainment site articles, Calendar’s debut contemporary romance explores the effects of trauma, Hollywood’s movie industry, identity, and more. (Content warnings apply. Open door.) More info →
Expiration Dates
In this contemporary and gently magical novel, every time Daphne Bell meets a new man, the Universe sends her a piece of paper containing his name and a number on it—the exact amount of time they’ll be together. It took her a while to figure out how those notes work, but once she did, she was able to see that they were never wrong. And this makes her feel occasionally hopeful, but mostly cursed—until she receives a note that says she’s found the relationship that will last forever. But Daphne finds herself unable to stop wrestling with the question of what she wants for her romantic future, even when she thinks she knows that future is certain. I read this in a day and appreciated the way Serle’s little injection of magic prodded me to think differently about my own life. As someone who’s never been to L.A., I especially enjoyed the strong sense of place: this book is set in many specific neighborhoods in L.A., and I googled every single one as I read! More info →
Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore
This fast-paced book is mystery, quest, and love letter to the written word, all rolled into one. After a few days working at Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore in San Francisco, Clay starts to wonder about the curiously named shop and its strange clientele. Using analysis skills from his Silicon Valley tech days, he starts to uncover much deeper secrets between the pages. A story about friendship and adventure as well as the conflict between new technology and print books, this is a crowd favorite among bookworms. More info →
What are your favorite books set in California? Please share in the comments.
P.S. 17 recommended reads for those traveling to Hawai’i, 17 recommended reads for those traveling to Florida, and more literary tourism.
49 comments
Time’s Mouth by Edan Lepucki is such a good California book and just a well written book in general that didn’t get nearly enough attention.
I highly suggest Verbatim Books in San Diego!!!! Being inside like a big exhale!
How about Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid?
Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Really strong sense of place and a glimpse into surf culture for a family that has lived around Malibu for generations. I thought this was more emotionally resonant than some of her other books.
Some must-see independent bookstores for anyone visiting California – Booksshop Santa Cruz (in Santa Cruz obviously), Chaucer’s in Santa Barbara, Green Apple Books in San Francisco.
Vromans in Pasadena
If you’re visiting the Central Coast- and you must- a true destination is Godmother’s Bookstore and gathering place in Summerland near Santa Barbara. It’s absolutely gorgeous.
Less glamorous, but still wonderful is The Book Loft in Solvang and Monarch Books in Arroyo Grande.
Also, Bad Animal in Santa Cruz is wonderful!
Hi there! Native northern Californian here! For non fiction lovers… and really anyone, I would recommend The Diary of a Forty-Niner by Chauncey Canfield. You can get a glimpse of life during the California Gold Rush. This was an extra fun read for me as I grew up and still live on N Bloomfield in Nevada City, CA.
Some musts for book lovers: the Huntington Library and Gardens, Pasadena’s independent bookstores Vroman’s and Octavia’s Bookshelf, and attend the Pasadena Festival of Women Authors.
I agree. I love the Huntingdon Gardens, and Vroman’s is amazing!
Somewhat obvious, but I loved Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Great characters and Malibu from the 1950’s to the 80’s.
The Golden Gate by Amy Chua is a fantastic book, mostly for the insight it gives into the politics and racism that existed in the San Francisco area between the 1920’s and the 1950’s.
Isabel Allende has a number of terrific books set in (or partially set in) California. Daughter of Fortune, about the California Gold Rush, is one of my favorites.
Bookstore recommendations:
Pegasus Books in Berkeley, CA
Moe’s Books in Berkeley, CA (kinda gives me Mr. Penumbra vibes)
(Berkeley is across the bay from San Francisco)
Verbatim Books in San Diego, CA
Maxwells Books in La Mesa, CA (part of San Diego)
These are used bookstores where I have found some amazing finds.
FYI Ruth Reichl has a delightful substack!
I’m excited to know this. I love her writing! Off to substack….
The Great Mann and The Ghost Writer both have an incredible sense of place and capture the times perfectly. Post WWII Los Angeles (in the African American community) and 1960-70’s Ojai (central coast). And both great reads/listens.
I also agree about Malibu Rising.
I’m a California native so this post is a fun one for me! For bookstore fans, The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman is based in LA. Love and Saffron by Kim Fay alternates between 1960’s LA and the PNW with lots of fun food focus along with an inspiring story of female friendship.
I agree with Malibu Rising fans. TJR really brought CA to life. Also, I’d add The Four Winds by Kristen Hannah for its depiction of families fleeing to California during the Great Depression.
I encourage anyone who hasn’t read The Library Book, Parable of the Sower, or Expiration Dates to dive in!
I loved this list and added several to my TBR! Thank you!
This is a fabulous list! I would add Daisy Jones and The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett, Wild by Cheryl Strayed (not a novel, but reads like one) and The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County by Mark Twain (a short story, but still).
Abbi Waxman’s novels are little jewels set in California.
Agree! Really enjoy her books.
If you are going anywhere near L.A., check out the Iliad bookstore! My husband and I moved from LA, where I grew up, to Louisville, back in late 2006. The Iliad was the first used bookstore I fell in love with. It will continue to be the store I compare all stores to, much as I compare Del Amo mall in the 90s to all other malls – in other words, nothing will compare. This line of thought this morning made me realize that I don’t want to read a fiction book set in LA anywhere near the times I lived there. I don’t want the fiction to warp my memories, for better or worse. Have you had any thoughts along these lines, Anne (or other readers)? From what I read about and hear from old friends my hometown and Del Amo mall are very different. I can’t find videos of the mall in the 90s, or even an old directory from when I wandered it at least once a week. I’m curious about other perspectives on this… have you read a book set in a time and place you lived? Did it change your memories? What was that like? Most importantly, do you regret reading the book?
I used to live near Del Amo mall – I miss it!!
I grew up in a relatively small town so the likelihood of books set there is slim but I’ve lived in Nashville for almost 50 years and there are plenty of books set here but I really don’t enjoy them – I’m too busy mentally correcting what I see as errors or trying to figure out what real places/people are the basis of plot points. I love books set in places I’ve visited so I have a good mental picture but I no longer read books set in my city.
Yes! This is exactly what I mean. The only story I’ve gotten close to enjoying about L.A. is a short story by Neil Gaiman in one of his collections. (I have a really hard time re-reading him right now, ymmv based on what he is currently accused of. It’s called The Goldfish Pool and Other Stories, and it’s in his collection Smoke and Mirrors.) And I can only read it because there are no specific scenes set in the where/when I lived in, but some of the descriptions hit parts of LA not described in other fiction. My first night in LA, when I was seven, my dad drove us through the hills along streets lined with eucalyptus trees. The smell is such a strong sense memory no one really mentions in anything I’ve read. The idea of reading books of places I’ve visited sounds like a great idea!
Fiona! When did you live near Del Amo? I left LA in 2006, but didn’t go to the mall regularly after about 2003/4-ish. I would love to hear if you went after the change from traditional mall that was done sometime during that timeframe.
Fiona/Amanda – I actually live near the Del Amo Mall currently (lived in LA my entire life and close to the Del Amo Mall for about 10 years). It has definitely changed a lot, even just in the last few years. I honestly don’t go there much anymore, especially after they put in all those high-end stores. If I do go, it’s mostly to the restaurants in and near the mall or to the Barnes and Noble on the same lot (because unfortunately, there are no independent bookstores close by).
In terms of reading books set in LA or near where I live, I’m actually opposite in that I like reading those types of books precisely because of the familiarity with the real places / locations. Part of this could be because of the sense of nostalgia that reading about familiar places/people/things evokes, which is one of the things that sustains me given the chaos of the world over the past two decades. The other part is that I love hunting for Easter Eggs in these books — it makes reading more fun for me to come across something I recognize and be able to say “omg, I know that place!” even if only for a few moments…. 😊
If you’re ever in Silicon Valley, go to Kepler’s Books in Menlo Park and Leigh’s Favorite Books in Sunnyvale. Next door to Leigh’s and under the same ownership is children’s bookstore, Bookasaurus.
A Map to Paradise and Only the Beautiful, both by Susan Meissner
The Phoenix Crown by Kate Quinn
Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
Both are set in San Francisco, and are great reads.
As a SF Bay Area native, I’m very attuned to portrayals of the area that feel very real to me, and I co-sign a lot of these books above, and other books by the same authors:
Vera Wong series and Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q. Sutanto (SF, CA coastal resort)
You, With a View by Jessica Joyce (Roadtrip starting in SF and hitting some CA national parks like Joshua Tree)
The Unwedding by Ally Condie (Big Sur)
Search by Michelle Hunevan (Altadena)
Sourdough by Robin Sloan (SF)
If you like dystopian science fiction, Gold Fame Citrus by Claire Vaye Watkins is set in Southern California.
I first saw The House of Broken Angels on an end cap at my local Barnes and Noble. Obviously, the artist didn’t think about older people with fuzzy vision when doing the cover design, because from 8 feet away the tiny “the” and “of” in the title were not visible, leaving the impression the book was called “House Broken Angels” — oops.
I recommend Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin, a 10 book series that gives a real sense of place, vibe, and culture. Lots of humor, poignant moments, wonderful characters.
Fun bookstores to visit – Godmothers in Summerland (near Santa Barbara) and Second Chances Used Books in Sebastopol which has a wonderful ice cream shop next door.
I think two additions to this list could be Typewriter Beach by Meg Waite Clayton , and Mother Daughter Traitor Spy by Susan Elia MacNeil.
Malibu Rising
If you are in LA, go to the Manhattan Beach library and go upstairs. You can see the ocean! It’s a lovely library. Also a great location – near stores and restaurants and the beach. Only a few blocks from the Strand where you can go for a beautiful walk or rent bikes.
I just moved to Manhattan Beach from Silicon Valley — can’t wait to get my new library card and also spend time at {pages} bookstore! My old local favorite indy bookstore was Kepler’s in Menlo Park. I also love Book Passage and Books Inc.
I love Taylor Jenkins Reid! A couple other California-based titles to add to the list:
– Vera by Carol Edgarian (set during the 1906 SF earthquake — juicy novel)
– Slow Days, Fast Company by Eve Babitz (60s/70s Los Angeles)
– pretty much anything by Joan Didion
California must reads include 2 books by Susan Straight. Both give a strong sense of place with multigenerational ethnicities & cultures with roots going back hundreds of years:
Sacrament (2025 novel)
In the Country of Women (2020 memoir).
This is a great list. I’ve read nearly all of them and added one to my TBR!
Hi Anne, I live in Danville and was surprised to hear you had been to Rakestraw Books. We have a fabulous library with a cute used bookstore too. So sorry to have missed you!
Carole
Taleen Voskuni’s books are all set in the Armenian-American community in California.
Warwick’s Bookstore in La Jolla (part of San Diego) is the country’s oldest family run independent bookstore. Great selection of books and lovely gifts,too.
There are SO MANY great mysteries/mystery authors that use California as their setting: from Dashiel Hammett & Raymond Chandler, to more current Michael Connelly (Bosch & Lincoln Lawyer series), Jonathan Kellerman, Walter Mosley, T. Jefferson Parker, Sue Grafton, and so many more! One of my favorites is T. C. Boyle’s The Tortilla Curtain.
The Tortilla Curtain, T C Boyle
House of Sand and Fog, Andre Dubus III
The Sympathizers, VietnamThanh Nguyen
Angle of Repose, Wallace Stegner
How Much of These Hills is Gold, C Pam Zhang
Hi Anne,
I was excited to see my beloved home state featured in your literary tourism series! I am a proud 4th generation Californian with roots in the Sacramento/Central Valley region. My husband’s family has roots in the Gold Country region.
The books you list are all great choices, but I’m here to say that there is more to California than San Francisco, Los Angeles, and the coastal region!
I appreciate that other people have added Mark Twain and Kristin Hannah to the list.
For additional reading I suggest:
John Muir, especially his writings about the beauty of the Sierra Nevada mountains;
Joan Didion’s writings about her roots in Sacramento, the state capitol;
Ishi, the Last of his Tribe and the later biography titled Ishi in Two Worlds, both by Theodore Kroeber, poignant accounts of the last survivors of an indigenous Northern California tribe;
and Cindy Sample, who currently lives in the El Dorado County foothills and sets her lighthearted cozy mystery series in and around the region where she lives (great fun).
Two more California writers I currently enjoy are Laura Dave and Jasmine Guillory, both of whom set their stories in various places throughout California, but primarily centered in the LA and Bay Areas. (Both do place some of their work in the Napa Valley region as well!)
I could go on, but I just wanted to remind readers that California’s beauty and charm go far beyond its biggest, most famous cities and its storied coastal region.
The Lincoln Lawyer, Bosch & Renee Ballard series by Michael Connelly are all set in Los Angeles.
The Women by Kristen Hannah is partially set on Coronado Island ( near San Diego), California. The Tortilla Curtain by T. C. Boyle is set in Topanga Canyon( near Malibu), CA. Island of the Blue Dolphins, winner of the Newbery Medal, by Scott O’Dell, is a beautiful & inspiring children’s book set on San Nicolas Island, off the coast of California , near Santa Barbara. The book is based on the real–life story of a Native American girl left alone on San Nicolas Island for 18 years, during the 19th century. It’s part of the 4th grade reading curriculum in Santa Barbara schools.
If you are in Santa Barbara, The Book Den, downtown across from the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, was founded in 1902 and has been in its current location since 1933, is wonderful. Another very old, hidden treasure for book lovers is Tecolote, in Montecito.
A book set in LA that still haunts me even now, despite having read it several years ago is Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha, which is about the LA riots that took place in the 1990s – an event that I remember vividly because it happened so close to home. Reading that book was particularly difficult for me since it captured a time period and moment in history that I was actually there for (which I write about in more detail in my review https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2815849960) but it is one of the most realistic fictionalized accounts I’ve read to date that captures the realities of what life was like living in LA as an Asian American during that time. Definitely recommended, though of course trigger warnings abound.
Eight Hundred Grapes by Laura Dave
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