Southern California Rating:FICTION1 THE BEAR AND THE...

Southern California Rating:

FICTION

1 THE BEAR AND THE DRAGON by Tom Clancy (Putnam: $28.95) CIA warrior and U.S. president Jack Ryan faces brewing trouble in Russia and China and a global struggle for Siberian oil.

Last Week: 1; Weeks on List: 3

2 THE BLIND ASSASSIN by Margaret Atwood (Nan A. Talese/Doubleday: $26) A narrative tour de force of self-deceit and revenge that joins the lives of two sisters with an unpublished sci-fi novel.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

3 PAGAN BABIES by Elmore Leonard (Dell: $24.95) A hard-boiled priest and a fast-talking tough girl team up against a Detroit mobster to raise money for Rwandan orphans.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

4 FAITH OF THE FALLEN by Terry Goodkind (Tor: $27.95) Book Six of the Sword of Truth series: Emperor Jagang is rising once again in the Old World.

Last Week: 6; Weeks on List: 2

5 FOUR BLONDES by Candace Bushnell (Atlantic Monthly: $24) Interconnected stories from the “Sex and the City” author about four women caught up in the glitz and glamour of New York.

Last Week: 4; Weeks on List: 3

6 WINTER SOLSTICE by Rosamunde Pilcher (St. Martin’s Press: $27.95) On the shortest day of the year, five people find themselves in a house in Northern Scotland learning to live with loss.

Last Week: 3; Weeks on List: 6

7 A PERMANENT TWILIGHT by Chuck Freadhoff (HarperCollins: $25) Idealistic reporter Johnny Rose probes L.A.’s underworld to find out who killed his runaway niece.

Last Week: 2; Weeks on List: 3

8 THE MAN WHO ATE THE 747 by Ben Sherwood (Bantam: $19.95) The romantic foibles of a Nebraskan farmer who eats a plane, crashed in his field, for his ladylove.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

9 THE SWITCH by Sandra Brown (Warner Books: $25.95) A beautiful identical twin seeking to avenge the murder of her sister runs across a strange cult immersed in a frightening project.

Last Week: 15; Weeks on List: 2

10 THE JAMES DEAN AFFAIR by Robert S. Levinson (Forge: $24.95) When a James Dean look-alike kills a soap opera star, amateur sleuths Neil Gulliver and Stevie Marriner decide to investigate.

Last Week: 13; Weeks on List: 4

11 A DENSITY OF SOULS by Christopher Rice (Talk Miramax: $23.95) Coming of age and the cruelties of a New Orleans prep school, from the vampire author’s son.

Last Week: 5; Weeks on List: 3

12 STALKER by Faye Kellerman (William Morrow: $25) Cynthia Decker, a young L.A. cop, wonders whether she’s being hazed by her colleagues or pursued by more violent offenders.

Last Week: 9; Weeks on List: 4

13 SHATTERED by Dick Francis (Putnam: $25.95) Violent thugs and the death of a jockey friend threaten a glass-blower’s world, unless he can learn the secret of a stolen videotape.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

14 OMERTA by Mario Puzo (Random House: $25.95) A family on the brink of legitimacy in a world of criminals finds itself caught in the middle of one last Mafia war.

Last Week: 12; Weeks on List: 7

15 BEE SEASON by Myla Goldberg (Doubleday: $22.95) A 9-year-old girl’s sudden success in spelling bees divides her family and causes each member to reassess the meaning of love and relationships.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 4

NONFICTION

1 NOTHING LIKE IT IN THE WORLD by Stephen Ambrose (Simon & Schuster: $28) The historian looks at the building of the transcontinental railroad and its impact on the growth of the nation.

Last Week: 3; Weeks on List: 3

2 WHO MOVED MY CHEESE? by Spencer Johnson (Putnam: $19.95) This co-author of “The One Minute Manager” uses the parable of mice in a maze to show people how to manage change.

Last Week: 1; Weeks on List: 28

3 I LOVE YOU, RONNIE The Letters of Ronald Reagan to Nancy Reagan (Random House: $24.95) Glimpses of the private life of the Gipper and his first lady, from his movie-making days to the presidency.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

4 ME TALK PRETTY ONE DAY by David Sedaris (Little, Brown: $22.95) Wisecracking essays on life with dad and the confusion and humiliation of learning French in Paris.

Last Week: 2; Weeks on List: 17

5 MEAN GENES by Terry Burnham and Jay Phelan (Perseus: $24) How greed, infidelity and other vices are part of our genetic inheritance dating to humanity’s hunter-gatherer days.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

6 IT’S NOT ABOUT THE BIKE by Lance Armstrong with Sally Jenkins (Putnam: $24.95) Triumph in the life of a champion cyclist, from overcoming cancer to winning the Tour de France.

Last Week: 4; Weeks on List: 8

7 A HEARTBREAKING WORK OF STAGGERING GENIUS by Dave Eggers (Simon & Schuster: $23) Memoir of a twentysomething slacker, who must bring up his baby brother when their parents die of cancer.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 30

8 AMERICAN RHAPSODY by Joe Eszterhas (Alfred A. Knopf: $25.95) Speedy ruminations on our national id accompanied by a techno-rave drumbeat of paranoia and sleaze.

Last Week: 6; Weeks on List: 8

9 TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE by Mitch Albom (Doubleday: $19.95) A sportswriter’s story of the life lessons he received during weekly visits to an older dying friend.

Last Week: 8; Weeks on List: 136

10 KITCHEN CONFIDENTIAL by Anthony Bourdain (Bloomsbury: $24.95) Tools of the culinary trade and tales from the trenches by the acclaimed chef of Les Halles in New York.

Last Week: 9; Weeks on List: 4

11 DREAM CATCHER by Margaret A. Salinger (Washington Square: $27.95) J.D. Salinger’s daughter describes growing up in the shadow of Holden, Phoebe and his other fictional creations.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

12 THE GREATEST GENERATION by Tom Brokaw (Random House: $24.95) TV anchor tells the stories of the generation that came of age during the Depression and World War II.

Last Week: 5; Weeks on List: 65

13 FROM DAWN TO DECADENCE by Jacques Barzun (HarperCollins: $36) A magnum opus from the eminent historian on the rise and fall of Western culture over the last 500 years.

Last Week: 14; Weeks on List: 17

14 FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS by James Bradley with Ron Powers (Bantam: $24.95) A son pieces together the history of his father, who helped raise the American flag at Iwo Jima.

Last Week: 13; Weeks on List: 14

15 ALL ABOUT LOVE by bell hooks (William Morrow: $22) How our everyday notions of what it means to give and receive love, established in childhood, often fail us in adulthood.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 2

PAPERBACKS

FICTION

1 THE RED TENT by Anita Diamant (Picador USA: $14) The blossoming of Dinah, Jacob’s only daughter, in Genesis.

2 SAVING FAITH by David Baldacci (Warner Vision: $7.99) A super-patriot uses treachery to return to the CIA’s glory days.

3 THE GIRLS’ GUIDE TO HUNTING AND FISHING by Melissa Bank (Penguin: $12.95) A young girl’s hunt for lasting love.

4 THE POISONWOOD BIBLE by Barbara Kingsolver (HarperPerennial: $14) A missionary family’s ordeals.

5 INTERPRETER OF MALADIES by Jhumpa Lahiri (Mariner: $12) Indian customs color the lives of people coping with loss.

6 HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG by Andre Dubus III (Vintage: $14) Two families clash over an auctioned house in this tragic tale.

7 THE SAVING GRACES by Patricia Gaffney (HarperPaperback: $6.99) The friendship of four women facing life’s hardships.

8 MONSTER by Jonathan Kellerman (Ballantine: $7.99) Alex Delaware hunts a psychologist’s killer in an insane asylum.

9 THE HOURS by Michael Cunningham (Picador USA: $13) Three stories built on Virginia Woolf’s novel “Mrs. Dalloway.”

10 HEADLONG by Michael Frayn (Picador: $14) Slapstick efforts by a professor to swindle a painting from an oafish landowner.

PAPERBACKS

NONFICTION

1 DAY HIKES AROUND LOS ANGELES by Robert B. Stone (Day Hike Books: $11.95) A guide to 45 trails for the non-serious hiker.

2 GUNS, GERMS AND STEEL by Jared Diamond (W.W. Norton: $14.95) The part played by this triad in history.

3 NO ONE LEFT TO LIE TO by Christopher Hitchens (Verso: $10) An invective against the Clinton presidency.

4 LIES MY TEACHER TOLD ME by James W. Loewen (Touchstone: $14) History textbooks that “make students stupid.”

5 THE PROFESSOR AND THE MADMAN by Simon Winchester (HarperPerennial: $13) A madman with a flair for words.

6 THE TERRIBLE HOURS by Peter Maas (HarperPaperback: $6.99) Rescuing the crew of a sunken sub and the man responsible.

7 RICH DAD, POOR DAD by Robert T. Kiyosaki and Sharon L. Lechter (Techpress: $15.95) Adventures in fiscal parenting.

8 THE SEAT OF THE SOUL by Gary Zukav (Fireside: $13) Teaching readers to rethink the mind-body connection.

9 LAKER GLORY by Tim Kawakami (Los Angeles Times Books: $18.95) Bling, bling: A look at the 1999-2000 season.

10 THE HUNGRY OCEAN by Linda Greenlaw (Hyperion: $14) Life on the Hannah Boden with “The Perfect Storm’s” Greenlaw.

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Rankings are based on a Times poll of Southland bookstores.