Southern California Rating:FICTION1 DEMOLITION ANGEL by...

Southern California Rating:

FICTION

1 DEMOLITION ANGEL by Robert Crais (Doubleday: $24.95) Carol Starkey must confront some old demons as she looks into the death by detonation of a former colleague.

Last Week: 1; Weeks on List: 3

2 THE TOUGHEST INDIAN IN THE WORLD by Sherman Alexie (Atlantic Monthly: $24) Stories of Native Americans caught between their culture and a sometimes hostile American middle-class.

Last Week: 3; Weeks on List: 2

3 THE INDWELLING by Tim F. Lahaye and Jerry B. Jenkins (Tyndale: $22.95) In Chapter Seven of the “Left Behind” series, the members of Tribulation Force face both judgment and salvation.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

4 THE HOUSE OF GENTLE MEN by Kathy Hepinstall (Bard: $22) In a special place in the Louisiana back country, men and women confront and try to eradicate the demons of their past.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 2

5 WHITE TEETH by Zadie Smith (Random House: $24.95) The intertwined stories of two North London families capture an empire’s worth of cultural identity, history and hope.

Last Week: 7; Weeks on List: 5

6 ANIL’S GHOST by Michael Ondaatje (Alfred A. Knopf: $25) A forensic anthropologist arrives in Ceylon to investigate the source of the organized campaign of murder engulfing the island.

Last Week: 2; Weeks on List: 5

7 THE HUMAN STAIN by Philip Roth (Houghton Mifflin: $26) The chronicle of an academic scandal and its impact on the aging faculty dean at its center and on his friend, Nathan Zuckerman.

Last Week: 6; Weeks on List: 4

8 GONE FOR SOLDIERS by Jeff Shaara (Ballantine: $26.95) Robert E. Lee is inducted into the mysteries of supreme command in the midst of the Mexican-American War.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

9 CRADLE AND ALL by James Patterson (Little, Brown: $25.95) A former nun turned private investigator, probing a series of seemingly immaculate conceptions, realizes her life is in danger.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

10 SARAH by J.T. Leroy (Bloomsbury: $19.95) The story of the prodigal son recast in a highway truck stop and its environs, as a 12-year-old boy tries to become as famous as his mother.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

11 TUFF by Paul Beatty (Alfred A. Knopf: $23) A 19-year-old boy is offered $20,000 to run for city council in East Harlem and embarks on an outlandish campaign.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

12 THE BRETHREN by John Grisham (Doubleday: $27.95) A scam by three former judges doing time in federal prison goes awry and ensnares a powerful man on the outside.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 13

13 EASY PREY by John Sandford (Putnam: $25.95) When a supermodel is found strangled after a party, millionaire Lucas Davenport is called to investigate.

Last Week: 8; Weeks on List: 3

14 DAUGHTER OF FORTUNE by Isabel Allende (HarperCollins: $26) A young woman escapes from the bonds of her youthful passion to Gold Rush California.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 22

15 BEFORE I SAY GOOD-BYE by Mary Higgins Clark (Simon & Schuster: $26) An ambitious young woman uses gumshoe tactics and psychic powers to probe her late husband’s murky past.

Last Week: 5; Weeks on List: 5

NONFICTION

1 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: 2; Weeks on List: 17

2 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: 13; Weeks on List: 2

3 ME TALK PRETTY ONE DAY by David Sedaris (Little, Brown: $22.95) Essays covering topics such as the cultural confusions of learning French in Paris. Reviewed by Susan Salter Reynolds, Page 11.

Last Week: 10; Weeks on List: 2

4 TEN THINGS I WISH I’D KNOWN BEFORE I WENT INTO THE REAL WORLD by Maria Shriver (Warner: $19.95) Notes from life’s trenches, expanded from a commencement speech.

Last Week: 1; Weeks on List: 7

5 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: 6; Weeks on List: 3

6 TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE by Mitch Albom (Doubleday: $19.95) A sportswriter’s empowering story about his weekly visits to see an older dying friend.

Last Week: 5; Weeks on List: 124

7 WHO MOVED MY CHEESE? by Spencer Johnson (Putnam: $19.95) This co-author of “The One Minute Manager” advises managers on how to get employees Y2K ready.

Last Week: 4; Weeks on List: 17

8 WHICH LIE DID I TELL? by William Goldman (Pantheon: $26.95) Further adventures in the screen trade from a veteran screenwriter whose work includes “All the President’s Men.”

Last Week: 7; Weeks on List: 12

9 CODE OF THE SAMURAI by Yuzan Daidoji, translated by Thomas Cleary (Charles E. Tuttle: $14.95) A modern translation of the Bushido Shoshinsu, the way of the Japanese warrior.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

10 IN THE HEART OF THE SEA by Nathaniel Philbrick (Viking: $24.95) Life and death aboard the Nantucket whaler Essex, which was sunk by a sperm whale in 1821.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 2

11 THE DEBT by Randall Robinson (Dutton: $23.95) An influential lobbyist argues that African Americans should be compensated by the government for institutionalized racism.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 4

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: --; Weeks on List: 57

13 DIGITAL DIARIES by Natacha Merritt (Taschen: $29.99) Photographs, from the explicit to the mundane, of a life lived in front of a digital camera.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

14 ‘TIS by Frank McCourt (Scribner: $26) A young McCourt arrives from Ireland in New York, with all its peril and promise, in this sequel to “Angela’s Ashes.”

Last Week: 11; Weeks on List: 31

15 GEORGIANA by Amanda Foreman (Random House: $29.95) Love affairs, drugs, gambling and scandals in the life of an 18th century ancestor of the late Princess Diana.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 11

PAPERBACKS

FICTION

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

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

3 INTERPRETER OF MALADIES by Jhumpa Lahiri (Mariner: $12) Indian heritage colors the lives of people coping with loss.

4 THE BLUEST EYE by Toni Morrison (Penguin: $12.95) An African American girl prays for her eyes to turn blue.

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

6 WHILE I WAS GONE by Sue Miller (Ballantine: $12.95) A stranger unsettles a veterinarian’s perfect world.

7 HANNIBAL by Thomas Harris (Dell: $7.99) A cleverly repulsive sequel to “The Silence of the Lambs.”

8 CHOCOLAT by Joanne Harris (Penguin: $12.95) A woman and her daughter open a chocolate store in a French village.

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

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

PAPERBACKS

NONFICTION

1 THE WORST-CASE SCENARIO SURVIVAL HANDBOOK by Joshua Piven and David Borgenicht (Chronicle: $14.95) S-O-S!

2 THE KILLING OF TUPAC SHAKUR by Cathy Scott (Huntington Press: $5.99) The story behind the murder of the 25-year-old rapper.

3 THE PERFECT STORM by Sebastian Junger (HarperPaperback: $13) Fishermen lost in a furious ocean storm.

4 NO EASY ANSWERS by Sally Smith (Bantam: $13.95) Raising children with learning differences.

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

6 BELLA TUSCANY by Frances Mayes (Broadway: $15) Stories of cuisine and Italian life in the villages.

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

8 THE ORCHID THIEF by Susan Orlean (Ballantine: $14) Centuries of theft, hatred and greed over a delicate flower.

9 A WALK IN THE WOODS by Bill Bryson (Broadway: $13) A memoir and a meditation on American wilderness.

10 GIRL, INTERRUPTED by Susanna Kaysen (Vintage: $12) A memoir of life in a psychiatric institute in 1967.

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Rankings are based on a Times poll of Southland bookstores.