26 recommended reads for those traveling to California (or who want to)

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 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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →

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 →