Southern California Rankings:FICTION1. A MAN IN FULL...

Southern California Rankings:

FICTION

1. A MAN IN FULL by Tom Wolfe (Farrar, Straus and Giroux: $28.95) The story of a real estate tycoon’s crash and burn and the sleaze who warm themselves by the fire.

Last Week: 1; Weeks on List: 2

2. PARABLE OF THE TALENTS by Octavia E. Butler (Seven Stories Press: $24.95) Survival in a dangerous early-21st century California. Reviewed by Susan Salter Reynolds, p. 15.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

3. MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA by Arthur Golden (Alfred A. Knopf: $25) The life and loves of a fisherman’s daughter who becomes a teahouse entertainer in Kyoto before and during WWII.

Last Week: 9; Weeks on List: 52

4. THE VAMPIRE ARMAND by Anne Rice (Alfred A. Knopf: $26.95) Is Lestat dead? As vampires from around the globe gather near his body, Armand tells his own story.

Last Week: 7; Weeks on List: 5

5. THE POISONWOOD BIBLE by Barbara Kingsolver (HarperCollins: $27.50) An evangelical Baptist missionary takes his wife and children to the Belgian Congo in 1959.

Last Week: 3; Weeks on List: 6

6. THE HAMMER OF EDEN by Ken Follett (Crown: $25.95) A young FBI agent must track down a terrorist group with the power to create earthquakes.

Last Week: 4; Weeks on List: 4

7. MIRROR IMAGE by Danielle Steel (Delacorte: $26.95) Beautiful, young, wealthy twins share adventures--and a husband--in the early part of the century.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

8. ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT by Mary Higgins Clark (Simon and Schuster: $17) A Christmas suspense story, complete with abandoned baby and jewel thief.

Last Week: 12; Weeks on List: 4

9. BRIDGET JONES’S DIARY by Helen Fielding (Viking: $22.95) The New Year’s resolutions of a single thirtysomething girlie Brit, from personal appearance to the perfect man.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 19

10. THE JEWELS OF TESSA KENT by Judith Krantz (Crown: $25.95) The workings of an auction house and the lives of two women, the men they love and their families.

Last Week: 8; Weeks on List: 2

11. WHEN THE WIND BLOWS by James Patterson (Little, Brown: $25) An astonishing discovery in the woods brings together a recently widowed veterinarian and a troubled FBI agent.

Last Week: 2; Weeks on List: 2

12. THE LOVE OF A GOOD WOMAN by Alice Munro (Alfred A. Knopf: $24) Eight new stories from Munro deal with love, passion, chaos and human desire.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

13. BLUE LIGHT by Walter Mosley (Little, Brown: $23) Flashes of blue light fall to Earth in the 1960s, and several Northern Californians gain superhuman powers.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 3

14. THE PATH OF DAGGERS by Robert Jordan (Tor: $27.95) The Wheel of Time series continues; as Book Eight opens, the Seanchan force is in possession of Ebou Dar. 5 4

Last Week: 5; Weeks on List: 4

15. BAG OF BONES by Stephen King (Scribner: $27.50) A best-selling writer is haunted by writer’s block and ghosts at his Maine summer home.

Last Week: 10; Weeks on List: 6

****

NONFICTION

1. CONVERSATIONS WITH GOD, BOOK THREE by Neale Donald Walsch (Hampton Roads: $22.95) Further dispatches on life and death dictated by the Man Upstairs.

Last Week: 3; Weeks on List: 2

2. 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: 1; Weeks on List: 46

3. PURE DRIVEL by Steve Martin (Hyperion: $21) A collection of humorous riffs and comical sketches on various topics, most written by the entertainer for the New Yorker.

Last Week: 2; Weeks on List: 8

4. THE PROFESSOR AND THE MADMAN by Simon Winchester (HarperCollins: $22) The editor of the Oxford English Dictionary was helped by a brilliant mental patient.

Last Week: 5; Weeks on List: 9

5. THE GOOD LIFE by Tony Bennett (Simon and Schuster: $25) The guy who left his heart in San Francisco shares a half century of memories from on and off the stage.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

6. KING LEOPOLD’S GHOST by Adam Hochschild (Houghton Mifflin: $26) How a Belgian king’s rule of terror in the Congo led to the deaths of 4 million indigenous people.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

7. WORK IN PROGRESS by Michael Eisner with Tony Schwartz (Random House: $27.50) The corporate rise and rise of Disney’s No. 1 mouseketeer.

Last Week: 12; Weeks on List: 5

8. LINDBERGH by A. Scott Berg (Putnam: $30) Daring aviator, loving father, isolationist and, finally, fallen hero--a dramatic American story.

Last Week: 7; Weeks on List: 9

9. CONVERSATIONS WITH GOD, BOOK ONE by Neale Donald Walsch (Putnam: $19.95) Channeling messages from Mr. Big about good, evil and the meaning of life.

Last Week: 4; Weeks on List: 73

10. THE NUMBER DEVIL by Hans Magnus Enzensberger (Metropolitan: $22) A young boy visits the world of numbers--prime, infinite and otherwise.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

11. KADDISH by Leon Wieseltier (Alfred A. Knopf: $27.50) A son’s reflection on the “mourner’s kaddish” he recites in the year after his father’s death.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 5

12. KING OF THE WORLD by David Remnick (Random House: $25) From Cassius Clay to Muhammad Ali--the story of the world’s greatest prizefighter.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

13. TUNESMITH by Jimmy Webb (Hyperion: $24.95) A primer for aspiring songwriters and pop music aficionados from one of the legends of the American songbook.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

14. JUST JACKIE by Edward Klein (Ballantine: $25.95) New details on what lay beneath the glamour and glitter of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.

Last Week: 8; Weeks on List: 5

15. FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME by Michael Jordan (Crown: $50) An antidote to the NBA strike: a career restrospective--with 200 photos--from the Bulls star.

Last Week: --; Weeks on List: 1

Paperbacks

FICTION

1. DIVINE SECRETS OF THE YA-YA SISTERHOOD by Rebecca Wells (Harper Collins: $13) Sisterhood in the South.

2. COLD MOUNTAIN by Charles Frazier (Vintage: $13) A Confederate soldier quits the Civil War.

3. BELOVED by Toni Morrison (Plume: $12.95) Remarkable occurrences in the life of an ex-slave.

4. THE READER by Bernhard Schlink (Vintage: $11) A boyhood interlude with an older woman and its aftermath.

5. SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST by Jonathan Kellerman (Bantam: $7.50) A killer murders in the name of science.

6. MIDWIVES by Chris Bohjalian (Vintage: $13) The moral dilemmas of a New England midwife.

7. THE WINNER by David Baldacci (WarnerVision: $7.99) A man, a woman and a crooked lottery scheme.

8. CAT & MOUSE by James Patterson (Warner: $7.99) On the trail of two psychopaths.

9. THE GOD OF SMALL THINGS by Arundhati Roy (HarperPerennial: $13) Rise and fall of an Indian family.

10. THE BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES 1998 edited by Garrison Keillor (Houghton Mifflin: $13) New and familiar voices.

****

NONFICTION

1. THE SEAT OF THE SOUL by Gary Zukav (Fireside: $12) Insights into creating the spirituality of daily life.

2. UNDER THE TUSCAN SUN by Frances Mayes (Broadway: $13) Making a home in a glorious Italian landscape.

3. THE MILLIONAIRE NEXT DOOR by Thomas J. Stanley and William D. Danko (Pocket: $14) Secrets of the wealthy.

4. INTO THIN AIR by Jon Krakauer (Anchor Books: $7.99) Risk and recklessness on a Mt. Everest expedition.

5. THE PERFECT STORM by Sebastian Junger (HarperPerennial: $13) Fisherman trapped in a storm.

6. HOLIDAYS ON ICE by David Sedaris (Little, Brown: $8.25) Department store Santas and other oddities.

7. NAKED by David Sedaris (Little, Brown: $12.95) Autobiographical essays from the NPR commentator.

8. TAKE THE RICH OFF WELFARE by Mark Zepezauer and Arthur Naiman (Odanian: $9) A new way to budget.

9. CITY OF QUARTZ by Mike Davis (Vintage: $15) How L.A.’s history and power structures will shape the city’s future.

10. INTO THE WILD by Jon Krakauer (Anchor Books: $12.95) A young man’s journey and death in the wilderness.

Rankings are based on a Times poll of Southland bookstores.