After a grueling presidential election, Mary Cotton of Newtonville Books said she was worried about holiday sales. “But then people came and were looking for books as answers, as comfort,’’ she said.
Some of the most popular titles at her store have included works that touch on politics and identity, such as Arlie Russell Hochschild’s “Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right’’ and J.D. Vance’s “Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis.’’ The year’s big novels — Colson Whitehead’s “The Underground Railroad,’’ Ann Patchett’s “Commonwealth,’’ Michael Chabon’s “Moonglow’’ — are selling briskly, but Cotton says she’s also recommending a sweet and quirky book called “Memoirs of a Polar Bear’’ by Yoko Tawada.
Katie Eelman at Papercuts JP said that two of her store’s hottest sellers have been Bernie Sanders’s campaign memoir, “Our Revolution: A Future to Believe in,’’ and local music icon Rick Berlin’s autobiography, “The Paragraphs’’ published by Cutlass Press, launched this year by Papercuts.
One unexpectedly popular book has been “The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate — Discoveries From a Secret World’’ by Peter Wohlleben. “It’s been selling like mad,’’ said Rachel Cass of Harvard Book Store, along with perennial seasonal blockbusters, such as David Sedaris’s essay collection “Holidays on Ice.’’
Marilyn Racette at Book Ends said big sellers at her store “seem to be skewing toward nonfiction.’’ Big titles at the Winchester shop include Michael Lewis’s “The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds’’ and Michael Holley’s “Belichick and Brady: Two Men, the Patriots, and How They Revolutionized Football.’’
Gillian Kohli of Wellesley Books was one of many booksellers to praise Amor Towles’s “A Gentleman in Moscow,’’ which she recommended for its absorbing exploration of character and its evocative unfolding of Russian history.
At Brookline Booksmith, Thomas Wickersham noted a trend of “amazing books by and about women,’’ including Grace Bonney’s “In the Company of Women: Inspiration and Advice From 100 Makers, Artists, and Entrepreneurs’’ as well as three books about artistic clashes: Globe art critic Sebastian Smee’s “The Art of Rivalry: Four Friendships, Betrayals, and Breakthroughs in Modern Art,’’ Alex Beam’s “The Feud: Vladimir Nabokov, Edmund Wilson, and the End of a Beautiful Friendship,’’ and “You Must Change Your Life: The Story of Rainer Maria Rilke and Auguste Rodin’’ by Rachel Corbett. “I’m revealing my personal Christmas list,’’ Wickersham added. “My mom and dad should stop reading if they don’t want their surprise to be spoiled.’’
Kate Tuttle, a writer and editor, can be reached at kate.tuttle@gmail.com.
