Books Set in California

East of Eden

Penguin Audio Classics

By: John Steinbeck
Narrated by: Richard Poe
Length: 25 hours 18 minutes

“Often described as Steinbeck's most ambitious novel, East of Eden brings to life the intricate details of two families, the Trasks and the Hamiltons, and their interwoven stories. If books can be described as amusement park rides, this one would be a roller coaster ('I'm on a roller coaster of emotion!') as it often had me laughing, crying,... Read more

The Joy Luck Club

By: Amy Tan
Narrated by: Gwendoline Yeo
Length: 9 hours 5 minutes

For decades, a quartet of Chinese women who have emigrated to San Francisco gather to eat dim sum, play mahjong, and talk—they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. Over the years, their stories have informed the lives of four daughters who feel the weight of family and world history on their shoulders. With wit and sensitivity, this novel explores... Read more

The Black Dahlia

L. A. Quartet

By: James Ellroy
Narrated by: Stephen Hoye
Length: 13 hours 54 minutes

Bonus feature includes an original afterword by James Ellroy, titled "Hillikers," read by Stephen Hoye.

On January 15, 1947, the torture-ravished body of a beautiful young woman is found in a vacant lot. The victim makes headlines as the Black Dahlia–and so begins the greatest manhunt in California history.

Caught up in the investigation are Bucky... Read more

The Day of the Locust

By: Nathanael West
Narrated by: Grover Gardner
Length: 5 hours 21 minutes

Admired by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dorothy Parker, and Dashiell Hammett, and hailed as one of the best one hundred English-language novels by Time magazine, The Day of the Locust continues to influence American writers, artists, and culture. Bob Dylan wrote the classic song “Day of the Locusts” in homage, and Matt Groening’s Homer Simpson is named... Read more

The Big Sleep

A Philip Marlowe Novel

By: Raymond Chandler
Narrated by: Scott Brick
Length: 6 hours 32 minutes

The renowned novel from the crime fiction master, with the "quintessential urban private eye" (Los Angeles Times), Philip Marlowe. • Featuring the iconic character that inspired the film Marlowe, starring Liam Neeson.

One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years

A dying millionaire hires private eye Philip Marlowe to handle... Read more

Daughter of Fortune

By: Isabel Allende
Narrated by: Isabel Allende & Blair Brown
Length: 13 hours 19 minutes

From the New York Times bestselling author of The House of the Spirits, Isabelle Allende, comes a passionate tale of one young woman's quest to save her lover set against the chaos of the 1849 California Gold Rush. Orphaned at birth, Eliza Sommers is raised in the British colony of Valparaíso, Chile, by the well-intentioned Victorian spinster... Read more

Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

A Novel

By: Robin Sloan
Narrated by: Ari Fliakos
Length: 7 hours 41 minutes

“A web designer and computer whiz is forced to find work at a small San Francisco bookstore, instead of silicon valley. The owner is strange and doesn't seem to be bothered by the fact that customers don't buy any books: they just borrow large, dusty tomes and return them a few days later. What follows is a whirlwind of high-tech sleuthing... Read more

The Tortilla Curtain

By: T. C. Boyle
Narrated by: T. C. Boyle
Length: 11 hours 47 minutes

In this explosive and timely novel, T. C. Boyle explores an issue at the forefront of the political arena. He confronts the controversy over illegal immigration head-on, illuminating through a poignant, gripping story the people on both sides of the issue: the haves and the have-nots.In Southern California’s Topanga Canyon, two couples live in... Read more

Tales of the City - Abridged

Tales of the City: Book #1

By: Armistead Maupin
Narrated by: Armistead Maupin
Length: 2 hours 58 minutes

A PBS Great American Read Top 100 PickThe first novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin’s bestselling San Francisco saga, and inspiration for the Netflix original series, Tales of the City“A consummate entertainer who has made a generation laugh. . . . It is Maupin’s Dickensian gift to be able to render love... Read more

Bound for Gold

A Peter Fallon Novel of the California Gold Rush

Peter Fallon: Book #6

By: William Martin
Narrated by: John Pruden
Length: 19 hours 56 minutes

Rare-book dealer Peter Fallon returns in a thrilling historical novel about the California Gold Rush, by New York Times bestselling author William MartinBound for Gold continues New York Times bestselling author William Martin’s epic of American history with the further adventures of Boston rare-book dealer Peter Fallon and his girlfriend,... Read more

The Maltese Falcon

By: Dashiell Hammett
Narrated by: William Dufris
Length: 7 hours 7 minutes

The Maltese Falcon is the definitive masterpiece of the hard-boiled detective genre. It introduces legendary PI Sam Spade, a loner who follows his own code and the rules of the street as he zeros in on his partner’s killer and the famous jewel-encrusted bird. Humphrey Bogart immortalized the tough-guy detective in the classic 1941 film. Read more

White Oleander - Abridged

By: Janet Fitch
Narrated by: Oprah Winfrey
Length: 6 hours 21 minutes

“A complex story of a daughter and mother that is intriguing and difficult to put down. A dark and skillfully crafted book that will stick with you. Highly recommend!! Read more

The Octopus

A Story of California

The Epic of the Wheat Series: Book #1

By: Frank Norris
Narrated by: John Lescault
Length: 21 hours 32 minutes

Like the tentacles of an octopus, the railroad in California reached out across the state, grasping everything of value in the state.Based on the bloody Mussel Slough Tragedy—a conflict between wheat farmers and the Southern Pacific Railroad—The Octopus is a stunning novel chronicling the twilight of the frontier West, a depiction of the... Read more

The Deer Park

A Novel

By: Norman Mailer
Narrated by: John Buffalo Mailer
Length: 12 hours 35 minutes

Amid the cactus wilds some two hundred miles from Hollywood lies a privileged oasis called Desert D'Or. It is a place for starlets and would-be starlets, directors, studio execs, and the well-groomed lowlifes who cater to them. And, as imagined by Norman Mailer in this blistering classic of 1950s Hollywood, Desert D'Or is a moral proving ground,... Read more

Wild

From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail (Oprah's Book Club 2.0)

By: Cheryl Strayed
Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
Length: 13 hours 1 minute

Oprah's Book Club 2.0 selection.

A powerful, blazingly honest memoir: the story of an eleven-hundred-mile solo hike that broke down a young woman reeling from catastrophe—and built her back up again.
 
At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon... Read more

California Girl

By: T. Jefferson Parker
Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
Length: 12 hours 5 minutes

A different world then, a different world now…California in the 1960s, and the winds of change are raging. Orange groves uprooted for tract houses, people flooding into Orange County, and strange new ideas in the air about war, music, sex, and drugs, and new influences including Richard Nixon and Timothy Leary.But for the Becker brothers, the... Read more

California

A History

A Modern Library Chronicles: Book #23

By: Kevin Starr
Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
Length: 13 hours 18 minutes

From the age of exploration to the age of Arnold, the Golden State’s premier historian distills the entire sweep of California’s history into one splendid volume.

Kevin Starr covers it all: Spain’s conquest of the native peoples of California in the early sixteenth century and the chain of missions that helped that country exert control over the... Read more