Since this is the season to buy car books, let’s find out which ones are the hottest at Amazon.com. If you click through the following links you will find that their top 100 auto history books have considerable overlap with their automotive pictorial and classic cars book lists. However, if you dig some more you’ll find less overlap between other categories, such as automotive industries, automotive racing and car customization.
My main takeaway in looking through these lists is the predominance of “car porn” — that is, oversized books with lots of big-and-colorful pictures of automobiles in sultry repose. Or going fast and furiously. There are even a few books apparently designed to be held with one hand.
Consumers most yearn to gaze upon muscle and exotic cars. For example, the Chevy Corvette Trivia Book (Collins, 2021) ranks either No. 1 or 2 on two lists. So too does Built for Speed: The World’s Fastest Road Cars (auto editors of Consumer Guide, 2019).
Serious books are back over there in the corner
Meanwhile, I don’t see many books that appear to tackle a serious subject. For example, Freewaytopia: How Freeways Shaped Los Angeles (Haddad, 2021) ranks a distant No. 70 and Driving While Black (Sullivan Sorin, 2020) is even farther back at No. 78 in the automotive history list.
The automotive industries list has the most popular serious books. As a case in point, Power Play: Tesla, Elon Musk, and the Bet of the Century (Higgins, 2021) ranks No. 5 and The Toyota Way, Second Edition: 14 Management Principles from the World’s Greatest Manufacturer (Liker, 2020) comes in at No. 8.
Of the books reviewed at Indie Auto (go here for a complete list), one of the best-selling ones is My Dad Had That Car (Burness, 2017). This is a car spotter’s guide composed of little more than images cut and pasted from brochures and ads. Another high-ranking book is American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company (Hoffman, 2013), a timeless exercise in hagiography that would make a heart-warming Touched By An Angel episode.
In short, infotainment seems to be popular this holiday season. Fortunately, the book publishing industry is quite happy to oblige.
Share your reactions to this post with a comment below or a note to the editor.
RE:SOURCES
- Burness, Tad; 2017. My Dad Had That Car: A Nostalgic Look at the American Automobile, 1920-1990. Hachette Book Group, New York, NY.
- Collins, Seth; 2021. Chevy Corvette Trivia Book: Uncover The History & Facts Every Corvette Fan Needs To Know! Bridge Press.
- Haddad, Paul; 2021. Freewaytopia: How Freeways Shaped Los Angeles. Santa Monica Press.
- Higgins, Tim; 2021. Power Play: Tesla, Elon Musk, and the Bet of the Century. Doubleday.
- Hoffman, Bryce G.; 2012. American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company. Crown Business, New York, NY.
- Liker, Jeffery; 2020. The Toyota Way, Second Edition: 14 Management Principles from the World’s Greatest Manufacturer. 2nd Ed. McGraw Hill.
- Sullivan Sorin, Gretchen; 2020. Driving While Black: African American Travel and the Road to Civil Rights. Liveright.
Hi Steve, any automotive titles NOT on your quite comprehensive list of reviewed books that you would suggest checking out? Also, is there a decent history of Oldsmobile that you or any of your other readers might recommend? Thanks!
Hi, CJ! The range of books I have reviewed is somewhat broad but rather nerdy. I’m a retiree and on a fixed income so I have focused on buying books that I most need to research Indie Auto articles. Often the books are older, obscure and out of print. For example, I’d usually rather get my hands on another Richard Langworth history than most of the new books on Amazon’s top-100 auto history list.
I’m hesitant to make general book recommendations to you because your reading taste is likely very different than mine, but I’d like to buy Kannan’s Downsizing Detroit (1982) and Mueller’s Kaiser-Frazer history (2005).
You ask about Oldsmobile books. Jan P. Norbye and Jim Dunne authored Oldsmobile 1946-1980: The Classic Postwar Years (1993). I haven’t looked through that book but have a lot of respect for Norbye’s work.
Another source of book reviews is a website called Speedreaders.info (here’s my take). And since we’re talking about book buying, I’ll throw in another pitch for Patrick Foster’s Olde Milford Press, which is a terrific place to find books on orphan brands.
Hi, Steve. Thanks for the reply. I am only partway through your list! Langworth, Norbye & Dunne are all well-respected, have read all 3 of them. Speedreaders.info is going to keep me very busy!