Poll: What's your favorite book about Los Angeles?

It's the top 12, the final dozen, your 12 favorite books about Los Angeles! Which will emerge as the favorite among them all? Vote now, below: Choose among Raymond Chandler and James Ellroy, Bret Easton Ellis and Joan Didion, John Fante and Nathanael West, Mike Davis and Thomas Pynchon. 

A week ago, we asked you to tell us your favorite books about Los Angeles; the answers came pouring in on Twitter and Facebook, so many that we had a runoff. A few who performed well -- Dawn Schiller, Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez and Terrill Lee Lankford -- also made our top 12, after rallying votes in their favor.

Now, vote for your favorite Los Angeles book: Your 12 finalists are listed alphabetically by title below. The polls will close Thursday morning.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Photos: Raymond Chandler, left, from the book "The Long Embrace" by Judith Freeman. Credit: Knopf. Right, James Ellroy in 2009 on the grounds of Arroyo High School in El Monte, where his mother's body was found in 1957. Credit: Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Toni Rio]

They are all so amazing.

[Paul]

Everything on the list is great, but I think you are missing other great works about Los Angeles. I'd add "Brothers & Sisters" by Bebe Moore Campbell, about a diverse group of people working at a community bank after the Rodney King riots, and Sandra Tsing Loh's novel "If You Lived Here, You'd Be Home By Now," about a yuppie couple buying a high-rise condo. They may not be as famous but they present a much more realistic portrait of Los Angeles.

[Shaun Mason]

Inherent Vice is another Pynchon novel about L.A. that is good.

[Marley]

I'm late to this poll but where is Chester Himes?

[Donna]

"Piccolo's Prank" and "Pedro, the Angel of Olvera Street" by Leo Politi. My family have been living in LA since 1900, and his books remind me of how I remember Olvera Street and Angel's Flight when I was a kid.

[bill]

Where are Fitzgerald's "The Last Tycoon", Lambert's "The Slide Area" and Isherwood's "A Single Man"?

[Mary Flett]

Chandler captured the spirit of the true LA -- before it became packaged and coiffed.

[jim bissell]

the road through wonderland is an amazing insight into the life of dawn schillier and john holmes durring a period of time were very few people had real insight into his(holmes) disfunctional and troubled life,also this book disspells quite a few of the myths and mysteries sorounding him,dawn suffered greatly durring this period of her life but was able to pull herself up and out of the chaos and dysfunction sorounding her.a great read it should be made into a lifetime movie.this book's story is the epilogue to the movie WONDERLAND,dawn is brave and inspiring sharing her story with the world,a real pageturner,not to be missed

[kelly mcgee]

a remarkable story!