Amazon has compiled a list of the top literary metro areas—many predictable, some more surprising
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Which cities are America's best-read? There's no need for guess work any longer, now that Amazon.com has compiled all of its book, magazine, and newspaper sales (in both print and Kindle format) since January 1st of this year for U.S cities with populations of more than 100,000 and ranked them according to their per-capita sales. Some of the results (via Mashable) are ho-hum, others more surprising.
1. Cambridge, Massachusetts
2. Alexandria, Virginia
3. Berkeley, California
4. Ann Arbor, Michigan
5. Boulder, Colorado
6. Miami, Florida
7. Salt Lake City, Utah
8. Gainesville, Florida
9. Seattle, Washington
10. Arlington, Virginia
11. Knoxville, Tennessee
12. Orlando, Florida
13. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
14. Washington, DC
15. Bellevue, Washington
16. Columbia, South Carolina
17. St. Louis, Missouri
18. Cincinnati, Ohio
19. Portland, Oregon
20. Atlanta, Georgia
Number 1 is a no-brainer: Cambridge, Massachusetts is home to Harvard and MIT. Next in line is quaint Alexandria, Virginia, which far outpaces nearby Washington DC which—for all its highly educated think-tankers, journalists, public servants, and lawyers—ranks just 14th. No surprise either that college towns Berkeley, Boulder, and Ann Arbor round out the top five.