Los Angeles Literature Events: 09/12/22 – 09/18/22
NOTE: There Are Both Online and Virtual Events Listed Here
Woodland Hills Mystery Book Club Discussion: Your House Will Pay at Washington Irving Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online (Hybrid) Event
A novel about racial tensions in Los Angeles, following two families—one Korean-American, one African-American—grappling with the effects of a decades-old crime.
In the wake of the police shooting of a black teenager, Los Angeles is as tense as it’s been since the unrest of the early 1990s. But Grace Park and Shawn Matthews have their own problems. Grace is sheltered and largely oblivious, living in the Valley with her Korean-immigrant parents, working long hours at the family pharmacy. She’s distraught that her sister hasn’t spoken to their mother in two years, for reasons beyond Grace’s understanding. Shawn has already had enough of politics and protest after an act of violence shattered his family years ago. He just wants to be left alone to enjoy his quiet life in Palmdale.
But when another shocking crime hits LA, both the Park and Matthews families are forced to face down their history while navigating the tumult of a city on the brink of more violence.
Discussion is facilitated by Mary C. Schaffer. Books are read in advance of the meetings and are available to borrow from the Woodland Hills Library Reference Desk or you may place a copy on hold through the library catalog or Libby app.
Please call (818) 226-0017 for more information.
NOTE: See site for link, guidelines, and details.
Where: Woodland Hills Branch Library, LAPL Community Room
Date: Monday the 12th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 22200 Ventura Blvd., Woodland Hills, CA 91364 (or online; see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-8
Poetry Reading with Adam Kirsch and Boris Dralyuk: The Discarded Life & My Hollywood and Other Poems at Chevalier’s Bookstore – In-Person Event
Adam Kirsch, in conversation with Boris Dralyuk, will discuss their books, The Discarded Life and My Hollywood and Other Poems, respectively.
In The Discarded Life, these moving and meditative poems by Adam Kirsch show how the experiences and recognitions of early life continue to shape us into adulthood. Richly evoking a 1980s childhood in Los Angeles, Kirsch uses Gen X landmarks–from Devo to Atari to the Challenger disaster–to tell a story of emotional and artistic coming of age, exploring universal questions of meaning, mortality, and how we become who we are.
My Hollywood and Other Poems, by Boris Dralyuk is a collection of lyric meditations on the experience of émigrés in Los Angeles. In forms ranging from ballades to villanelles to Onegin sonnets, the poems pursue the sublime in a tarnished landscape, seek continuity and mourn its loss in a town where change is the only constant. My Hollywood draws on the poet’s own life as a Jewish immigrant from the Soviet Union, honors the vanishing traces of the city’s past, and, in crisp and poignant translations, summons the voices of five Russian poets who spent their final years in LA, including the composer Vernon Duke.
Adam Kirsch is the author of The Discarded Life (Red Hen Press) and three other collections of poetry, as well several books of literary history and criticism, including The People and the Books: 18 Classics of Jewish Literature and Rocket and Lightship: Essays on Literature and Ideas. A native of Los Angeles, he lives in New York where he is an editor at the Wall Street Journal.
Boris Dralyuk is the editor in chief of the Los Angeles Review of Books. He is co-editor (with Robert Chandler and Irina Mashinski) of The Penguin Book of Russian Poetry, editor of 1917: Stories and Poems from the Russian Revolution and Ten Poems from Russia, and translator of Isaac Babel, Andrey Kurkov, Maxim Osipov, Mikhail Zoshchenko, and other authors. His poems have appeared in The New York Review of Books, The New Criterion, The Hudson Review, and elsewhere, and his criticism and translations have appeared in the Times Literary Supplement, the London Review of Books, and The New Yorker, among other venues. His collection My Hollywood and Other Poems appeared from Paul Dry Books in 2022.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and event details.
Where: Chevalier’s Bookstore
Date: Monday the 12th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
At Skylight: Talia Lakshmi Kolluri, with Melissa Chadburn & What We Fed to the Manticore at Skylight Bookstore – In-Person Event
Talia Lakshmi Kolluri, in conversation with Melissa Chadburn, will discuss her new book, What We Fed to the Manticore.
In nine stories that span the globe, What We Fed to the Manticore takes readers inside the minds of a full cast of animal narrators to understand the triumphs, heartbreaks, and complexities of the creatures that share our world.
Through nine emotionally vivid stories, all narrated from animal perspectives, Talia Lakshmi Kolluri’s debut collection explores themes of environmentalism, conservation, identity, belonging, loss, and family with resounding heart and deep tenderness. In Kolluri’s pages, a faithful hound mourns the loss of the endangered rhino he swore to protect. Vultures seek meaning as they attend to the antelope that perished in Central Asia. A beloved donkey’s loyalty to a zookeeper in Gaza is put to the ultimate test. And a wounded pigeon in Delhi finds an unlikely friend.
Talia Lakshmi Kolluri’s short fiction has appeared in The Minnesota Review, Ecotone, Southern Humanities Review, The Common, and elsewhere. She was born and raised in Northern California and currently lives in California’s beautiful Central Valley with her husband and cat.
Melissa Chadburn is the author of the debut novel A Tiny Upward Shove (Farrar, Straus & Giroux). Through her own labor and literary citizenship, Chadburn strives to upend economic violence. A PhD candidate in creative writing at the University of Southern California.
NOTE: See stie for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Skylight Bookstore
Date: Monday the 12th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Monday Night Fiction Workshop at Beyond Baroque – Zoom Online Event
This free Monday Night Fiction Workshop led by Raquel Baker is a community writing workshop in which participants are asked to bring copies of 2-3 pages of fiction to read, and to use for critique and discussion. Registration is required.
Raquel Baker earned a PhD in English Literary Studies from the University of Iowa and an MFA in Creative Writing from Mills College. She is currently Assistant Professor of Postcolonial Studies and Transnational Literatures at CSU Channel Islands. She has published poetry and nonfiction and done readings with the Ventura Poetry Project.
Where: Beyond Baroque – Online event (tickets at Eventbrite) (check to verify)
Date: Monday the 12th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: Zoom Online
Website: https://beyondbaroque.org/free_workshops.html or https://www.eventbrite.com/e/monday-night-fiction-workshop-tickets-411567458347
Taylor Jenkins Reid Author Luncheon & Carrie Soto Is Back at Pages Bookstore at Manhattan Country Club – In-Person Event
Join us at a special author luncheon to welcome Taylor Jenkins Reid to celebrate the release of her new novel, Carrie Soto Is Back.
In keeping with the tennis theme of the novel the luncheon will be held at the beautiful Manhattan Country Club. Your ticket includes a three-course lunch and a copy of the hardcover book which Taylor will sign at the luncheon
At thirty-seven years old, Carrie makes the monumental decision to come out of retirement and be coached by her father for one last year, in an attempt to reclaim her record. Even if the sports media says that they never liked the “Battle-Axe” anyway. Even if her body doesn’t move as fast as it did. And even if it means swallowing her pride to train with a man she once almost opened her heart to: Bowe Huntley. Like her, he has something to prove before he gives up the game forever.
In spite of it all: Carrie Soto is back, for one epic final season. In this riveting and unforgettable novel, Taylor Jenkins Reid tells her most vulnerable, emotional story yet.
Taylor Jenkins Reid is the New York Times bestselling author of eight novels, including Malibu Rising, Daisy Jones & The Six, and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and their daughter.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines, and details.
Where: Pages Bookstore – in the Courtyard
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 11:30 am
Address: 1330 Parkview Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/anastasia
Meg Elison In-Person Book Signing & Number One Fan at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join Cellar Door Bookstore for an in-person book signing by Meg Elison, author of The Road to Nowhere trilogy, to talk about her new book, Number One Fan.
On her way to a speaking engagement, bestselling novelist Eli Grey gets into a cab and accepts a drink from the driver, trusting that everything is fine. She wakes up chained in the stranger’s basement. With no close family or friends expecting her to check in, Eli knows she needs to save herself. She soon realizes that her abduction wasn’t random, and though she thinks she might recognize her captor, she can’t figure out what he wants. Her only clues are that he’s very familiar with her books and deeply invested in the fantastical world she creates. What follows is a test of wills as Eli pits herself against a man who believes she owes him everything–and is determined to take it from her.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, link, and details.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 5225 Canyon Create Dr., #30A, Riverside, CA 92507
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/numberonefan
The Mic at Micky’s Open Mic, with Hosts Brian Sonia-Wallace & Nate Lovett at Micky’s Nightclub & Bar – In-Person Event
Join The Mic at Micky’s Open Mic and Literary Readings, hosted by West Hollywood Poet Laureate Brian Sonia-Wallace, Nate Lovett and Tony Moore.
This is a weekly event for creatives to collaborate and write something for the Mic and/or sign up for the Open Mic, limited to 3-5 minutes per person, and offering poems, stories and music.
Located in the heart of one of LA’s oldest gay clubs, this space promises connection and community for folks across the LGBTQ+ spectrum (and allies!) before the untz untz starts.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Micky’s Nightclub & Bar in West Hollywood
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 6 pm – 9 pm
Address: 8857 Santa Monica Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-mic-mickys-tickets-383607870467
Poetry Open Mic with Wyatt Underwood via Westwood Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event
Join the monthly Poetry Open Mic hosted by Wyatt Underwood. Held every 2nd Tuesday of the month online.
Share a poem you wrote or a poem you love! You are also welcome to just listen and enjoy.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 6 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/poetry-open-mic
Chrysta Bilton, with Stephanie Danler, & Normal Family at Diesel Bookstore – In-Person Event
Chrysta Bilton, in conversation with Stephanie Danler, will present and discuss her book, Normal Family: On Truth, Love, and How I Me My 35 Siblings.
What is a “normal family,” and how do you go about making one? Chrysta Bilton’s magnetic, larger-than-life mother, Debra, yearned to have a child, but as a single gay woman in 1980s California, she had few options. Until one day, while getting her hair done in a Beverly Hills salon, she met a man and instantly knew he was the one she’d been looking for. Beautiful, athletic, artistic, and from a well-to-do family, Jeffrey Harrison appeared to be Debra’s ideal sperm donor.
A verbal agreement, a couple of thousand in cash, and a few squirts of a turkey baster later, and Chrysta was conceived. Over the years, Jeffrey would make regular appearances at the family home, which grew to include Chrysta’s baby sister. But how much did Debra really know about the man she’d chosen to father her daughters? And as a single mother torn between ferocious independence and abject dependence—on other women, alcohol, drugs, and the adrenaline of get-rich-quick schemes—what secrets of her own was she keeping?
It wasn’t until Chrysta was a young adult that she discovered just how much her parents had hidden from their daughters—and each other—including a shocking revelation with far-reaching consequences not only for Debra, Chrysta, and her sister, but for dozens and possibly hundreds of unsuspecting families across the country. After a lifetime of longing for a “normal family,” can Chrysta face the reality of her own, in all its complexity? Bringing us into the fold of a deeply dysfunctional yet fiercely loving clan that is anything but “normal,” this emotional roller coaster of a memoir will make you cry, laugh, and rethink the meaning of family.
Chrysta Bilton is a writer who lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two children. Her work has appeared in The Guardian, Literary Hub, and Newsweek. Her memoir, Normal Family, which debuted in July, is her first book. The book was named a “Best Book of the Summer” by LA Times, Vanity Fair, People Magazine, USA Today, Amazon, Apple, and Kirkus.
Stephanie Danler is a novelist, memoirist, and screenwriter. She is the author of Stray and the international bestseller Sweetbitter, and is also the creator and executive producer of the Sweetbitter series on Starz.
NOTE: See stie for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Diesel Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://www.dieselbookstore.com/event/Chrysta-Bilton-September-13-Author-signing
Mystery Book Club & A Secret About a Secret at Pages Bookstore – In-Person Event
The Mystery Book Club will discuss this month’s selection, A Secret About a Secret, by Peter Spiegelman.
A literary mystery thriller about a murder at a secluded research facility and the secrets that it exposes. “Cyber thievery, lust, corporate espionage, and a host of deleterious secrets comprise the chords of this sweeping, riveting symphony. A bold and original thriller by a masterful storyteller,” says Elizabeth Brundage, author of The Vanishing Point
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Pages Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/mystery-book-club-8
At Skylight: T.C. Boyle & I Walk Between the Raindrops at Skylight Bookstore – In-Person Event
T.C. Boyle will present and discuss his new short story collection, I Walk Between Raindrops.
In the title story of Walk Between the Raindrops, a woman sits down next to a man at a bar and claims she has ESP. In “Thirteen Days,” passengers on a cruise line are quarantined. And “Hyena” begins simply: “That was the day the hyena came for him, and never mind that there were no hyenas in the South of France, and especially not in Pont-Saint-Esprit—it was there and it came for him.”
T.C. Boyle is an American novelist and short-story writer. Since the mid-1970s, he has published eighteen novels and twelve collections of short stories. He won the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1988 for his third novel, World’s End, and the Prix Médicis étranger (France) in 1995 for The Tortilla Curtain. His novel Drop City was a finalist for the 2003 National Book Award. Most recently, he has been the recipient of the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award, the Henry David Thoreau Prize, and the Jonathan Swift Prize for satire. He is a Distinguished Professor of English Emeritus at the University of Southern California and lives in Santa Barbara.
NOTE: See stie for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Skylight Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-tc-boyle-presents-i-walk-between-raindrops
Adult Book Group & The Last Green Valley at Once Upon a Time Bookstore – Online Zoom Event
Join us for our Adult Book Group discussion of this month’s selection, The Last Green Valley, by Andrew Sullivan.
This historical fiction novel set in 1944 is about a Ukranian family caught between two warring forces and overcoming horrific trials to pursue their hope of immigrating to the West. The Martels’ story is a brutal, complex, and ultimately triumphant tale that illuminates the extraordinary power of love, faith, and one family’s incredible will to survive and see their dreams realized.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, tickets, and details.
Where: Once Upon a Time Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 7:30 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., Montrose, CA 90069
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/adult-book-group-last-green-valley-mark-sullivan
The Virtual Cobalt Series & Open Mic with Eike Waltz – Virtual Zoom Event
The Virtual Cobalt Poets Series, presented by Rick Lupert via Zoom, will feature an Open Reading and guest Eike Waltz.
Eike Waltz is a former ballet dancer, poet, and artist, who enjoyed a twofold career as ballet dancer in his native Germany and as a US based international engineering designer and international electronics industry consultant (US citizen since 1997). Between these careers, he studied fine art and industrial design at the Royal College of Art in London (MdesRCA). He published his first and only book during 1961 in Munich which successfully sold almost all 500 limited editions in the same summer. After the events of 911, he became politically active as a concerned citizen and began to write and perform about what he saw and heard. Participating in slams has had a twofold effect on him: First, the discipline to write about a subject and perform the subject matter in 3 minutes successfully was/is challenging. Second, by reading to the much younger Slam generation he realized that he had forgotten how it was to be young. He had to rethink/rediscover himself.
NOTE: Details and Zoom link at event link.
Where: Cobalt Poets – Online Zoom Event
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: Online event (see site)
Website: http://poetrysuperhighway.com/cobalt/calendar.html
Da Poetry Lounge Tuesday Open Mic at Greenway Court – In Person Event
The nation’s largest weekly Open Mic event is 24 years strong. It takes place every Tuesday and is open to all ages. Third Tuesdays are SLAM NIGHTS! A slam is a poetry competition.
$10 donation. Do NOT lineup prior to 7:30 p.m. Free parking adjacent to theatre.
See sites for details.
Where: Greenway Court Theatre and YouTube Live Stream
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 9 pm – 11 pm
Address: 544 N. Fairfax Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90036
Website: https://www.instagram.com/p/ChLUBSRPCFb/ or https://www.dapoetrylounge.com/admission
SOM Tuesdays Open Mic at Di Piazza’s Pizza, Long Beach – In-Person Event
SOM Open Mic Tuesdays at Di Piazza’s takes place in a casual setting with a lunch & dinner menu that includes pizzas, pastas, salads, sandwiches, burgers and more. Come and share music, comedy, and poetry with SOM and Di Pizza.
Where: Di Piazza’s Pizza (Check to verify)
Date: Tuesday the 13th
Time: 9 pm – 12 am
Address: 5205 E. Pacific Coast Hwy., Long Beach, CA
Website: https://dipiazzas.com/tickets-%26-events
Page Turners Book Club & In the Wild LIfe, by Jeff Zentner at Pages Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us at the new Page Turners Book Club, for teens in 8th & 9th grades, which will meet to discuss our first selection, Jeff Zentner’s novel, In the Wild Life.
It’s a coming-of-age novel about two best friends whose friendship is tested when they get the opportunity to leave their impoverished small town for an elite prep school.
NOTE: See site for guidelines, book purchase, and details.
Where: Pages Bookstore
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 4:30 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Avenue, Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/book/9781524720278
Creative Writing Workshop with Tony DuShane at Los Feliz Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us at the Library for a 90-minute writer’s workshop, a free event presented by UCLA Extension instructor Tony DuShane, screenwriter of the film Confessions of a Teenage Jesus Jerk, based on his novel of the same name.
Tell Your Story!
NOTE: See site for guidelines, and details.
Where: Los Feliz Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 1874 Hillhurst Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/creative-writing-workshop-tony-dushane-9
Rachel Aviv, with Stephanie Danler, & Unsettled Minds at Skylight Bookstore – Online Event
Rachel Aviv, in conversation with Stephanie Danler, will present and discuss her new book, Unsettled Minds and the Stories That Make Us.
In Strangers to Ourselves, a powerful and gripping debut, Rachel Aviv raises fundamental questions about how we understand ourselves in periods of crisis and distress. Drawing on deep, original reporting as well as unpublished journals and memoirs, Aviv writes about people who have come up against the limits of psychiatric explanations for who they are.
Aviv asks how the stories we tell about mental disorders shape their course in our lives. Challenging the way we understand and talk about illness, her account is a testament to the porousness and resilience of the mind.
Rachel Aviv is a staff writer at The New Yorker, where she writes about medicine, education, criminal justice, and other subjects. In 2022, she won a National Magazine Award for Profile Writing. A 2019 national fellow at New America, she received a Whiting Creative Nonfiction Grant to support her work on Strangers to Ourselves. She lives in Brooklyn, New York
Stephanie Danler is a novelist, memoirist, and screenwriter. She is the author of Stray and the international bestseller Sweetbitter, and is also the creator and executive producer of the Sweetbitter series on Starz. Her work has appeared in The Sewanee Review, Vogue, The New York Times Book Review, and The Paris Review Daily. She lives in Los Angeles, California.
NOTE: See site for link and details.
Where: Skylight Bookstore
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 6 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Pacoima Book Club Discussion: Wish You Were Here at Pacoima Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event
The Pacoima Book Club will discuss this month’s selection, Wish You Were Here, by Jodi Picoult.
Diana O’Toole is perfectly on track. She will be married by thirty, done having kids by thirty-five, and move out to the New York City suburbs, all while climbing the professional ladder in the cutthroat art auction world. She’s an associate specialist at Sotheby’s now, but her boss has hinted at a promotion if she can close a deal with a high-profile client. She’s not engaged just yet, but she knows her boyfriend, Finn, a surgical resident, is about to propose on their romantic getaway to the Galápagos—days before her thirtieth birthday. Right on time.
But then a virus that felt worlds away has appeared in the city, and on the eve of their departure, Finn breaks the news: It’s all hands on deck at the hospital. He has to stay behind. You should still go, he assures her, since it would be a shame for all of their nonrefundable trip to go to waste. And so, reluctantly, she goes.
Almost immediately, Diana’s dream vacation goes awry. Her luggage is lost, the Wi-Fi is nearly nonexistent, and the hotel they’d booked is shut down due to the pandemic. In fact, the whole island is now under quarantine, and she is stranded until the borders reopen. Completely isolated, she must venture beyond her comfort zone. Slowly, she carves out a connection with a local family when a teenager with a secret opens up to Diana, despite her father’s suspicion of outsiders.
In the Galápagos Islands, where Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection was formed, Diana finds herself examining her relationships, her choices, and herself—and wondering if when she goes home, she too will have evolved into someone completely different.
Please email pcoima@lapl.org for the Zoom link.
NOTE: See site for link, and details.
Where: Pacoima Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/pacoima-book-club-0
Author Event: Ruthie Marlenee & Agave Blues and Mary Camarillo & The Lockhart Women at Bel Canto Bookstore at The Hangout – In-Person Event
Join Bel Canto to hear author Ruthie Marlenee, in conversation with author Mary Camarillo, to discuss her book, Agave Blues.
Sometimes la sangre atrae “the blood calls you back” and when Maya gets the call to go back to her agave roots in order to claim the body of her long-missing father, her world changes forever. Set against the backdrop of her childhood Mexico, Agave Blues is the story of ailing Attorney Maya in a broken relationship and butting heads with her teenaged daughter, Lily. Maya swore never to return, but once she sets foot on the mystical grounds, she uncovers the turbulent history of her family and how tequila lies on top of secrets that have altered her life, both emotionally and physically. She realizes what’s been missing in her life-magic, mystery, art, unconditional love and the stories of her past, including the myth her father used to share with her about her grandfather, Pancho Villa. The fields seem to heal her and her relationships and so she extends her stay and further reconnects with her family. But when she comes in contact with the handsome, yet haunted Antonio, a childhood crush resurfaces, only to cause her more grief as she tries to learn the tequila business.
Ruthie Marlenée is a Mexican-American novelist, poet and screenwriter born and raised in Orange County, California, and lives in Los Angeles and the desert of the Coachella Valley with her husband. She earned a Writers’ Certificate in Fiction from UCLA and is the author of Isabela’s Island, Curse of the Ninth, nominated for a James Kirkwood Literary Prize and Agave Blues which has received an Honorable Mention by the International Latino Book Awards for the Isabel Allende Most Inspirational Fiction Book Award.
Mary Camarillo’s novel The Lockhart Women was published in June 2021 by She Writes Press. It won first place in the Next Generation Indie Awards for first fiction and was a finalist in the Screencraft Cinematic Book Competition. She had a long career with the postal service as a distribution clerk, accounting manager, CPA and auditor for the Inspector General’s office. Her poems and short fiction have appeared in publications such as 166 Palms, The Sonora Review, Lunch Ticket, and The Ear. She lives in Huntington Beach, California with her husband who plays ukulele and their terrorist cat Riley.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Bel Canto Bookstore at The Hangout
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 2122 E. 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814
A.M. Homes & The Unfolding: A Novel at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Join us to hear A.M. Holmes present and discuss her first novel since May We Be Forgiven. This novel, The Unfolding, delivers us back to ourselves in this stunning alternative history that is both terrifyingly prescient, deeply tender and devastatingly funny.
The Big Guy loves his family, money and country. Undone by the results of the 2008 presidential election, he taps a group of like-minded men to reclaim their version of the American Dream. As they build a scheme to disturb and disrupt, the Big Guy also faces turbulence within his family. His wife, Charlotte, grieves a life not lived, while his 18-year-old daughter, Meghan, begins to realize that her favorite subject–history–is not exactly what her father taught her.
In a story that is as much about the dynamics within a family as it is about the desire for those in power to remain in power, Homes presciently unpacks a dangerous rift in American identity, prompting a reconsideration of the definition of truth, freedom and democracy–and exploring the explosive consequences of what happens when the same words mean such different things to people living together under one roof.
The author’s acclaim and success as a producer of popular culture film and television features allows presentation here of a distinctly individual and personal yet universally interesting book for collectors and the general public alike, which has no comparison and could not be replicated even in a minor form, by anyone else.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, tickets, and details.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/am-homes
At Skylight: Ashton Politanoff, with Emily Hall, & You’ll Like It Here at Skylight Bookstore – In-Person Event
Ashton Politanoff, in conversation with Emily Hall, will present and discuss his new book, You’ll Like It Here.
You’ll Like it Here is a haunting bricolage, divided into three parts, that excavates the forgotten history of Redondo Beach in the early 1900’s through old news clippings, advertisements, recipes and other ephemera that speak to the ills of male stoicism, industrialization and capitalism, and environmental displacement. Ashton used digital archives from the Redondo Reflex and other city adjacent newspapers as the basis for his surrealist account, masterfully tracing this larger shift away from coastal maritime repose in the wake of the Spanish Flu, the Great Depression, and World War II through momentary fragments that feel as real and palpable as they do transient, mythological, and strangely reminiscent of our current times.
Ashton Politanoff’s writing has appeared frequently in NOON, as well as New York Tyrant, Conjunctions, Egress, and other print and digital journals. Several of his stories have been anthologized, and he is a full-time English Instructor at Cypress College.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Skylight Bookstore
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-ashton-politanoff-conversation-emily-hall
Anansi Virtual Writers Workshop at The World Stage – In-Person Event
The Anansi Writers Workshop was founded in 1990 by Kamau Daáood, Akilah Oliver, Nafis Nabawi and Anthony Lyons. In 1993, Michael Datcher initiated the development of a three-part format for the workshop. Our tradition of a community workshop began in the late 1960s at the Watts Writers’ Workshop, where World Stage co-founder Kamau Daáood started his writing career. For general information and booking, contact V. Kali, the Anansi Writers Workshop Coordinator, at vkaliflowers@gmail.com.
• 7:30p.m.–8:30p.m. — Formal workshop;
• 8:30p.m.–9:00p.m. — Featured reader;
• 9:05p.m.–10:00p.m. — Open mic
Suggested: $5.00 Donation via PayPal: The World Stage Gallery.
NOTE: See site for further details, and any change in the schedule. Contact kaliflowers@gmial.com or call (323) 293-2451
Where: The World Stage
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: 4321 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008
Website: https://www.theworldstage.org/events.html
Wednesday Night Poetry Workshop via Beyond Baroque – Zoom Online
Join Beyond Baroque’s longest running free poetry workshop via Zoom online as we welcome new and seasoned poets to share their work and provide feedback. Facilitators are rotated quarterly, and the current facilitator is Jose Hernandez Diaz.
Jose Hernandez Diaz is a 2017 NEA Poetry Fellow. He is the author of The Fire Eater (Texas Review Press, 2020). His work appears in The American Poetry Review, Boulevard, Colorado Review, Huizache, Iowa Review, Poetry, The Southern Review, The Yale Review, and in The Best American Nonrequired Reading Anthology 2011. He teaches creative writing online and edits for Frontier Poetry.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets and information.
Where: Online event
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: Online event
Website: https://www.beyondbaroque.org/free_workshops.html or https://www.eventbrite.com/e/wednesday-night-poetry-workshop-tickets-415931380957
Flight School Open Mic Has Returned! at Playground Hookah Lounge – In-Person Event
Join us for the return of the weekly Flight School Open Mic, offered every Wednesday from 8pm – 12pm.
All arts are welcome: singing, dance, poetry, improv, comedy, music, and we learn to fly together, all balanced by host O. Smith and a full live band and DJ D-Major.
$10 Entry at the door. $8 tickets at Eventbrite.
NOTE: Check site for further details, updates, and information.
Where: Flight School Open Mic at the Playground
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 8 pm – 12 am
Address: 630 N. La Brea Ave., Inglewood, CA 90302
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/flight-school-open-mic-tickets-362732902877?aff=erelpanelorg
Poetry Reading & Open Mic by Two Idiots Peddling Poetry & Jonathan Humanoid at The Ugly Mug – In-Person Event
Join Ben Trigg and Two Idiots Peddling Poetry at the Ugly Mug on Wednesday Night for our Reading & Open Mic, featuring Jonathan Humanoid.
The format is to welcome a featured poet for a reading, and an Open Mic reading. Tonight’s featured reader is Jonathan Humanoid.
Jonathan Humanoid writes poems and is constantly confused. He would like to believe that the writing poetry thing helps with the being confused, but there’s no evidence to support this. He writes in the hopes that others will feel less alone by reading his work as he feels less alone by sharing it. Jonathan has had poems in Freeze Ray, Fight Evil With Poetry‘ first anthology, and Shit Men Say To Me! An Anthology Challenging Toxic Masculinity. He also put two DIY chapbooks called I Was Never Going to be Normal and Deconstructing Borderline Personality Disorder and his first full length collection of poetry Decomposition of the Living will be released this August through Silver Star Labs.
$4 cover fee, cash only. Masks are required unless eating or drinking.
NOTE: See site for further details, guidelines & information.
Where: The Ugly Mug, Orange
Date: Wednesday the 14th
Time: 8 pm
Address: 261 N. Glassell St., Orange, CA 92866
Website: https://www.facebook.com/Two-Idiots-Peddling-Poetry/ or https://www.facebook.com/events/359413046369975
Teen Open Mic Hosted by Micah Tasaka, via Poetry out Loud, at Creative Grounds – In-Person Event
Join Poetry out Loud for a Teen Open Mic, hosted by Micah Tasaka, offered monthly through January 19, 2023. Micah Takaka is a queer, non-binary, mixed Japanese poet, multidisciplinary artist, reiki master, and magic maker from the Inland Empire,
For more information contact Romaine Washington poetromaine@gmail.com.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines, and details.
Where: Creative Grounds, San Bernadino
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 4:30 pm – 6:30 pm
Address: 395N.E. St, Unit 101B, San Bernardino, CA 92401
Website: N/A
Ling Ma, with Alexandra Kleeman, & Bliss Montage: Stories via Skylight Bookstore – Online Event
Ling Ma, in conversation with Alexandra Kleeman, will present and discuss her new book, Bliss Montage: Stories
In Bliss Montage, Ling Ma brings us eight wildly different tales of people making their way through the madness and reality of our collective delusions: love and loneliness, connection and possession, friendship, motherhood, the idea of home. A woman lives in a house with all her ex-boyfriends. A toxic friendship grows up around a drug that makes you invisible. An ancient ritual might heal you of anything—if you bury yourself alive. These and other scenarios investigate the ways that the outlandish and the ordinary are shockingly, deceptively, heartbreakingly alike.
Ling Ma is a writer hailing from Fujian, Utah, and Kansas. She is the author of the novel Severance, which received the Kirkus Prize, a Whiting Award, the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, and the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award. She lives in Chicago with her family.
Alexandra Kleeman is the author of the novel Something New Under the Sun, one of the New York Times’ Notable Books of 2021, Intimations, a short story collection, and the novel You Too Can Have A Body Like Mine. Her writing has been published in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, n+1, and The Guardian. She is an Assistant Professor at the New School and the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in Fiction.
NOTE: See site for further details, link, & information.
Where: Skylight Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 5 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/live-zoom-ling-ma-presents-bliss-montage-alexandra-kleeman
Mystery Book Club & Fadeout at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join the Mystery Book Club for a discussion of this month’s selection, Fadeout (A Dave Brandsetter Mystery #1) by author Joseph Hansen.
Five decades after its original landmark publication, Joseph Hansen’s Fadeout is as fresh and important as ever. Preceded only by a handful of gay protagonists in crime fiction, Hansen’s Dave Brandstetter, a ruggedly handsome World War II vet with a quick wit, faultless moral compass, and endless confidence, shattered stereotypes and won over a large reading audience, a feat previously considered impossible for queer fiction.
Set in the mid-1960s, Fadeout centers on the disappearance of a southern California radio personality named Fox Olson. A failed writer, Olson finally found success as a beloved folksinger and wholesome country raconteur with a growing national audience. The community is therefore shocked when Olson’s car is found wrecked, having been driven off a bridge and swept away in a fast-moving arroyo on a rainy night. A life insurance claim is filed by Olson’s widow and the company holding the policy sends their best man to investigate. The problem is that Olson’s body was never found. Not in the car. Not further down the river. As Dave Brandstetter begins his investigation he quickly finds that none of it adds up.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, link, and details.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 5225 Canyon Create Dr., #30A, Riverside, CA 92507
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/mystery-book-club-fadeout
Writer’s Workshop with Editor-in-Chief of Dryland Literary Journal, Viva Padilla at Re/Arte – In-Person Event
Join us for a Writer’s Workshop led by Viva Padilla to focus on getting your work published. Bring your work to get feedback. Donation of $15 minimum encouraged.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, further details, guidelines & information.
Where: Re/Arte Centro Literario
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 2123 East Cesar Chavez Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90033
Website: https://reartela.com/events%2Feventos
Marianne Wiggins, with David Ullin, & Properties of Thirst at Diesel Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join Marianne Wiggins, in conversation with David Ulin, to discuss her new book, Properties of Thirst.
This book is a story of land and inheritance, and an examination of a changing American landscape during one of this country’s darkest periods. Set against the backdrop of World War II, Properties of Thirst is an epic story of one family’s unbreakable bond. The Rhodes family is at the center of the story. Rocky Rhodes has spent years fiercely protecting his California ranch from the Los Angeles Water Corporation. He lost his beloved wife, Lou, years earlier and raised their twins, Sunny and Stryker, on the ranch alongside his sister. With the country on the brink of war, Stryker enlists in the navy, and soon his family is forced to endure another senseless tragedy. Now more than ever, Rocky is determined to hold onto the only home his children have ever known. This goal is further complicated when the US government begins construction on a Japanese internment camp on the edge of the property, and Rocky realizes that the land faces even bigger threats than the LA watermen he’s battled for years.
Marianne Wiggins is the author of eight books of fiction including John Dollar and Evidence of Things Unseen and two short story collections. For her novel Evidence of Things Unseen she was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award. She has won a Whiting Award, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, the Heidinger Kafka Prize, and was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. She lives in Los Angeles.
David L. Ulin is the author or editor of more than a dozen books, including Sidewalking: Coming to Terms with Los Angeles, shortlisted for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and Ucross Foundation. He is the books editor of Alta Journal, and a professor of English at the University of Southern California, where he edits the journal Air/Light.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines & information.
Where: Diesel Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://www.dieselbookstore.com/event/Marianne-Wiggins-Author-signing
Brian Levant & My Life and Toys at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Join Book Soup to hear Brian Levant present and discuss his book, My Life and Toys, an extraordinary collection of animation feature and comic toys in an original book of photographs and text.
The author’s acclaim and success as a producer of popular culture film and television features allows presentation here of a distinctly individual and personal yet universally interesting book for collectors and the general public alike, which has no comparison and could not be replicated even in a minor form, by anyone else.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, tickets, and details.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/brian-l evant
Exploring Political Poetry: a Workshop with Judith Pacht at Beyond Baroque – In-Person Event
Join us for a 2-part Writing Workshop titled Exploring Political Poetry, led by Judith Pacht on September 15 & 22.
Two generative workshops will examine the strategies poets use in their work with time for participants to explore (if they choose to) those strategies in their own writing. We’ll look at examples poets use: metaphor, poetry of witness, elevated and low diction (and more) and do close readings of Carolyn Forche, Anna Akhmatova, Langston Hughes, Audre Lorde and others. Participants will be given a packet of 40 poems by 40 poets and a bibliography so their reading and writing can continue independently.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, tickets, and details.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center (in the Poet’s Garden)
Date: Thursday the 15th (and Thursday the 22nd)
Time: 7 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291
Book Talk: Isabel Kaplan, with Coco Mellors, & NSFW at Chevalier’s Bookstore – In-Person Event
Isabel Kaplan, in conversation with Coco Mellors, will discuss her new book, NSFW.
Blisteringly sharp and hypersmart–meet Isabel Kaplan’s searing debut novel about a young woman trying to succeed in Hollywood without selling her soul.
From the outside, the unnamed protagonist in NSFW appears to be the vision of success. She has landed an entry-level position at a leading TV network that thousands of college grads would kill for. And sure, she has much to learn. The daughter of a prominent feminist attorney, she grew up outside the industry. But she’s resourceful and hardworking. What could go wrong?
At first, the high adrenaline work environment motivates her. Yet as she climbs the ranks, she confronts the reality of creating change from the inside. Her points only get attention when echoed by male colleagues; she hears whispers of abuse and sexual misconduct. Her mother says to keep her head down until she’s the one in charge–a scenario that seems idealistic at best, morally questionable at worst. When her personal and professional lives collide, threatening both the network and her future, she must decide what to protect: the career she’s given everything for or the empowered woman she claims to be.
Fusing page-turning prose with dark humor and riveting commentary on the truths of starting out professionally, Isabel Kaplan’s NSFW is an unflinching exploration of the gray area between empowerment and complicity. The result is a stunning portrait of what success costs in today’s patriarchal world, asking us: Is it ever worth it?
Isabel Kaplan is the author of the national bestselling novel NSFW, which has been longlisted for the Center For Fiction’s First Novel Prize, as well as the national bestselling young adult novel Hancock Park. She graduated from Harvard and holds an MFA in creative writing from NYU. Born and raised in Los Angeles, she currently lives in New York.
Coco Mellors grew up in London and New York, where she received her MFA in Fiction from New York University. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times’ Modern Love column, NY Mag’s The Cut, and The Stack, among others. Her first novel, CLEOPATRA AND FRANKENSTEIN, was published in February by Bloomsbury and has been optioned for television by Warner Bros with Mellors attached to write. She currently lives in Los Angeles and is finishing her second novel, BLUE SISTERS.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and event details.
Where: Chevalier’s Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/book-talk-nsfw-by-isabel-kaplan-with-coco-mellors-tickets-412384161127
At Skylight: Gabi Abrao & Notes on Shapeshifting at Skylight Bookstore – In-Person Event
Gabi Abrao will present her new book, Notes on Shapeshifting.
Abrāo’s work has been described by The Outline as “an existential funhouse of familiar thoughts” that “publicly grapples with pillars of its own existence within the influencer economy.” Alongside The Outline, her work has been featured in publications such as The Atlantic, Dazed, The Harvard Crimson, and The Face, among others. In response to Abrāo’s work, Dazed Magazine wrote, “Gabi debunks the myth that wellness is the preserve of the privileged, and in doing so hands it back to the masses,” and Notes on Shapeshifting is a reminder that we are agents of the change that we seek. Gabi Abrāo’s Notes on Shapeshifting is an ode to existing in physical form, fully aware of the changing energy that flows through every aspect of it. As Abrāo writes, “tapping into the ether body to take a break from the demands of the earth body, / making peace with ephemerality, / lightness, / shapeshifting”. Throughout this collection, you are invited to travel through various states; pure infatuation to heartbreak, confidence to defeat, from a skepticism for living to a full-on trust in it. And Notes on Shapeshifting yearns to soothe and arouse along the way.
Gabi Abrāo is an artist, writer, and digital creator that was born and raised in West Los Angeles. She is also known under her Internet username, sighswoon. With over 130K followers online, her work has embraced the ephemerality of the human experience. Abrāo has produced numerous how-to guides on topics such as How to Embrace Your Shape-Shifting and Ever-Changing Nature, Things You Can Pretend to Be When You Feel Uncentered, and How to Have a Positive Experience on Instagram. All of Abrāo’s life’s work is devoted to developing a language with the invisible.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Skylight Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-gabi-abr%C3%A3o-presents-notes-shapeshifting
Streaming Hope: Open Mic & Curated Show at Streaming Hope at Metro Cafe – In-Person Event
Join the Streaming Hope Open Mic & Curated Show event on the 3rd Thursday of the month.
Streaming Hope is a space created to foster a supportive community that affirms artists and celebrates creativity by sharing stories through various disciplines of art.
They keep a positive space, including language (sometimes we have kids in the audience). The night showcases performances from prebooked and open mic artists with a live workshop towards the end of our event.
CONNECT & Submit to Perform: Linktr.ee/StreamingHope
LOCATION TYPE: OUTDOORS
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Streaming Hope at Metro Café
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 7 pm – 10 pm
Address: 603 Arizona Ave., Santa Monica, CA 90401
Susan Coll, with Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, & Bookish People at Vroman’s Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us to hear author Susan Coll, in conversation with Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, discuss her new novel in paperback, Bookish People.
A perfect storm of comedic proportions erupts in a DC bookstore over the course of one soggy summer week—narrated by two very different women and punctuated by political turmoil, a celestial event, and a perpetually broken vacuum cleaner.
This is a big-hearted screwball comedy and it features an intergenerational cast of oblivious authors and over-qualified booksellers—as well as a Russian tortoise named Kurt Vonnegut Jr.—and captures the endearing quirks of some of the best kinds of people: the ones who love good books.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://www.vromansbookstore.com/susan-coll-discusses-bookish-people
Strong Words: Voices of the City Reading Event at The Autry in Griffith Park – In-Person Event
Join us for Strong Words: Voices of the City, to hear an intimate program of storytelling, music, and art inspired by the Autry’s Dress Codes art exhibition. Stories by:
Alex Alpharaoh is a Guatemalan-born award-winning actor, writer, spoken word poet, solo performer, and teaching artist from Los Angeles. He is the recipient of the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle’s 2018 “Solo Performance of the Year” for his work on his autobiographical solo performance WET: A DACAmented Journey. In 2020, his newest play, O-Dogg: An Angeleno Take on Othello, was workshopped at REDCAT’s NOW festival, as well as the Garry Marshall Theatre’s New Works Festival. Alex was a semi-finalist for Center Theatre Group’s Sherwood Award, as well as a finalist for the Princeton Arts Fellowship. WET will be published as part of a Latinx theatre anthology titled Seeking Common Ground. He is currently in the process of writing his first memoir about his experiences growing up in LA without legal status, as well as parts one and three of WET, titled WET: DREAMers and WET: South-Central American.
Michael Coscia is a writer and filmmaker, his filmography is known for his writing on Sticky Pinecones (2021), How to Be a Latin Lover (2017) and Seven Psychopaths (2012).
Josh Gershick is an author, playwright, and filmmaker, whose works include the short film “Door Prize” and the play “Bluebonnet Court.” He is writer/director of the film Door Prize, winner of the Alfred C. Kinsey Award, honoring film that furthers understanding of gender or sexuality; and author of two acclaimed oral histories “Gay Old Girls,” winner of the ForeWord Book of the Year Award for LGBT Nonfiction, an American Library Association Gay & Lesbian Book of the Year Nominee, and a Lambda Literary Award Finalist; and Secret Service: Untold Stories of Lesbians in the Military, winner of the ForeWord Book of the Year Award for LGBT Nonfiction and a C-SPAN Book TV featured title. A former newspaper reporter and editor, he earned an MFA from the USC School of Dramatic Arts & an MPW from the USC Dornsife College.
Marlene Nichols is an international storyteller, writer and performer who explores the universal dramas of childhood, love, memorial, and technology. She is a freelance creative consultant.
Lynne Thompson was appointed Poet Laureate for the City of Los Angeles in February 2021. She’s the author of “Beg No Pardon”, winner of the Perugia Press Book Prize, “Start With A Small Guitar”, and “Fretwork”, winner of the Marsh Hawk Press Prize.
Amanda Wixon (Chickasaw) is Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of California, Riverside. She is a co-editor of book, Medicine, Education, and the Arts in Contemporary Native America: Strong Women, Resilient Nations (2022).
Music by The Ukulele Orchestra of the Western Hemisphere,
Photo exhibit by Michael H. Hirabayashi.
Produced in partnership with Strong Words, a Los Angeles based monthly community event that celebrates diversity through the creative arts.
http://www.strongwordslive.com
Doors open at 6:30 p.m. so audiences can visit the associated exhibition Dress Codes
NOTE: See site for RSVP, tickets, and further information.
Where: The Autry in Griffith Park
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 7:30 pm (Doors at 6:30 pm)
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://theautry.org/events/performing-arts/strong-words-voices-city-autry
Fos–Thursday & FOST Artistic Collective Presents: Freedom of Speech Open Mic with Sabor y Cultura Café – In-Person & Online IG Event
Please help FOS’s in-person venue Sabor y Cultura with the link in the bio. Open Mic is currently only on IG Live at 8 pm, with sign-ups open on Wednesday at 3pm.
NOTE: See site for cost, event details.
Where: Freedom of Speech (FOS) Open Mic – In-Person & Online IG event
Date: Thursday the 15th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: 665 N. Heliotrope Dr., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://www.instagram.com/fos_thursdays/
Spectacular Storytime for Children at Once Upon a Time Bookstore – In-Person Kids Event
Spectacular Storytime is offered every Friday morning at 9:30 am. It is ready to delight and dazzle with troubadour Maddie, it and is geared for children ages 3-6.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Once Upon a Time Bookstore
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 9:30 am
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/spectacular-story-time-5
Your Author Series: Johnnie Christmas & Swim Team at Central Library, LAPL – Online Kids Event
Join the Your Author Series to discuss this presentation of the children’s book, Swim Team and meet author Johnnie Christmas.
Bree can’t wait for the first day at her new middle school until she’s stuck with the only elective that fits her schedule, the dreaded Swim 101. The thought of swimming makes Bree more than a little queasy, yet she’s forced to dive headfirst into one of her greatest fears. Can she defy the odds and guide her team to a state championship, or have the Manatees swum their last lap—for good?
NY Times Bestselling graphic novelist Jonnie Christmas is writer of the Image Comics sci-fi series Tartarus and Crema as well as Firebug and co-creating the pre-apocalyptic thriller Sheltered. A graduate of the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY, he currently lives in Vancouver BC.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, link, and event details.
Where: Central Library, LAPL
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 4 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/your-author-series-johnnie-christmas
Darren Aronofsky, with Ari Handel, & Monster Club at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
Join us to hear author Darren Aronofsky discuss his YA novel, Monster Club.
From the award-winning screenwriter-director Darren Aronofsky and his screenwriting partner, Ari Handel, comes Monster Club.
This debut novel is the first book in a thrilling, new adventure series about growing up, letting go, and facing down your monsters.
Like almost everything in eleven-year-old Eric “Doodles” King’s life, King’s Wonderland–the amusement park his great-great grandfather founded—was seriously damaged when a hurricane hit his beloved Coney Island neighborhood. Now hungry property developers are circling the wreckage of the once-awesome King’s Wonderland, and Eric’s family is falling apart from the threat of losing it all.
If it weren’t for Monster Club—the epic roleplaying game that Eric and his friends created—Eric’s life would be pretty terrible. Drawing his favorite monster battling with his best friends’ creations is the one thing that still gets Eric excited. So when his friends start to think of Monster Club as a kid’s game and get more interested in other things, Eric just can’t deal. But then Eric happens across a long-lost vial of magic ink that brings their monster drawings to life, and suddenly, Monster Club isn’t just for fun anymore.
The monsters Eric and his friends created are wreaking havoc across Coney, and it’s on the Monster Club to save their city, the amusement park, and maybe, just maybe, Eric’s family, too. It’s a hilarious, heartfelt adventure from the creative minds of Darren Aronofsky and Ari Handel that fans of Last Kids on Earth and Spy School are sure to love.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 6 pm
Address: Online (see site)
Website: https://www.vromansbookstore.com/darren-aronofsky-discussing-monster-club
Friday Fire Feature Ceasar Avelar & Open Mic, hosted by Brenda Vaca at Casa Verde LA – In-Person Event
Join us for Friday Fire Residency Goes Live @ Casa Verde LA, Uptown Whittier, hosted by Brenda Vaca, presented every 3rd Friday of the month and featuring, open mic, and vendors.
Caesar Avelar is a poet, writer, and performer, and the host of Obsidian Tongues Open Mic at Café con Libros Press in Pomona.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Casa Verde LA
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 7 pm
Address: Uptown Whittier, CA
Website: https://www.facebook.com/riotofroses/
Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi, with David Ulin, & Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions at Skylight Bookstore – In-Person Event
Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi, in conversation with David Ulin, will discuss the American debut of the Nigerian author’s dazzling novel which explores her homeland’s past, present, and possible future through the interconnected stories of four fearless globe-trotting women: Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions: A Novel in Interlocking Stories.
Revolving around loss, belonging, family, friendship, alienation, and silence, Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions is a moving, multifaceted portrait of lives shaped by hope and sorrow—of women who must contend with the ever-present and unsettling notion that moving forward in time isn’t necessarily progress.
Moving between Nigeria and America, this novel is a window into the world of accomplished Nigerian women, illuminating the challenges they face and the risks they take to control their destinies.
Students at an all-girls boarding school, Nonso, Remi, Aisha, and Solape forge an unbreakable sisterhood that is tempered during a school rebellion, an uprising with repercussions that will forever reverberate through their lives. The children of well-to-do families, these young women have been raised with a thirst for independence, believing a university education is their right—a legacy of ambition and hope inherited from their foremothers.
Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi was born and raised in Ibadan, Nigeria. A finalist for the 2009 PEN/Studzinski Award (published in New Writing from Africa 2009, a collection of PEN/Studzinski Award finalists’ stories), her stories have been published in Ploughshares and listed in The Best American Short Stories 2018. Her poetry has appeared in the Massachusetts Review, the Indiana Review and Wasafiri. She graduated from Barnard and UPenn with bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in computer science. Omolola is a Professor of Preventive and Social Medicine at Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science in South Los Angeles, where she teaches and conducts research on using biomedical informatics to reduce health disparities. She lives in California with her husband.
David L. Ulin is the author or editor of more than a dozen books, including Sidewalking: Coming to Terms with Los Angeles, shortlisted for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and Ucross Foundation. He is the books editor of Alta Journal, and a professor of English at the University of Southern California, where he edits the journal Air/Light.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines, and details.
Where: Skylight Bookstore
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Open Mic Night! At Village Well Coffee & Books – In-Person Event
Calling all musicians, poets, authors, and comedians for our bi-monthly open mic night!
This all-inclusive event will create space for local artists of any medium to share their talents with the community. Come hang out, as an audience member, or a performer, and meet some talented locals!
Sign-ups for performers are at the door, day of, 30 minutes prior to the event. Sets are limited to 5-10 minutes. All performances must be family friendly.
We will provide two microphones and two mic stands. Please bring any other equipment you will need.
This event is free, no registration is required!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd., #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/19463
Daniel Hockenson & Anne Lesley Launch Books at Poetic Research Bureau – In-Person Event
Join us to celebrate the launch of Danile Hockenson’s new book, Modal Rose Coda and Anne Lesley Selcer’s book, Sun Cycle, published in 2019.
Daniel Hockenson is an artist and writer who lives in Los Angeles. His text and visual work has been presented at Whitechapel Gallery, the Torrance Museum of Art, and at Hayworth Gallery. Modal Rose: Coda, published by Insert Blanc Press, is his first book.
Anne Lesley Selcer works in the expanded field of language. They write on, with, around and underneath art. This has created a book of essays called Blank Sign Book, a book of poems called Sun Cycle and a multitude of multiform publications, performances and moving pictures scattered through galleries, art spaces and magazines. Their off-page works have shown at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, The Moscow International Experimental Film Festival, Cork International Film Festival, Ribalta Film Festival, The Berkeley Art Museum, Crossroads Film Festival, Kroswork and ProArts among other places. Recent poetry appears in Beast, SPAM, Blazing Stadium, Interim and Dirt Child. Writing has been commissioned by Artspeak, Mills College Art Museum, The Capilano Review and other art institutions, most recently by Cindy Rehm for her monograph Transference.
On Modal Rose Coda:
The most striking thing about the study of languages are their convivialities—linguistic similarities that appear when we pass from one country to another or even one region to another. Convergences over time often escape the observer, however convergences in space cannot be avoided. Confronted with legible texts, one is literally composed; a steadiness persists, a stability within the semicircular canals: all the “otoliths” in balance; in reading, the signifying mass of the text holds form, ventilated by cultural action.
A text reveals a topology of desire, a singular form carved from the possibilities contained within the lexicon of its author. In this sense, Modal Rose: Coda, is no different; yet, in an attempt to find distance from overt expressions of self, this work opts to wander down more well-trodden paths, those guided by clearly-legible signage, swapping out the onus of personal desire for mixtures of order and chaos that only the whims of the many might achieve through patterns of repetition, gradual changes, and over fair amounts of time. Here, a topology of desire is revealed specifically through the collision and comparison of distinct lexicons.
Comprised of 13 non-traditional double sestinas and largely determined by specific orthographies shared between a half-dozen of the most-used Latin-script-based languages, Modal Rose: Coda finds its form within the confines of a strictly visual commonplace, and in doing so, boils the English language down to its most prevalent cross-cultural imports and exports. These import/exports (these loanwords, these inter-lexical homographs found common to English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish), both fixed by stereotypical overuse and unmoored by their vast combinatorial potentials, reveal various nodes of fixation held by the Westernized multitudes, nodes that, when left to commingle, link and twist into a spindly, descriptive, and sanctioned Babel.
Where: Poetic Research Bureau
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9 pm
Address: 2220 Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90057
Website: https://www.poeticresearch.com/events/daniel-hockenson-amp-anne-lesley-selcer
Reading & Conversation: traci kato-kiriyama & Noriko Nakada at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person & Online Event
Celebrate the recent publication of traci kato-kiriyama’s, Navigating With(out) Instruments, with a reading and conversation featuring Noriko Nakada, the author of a series of memoirs including I Tried, Overdue Apologies, and Through Eyes Like Mine. traci kato-kiriyama’s work is transdisciplinary, as they are a writer, actor, and theatre devisor, centering community building within their work at large. Noriko Nakada is a member of the leadership team for Women Who Submit, an organization empowering women and non-binary writers to submit their work for publication.
traci kato-kiriyama (they+she) –based on unceded Tongva land in the south bay of Los Angeles– is the author of Navigating With(out) Instruments, an award-winning multi-, inter- and transdisciplinary artist, recognized for their work as a writer/performer, theatre deviser, cultural producer, and community organizer. As a storyteller and Artivist, tkk is grounded in collaborative process, collective self-determination, and art+community as intrinsically tied and a critical means toward connection and healing. She is a performer & principal writer for PULLproject Ensemble, two-time NET recipient; NEFA 2021-22 finalist for their show TALES OF CLAMOR. tkk —presented for over 25 years in hundreds of venues throughout North America as a writer, actor, poet, speaker, guest lecturer, facilitator, Artist-in-Residence, and organizing / arts & culture consultant— has come to appreciate a wildly hybrid career (w/ presenters incl. LaMaMa Cabaret; Enwave Theatre; The Smithsonian; The Getty; Skirball Cultural Center; and Hammer Museum, to Zero Gravity; Grand Park; Whisky a Go Go; Hotel Cafe; House Of Blues Foundation Room; and countless universities, arts spaces, and community centers across the country). Their work is also featured in a wide swath of media and print publications (incl. NPR; PBS; Elle.com; Entropy; Chapparal Canyon Press; Tia Chucha Press; Bamboo Ridge Press; Heyday Books; Regent Press).
Noriko Nakada is a multi-racial Asian American who creates fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and art to capture the hidden stories she has been told not to talk about. Publications include her memoir series: Through Eyes Like Mine, Overdue Apologies, and I Tried. Through Eyes Like Mine was shortlisted for the 2040 Book Award. Excerpts, essays, fiction, and poetry have appeared in Catapult, Meridian, Kartika, Hippocampus, and Linden Avenue. She is a member of the leadership team for Women Who Submit, an organization empowering women and non-binary writers to submit their work for publication. Works in progress include Waiting for the Other Shoe to Drop: One Family’s Struggle with Mental Illness, and Rice Paper Superheroes, a historical novel about a Japanese American family during World War II.
NOTE: See site for tickets, link, and hybrid event details.
Where: Beyond Baroque
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 8 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice CA 90291
SWAAM Spoken Word Art & Music Event & bridgette bianca, by Lorenzo Frank at Park Hills Community Center – In-Person Event
Join us to hearfeatured poet bridgette bianca, plus an Open Mic, hosted by Lorenzo Frank onthe third Friday of the month.
NOTE: See site for guidelines, and details.
Where: Park Hills Community Center
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 8:30 pm
Address: 5245 Overdale Dr., Los Angels, CA 90043
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/swaam-spoken-word-art-music-tickets-415109091467?aff=ebdssbdestsearch
Third Fridays Poetry Reading Series, with Elena Secota, at Rapp Saloon – In-Person Event
Join Third Fridays to hear featured poets and an Open Mic, hosted by Elena Secots on every third Friday of the month.
Featured guests and guidelines TBA.
NOTE: See site for guidelines, and details.
Where: Rapp Saloon
Date: Friday the 16th
Time: 8:30 pm
Address: 1436 2nd St., Santa Monica, CA 90401
Website: https://www.facebook.com/therappsaloonpoetryreading/
Graphic Novel Book Club: Diary of a Reluctant Dreamer at Bel Canto Bookstore – Online Event
Join Bel Canto Bookstore’s Graphic Novel Book Club every Third Saturday of the month, and discuss this month’s selection, Diary of a Reluctant Dreamer: Undocumented Vignettes from a Pre-American Life, by Alberto Ledesma.
In this hybrid memoir, Alberto Ledesma wonders, At what point does a long-time undocumented immigrant become an American in the making? From undocumented little boy to “hyper documented” university professor, Ledesma recounts how even now, he sometimes finds himself reverting to the child he was, recalling his father’s words: “Mijo, it doesn’t matter how good you think your English is, la migra will still get you.”
NOTE: See site for guidelines, and event details.
Where: Bel Canto Bookstore
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 10 am
Address: On-line
2nd Annual Beyond the Book Event at Downey City Library – In-Person Event
Beyond the Book is Downey City Library’s second annual celebration of all the great resources the library has to offer outside of books, highlighting artists, makers, writers and the DIY spirit in our community.
The all-ages event will feature:
Live Music
Art, Design and Maker Workshops
Panel Discussions with Authors and Creators, including:
Writers Panel: Write From Where You Are
Hear from native SoCal writers Dorany Pineda, Erick Gallindo and Michael Jaime-Becerra on how to write and create stories based on your personal experiences.
Dorany Pineda writes about books, publishing and the local literary scene for the Los Angeles Times. She served a brief stint in City News Service’s police beat and was a general assignment reporter for the Los Angeles Wave newspaper. Pineda earned her bachelor’s in literature from UC Santa Cruz in 2012 and a journalism certificate from East Los Angeles College in 2017.
Erick Gallindo is a five-time Telly Award-winning writer, director, and showrunner originally from Southeast Los Angeles. He is the co-creator, writer and executive producer of “The Mexican Beverly Hills, a sitcom currently in development at CBS. His co-written screenplay ““A Christmas to Remember” was recently optioned by Broken English and Grandave Studios. Erick is also the creator, head writer, executive producer and host of multiple international hit podcasts including: The Ballad of Chalino Sanchez, WILD, Out of The Shadows. He has written essays on life and culture for the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, and is currently the showrunner on “Snooze” for NPR station KPCC/LAist Studios. He was the first managing editor of L.A. Taco, where his work won a James Beard Foundation award.
Michael Jaime-Becerra grew up in El Monte, California, a working-class suburb of Los Angeles. He received his MFA from the University of California, Irvine, and currently teaches creative writing at University of California, Riverside. His short-story collection, Every Night Is Ladies’ Night, was named one of the best of the year by The Washington Post and the San Francisco Chronicle. It was awarded a California Book Award, the Silver Medal for a First Work of Fiction. Michael is a winner of an International Latino Book Award. He lives in El Monte, California.
Writers Panel: Suburban Past, Present, And Future
Listen to urban planner Jonathan Pacheco Bell, writer Mike Sonksen, and poet Marisa Urrutia Gedney talk about suburban culture, the cultural history of Downey and Southern Californian suburbs.
Jonathan Pacheco Bell is a practicing urban planner based in Pasadena, CA. He has 20 years of professional experience in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors spanning the fields of urban planning, architecture, labor organizing, and community libraries. He comes to Cal Poly Pomona Urban & Regional Planning with expertise in community engagement, participatory planning and design, inclusive public space, General, Specific, Community and Vision Plans, code enforcement, zoning ordinances, planning studies, policy writing, and project management.
Mike Sonksen, also known as Mike the Poet, is a 3rd-generation L.A. native acclaimed for published essays, poetry performances and mentoring teen writers. Mike teaches at Woodbury University. His latest book is Letters to My City, and his vast work on literary culture has been published by LARB, KCET, LA Taco, and appears in many journals, publications and venues.
Marisa Urrutia Gedney is the author of Alter of the Imagination. As an Aztec dancer, offering prayer to Coatlicue, Coyolxauhqui, and Tonantzin in every dance, each poem asks permission to honor the endurance of her family. Each poem is a plea, teach her how to do this: live. To live how the other women who came before her could not: free.
NOTE: See site for guidelines, and event details.
Where: Downey City Library
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 10 am – 6 pm
Address: 11121 Brookshire Ave., Downey, CA 90241
Website: https://www.downeylibrary.org/calendar/2022/9/17/beyond-the-book
Special Storytime: Melissa de la Cruz & Dona Esmeralda, Who Ate Everything at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
Join us for a special storytime with children’s author Melissa de la Cruz, who will present her new book, Dona Esmeralda, Who Ate Everything.
This book is a silly laugh-out-loud read-aloud picture book debut from #1 New York Times bestselling author Melissa de la Cruz!
Once upon a time, in the middle of a group of seven thousand happy islands named after King Philip of Spain, there lived a lady named Doña Esmeralda.
She had a big bouffant hairdo and was much smaller than you.
And she was always hungry…
And so begins the wickedly hilarious tale of one very old, but very stylish little lady who loves to eat, but can only find the ooey, gooey, mushy, smelly leftovers of naughty children to nosh on. But what happens when Doña Esmeralda finds out about all the tasty treats that children do eat? Hold on to your hairdos as Esmeralda eats everything in sight in a cumulative read-aloud inspired by stories from author Melissa de la Cruz’s childhood in the Philippines,
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 11 am
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena CA 91101
Website: https://www.vromansbookstore.com/melissa-de-la-cruz-presents-dona-esmeralda
Café con Libros Literacy Festival Launched at Café con Libros Press, Pomona – In-Person Event
Join us for the first Café con Libros Literacy Festival and meet authors, get free books, join a workshop. and participate in our vino n verses Open Mic.
The festival begins at 12:30 PM with storytime, coloring, and crafts for kids.
1:00 Cuentitos con Crafts with Joe Cepeda, author of Rafa Counts on Papa
2:00 workshop with published author and illustrator Joe Cepeda
3:30-5:30 Free book bundles for children and teachers
5:30 poetry workshop with James Coates, author of Midnight and Mad Dreams
7:30 Vines and Verses Open Mic
Meet authors and get free Date Night with a Book books staring at 5:30 PM
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details. Suggested $10 donation for workshops
Where: Café con Libros
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 12;30 pm – 9 pm
Address: 280 West 2nd St., Pomona, CA 91766
Early Readers Book Club & Rise of Zombert via Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Kids Event
Join our Early Readers Book Club to discuss this month’s selection, Rise of Zombert, by Kara LaReau, Ryan Andrews (illustrator)
From the Zombert mystery series, Rise of Zombert asks could Bert really be a zombie cat?
NOTE: See site for guidelines and event details.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Saturday 17th
Time: 1 pm
Address: 5225 Canyon Crest Dr., #30A, Riverside, CA 92507
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/early-readers-book-club-rise-zombert
Sarah Kuhn IN-PERSON Launch Party for Holiday Heroine, with Jenny Yang, Jenn Fujikawa. Julia Cho & Elizabeth Ho at The Ripped Bodice Bookstore – In-Person Event
We are hosting an IN-PERSON book launch for Sarah Kuhn and new book, Holiday Heroine.
Hosted by Jenny Yang, Sarah will be in conversation with cookbook author Jenn Fujikawa, with special appearances by actors Julia Cho, Elizabeth Ho, and Tim Chiou. A signing will follow the event for Sarah and Jenn.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines, and details.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 2 pm – 3:30 pm
Address: Main St., Culver City, CA 90323
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
Kid’s Storytime & Mirelle Ortega Book Signing & Magic at Village Well Coffee & Books – In-Person Kids Event
Mirelle Ortega is a writer and illustrator for publishing and TV animation based in Los Angeles, California. She has illustrated several books, including Small Room, Big Dreams: The Journey of Julián and Joaquín Castro by Monica Brown, and The Mythics series by Lauren Magaziner. Visit her online at http://www.mirelleortega.com
About the book
Magic is based on Ortega’s own story of growing up on her family’s pineapple farm in Mexico, Magic follows a girl as she’s discovers the true meaning of the word *magic* as it applies to change and transformation. Magic can transform dirt into pineapples, seeds into trees, wool into blankets, words into stories, blank pages into pictures—a story into a picture book.
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 2 pm – 3 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd., #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/19577
Saturday Afternoon Poetry & Featured Readers & Open Mic – In-Person Event & Online Event via Zoom
Join us at Saturday Afternoon Poetry online to hear featured readers Juanita E. Mantz Pelaez, Alex Petunia & Jose Ruiz, September Song publication reading, plus Open Mic readers hosted by COCO.
Juanita E. Mantz Pelaez, is the author of Tales of an Inland Empire Girl (Los Nietos, Jan 2022) & Portrait of a Deputy Public Defender, or how I became a punk rock lawyer.
Alex Petunia is the author of Tending My Wild, a collection that braves a trial unmarked running away on all fours back of a forgotten self.
Jose Ruiz is the author of The Book of Poems, a legendary saga of a world before poetry, one that languished in darkness until the 13th century.
All events are curated by Don Kingfisher Campbell.
Where: Saturday Afternoon Poetry at Rosebud Coffee Patio
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 3 pm – 5 pm
Address: 2302 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena CA & Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: http://saturdayafternoonpoetry.blogspot.com/
Richard T. Rodriguez, with Dr. Marlen Rios-Hernandez, & A Kiss Across the Ocean at LibroMobile – In-Person Event
Join LibroMobile and Ghostown Anaheim for a book release celebration of A Kiss Across the Ocean: Transatlantic Intimacies of British Post-Punk and US Latinidad, by author Richard T. Rodriguez, who will be in conversation with Dr. Marlen Rios-Hernandez.
A Kiss Across the Ocean examines an array of interactions and exchanges between British musicians catalyzed by the early punk movement and Latinas and Latinos in the United States. Melding memoir with cultural criticism, Rodríguez spotlights a host of influential bands and performers including Siouxsie and the Banshees, Adam Ant, Bauhaus, Soft Cell, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, and Pet Shop Boys. He recounts these bands’ importance for him and other Latinx kids and discusses their frequent identification with these bands’ glamorous performance of difference. He demonstrates how the music and styles that have come to define the 1980s hold significant sway over younger generations equally enthused by their matchlessly pleasurable and political reverberations.
Where: LibroMobile at Bristol Food Court
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 1180 S. Bristol St., Santa Ana, CA 92704
Sci-Fi & Fantasy Book Club & Clara and the Sun via Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Kids Event
Join our Sci-Fi& Fantasy Book Club to discuss this month’s selection, Clara and the Sun, by Kazuo Ishiguro.
Here is the story of Klara, an Artificial Friend with outstanding observational qualities, who, from her place in the store, watches carefully the behavior of those who come in to browse, and of those who pass on the street outside. She remains hopeful that a customer will soon choose her. Klara and the Sun is a thrilling book that offers a look at our changing world through the eyes of an unforgettable narrator, and one that explores the fundamental question: what does it mean to love?
Kazuo Ishiguro was born in Nagasaki, Japan, in 1954 and moved to Britain at the age of five. His eight previous works of fiction have earned him many honors around the world, including the Nobel Prize in Literature and the Booker Prize.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and event details.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Saturday 17th
Time: 5 pm
Address: 5225 Canyon Crest Dr., #30A, Riverside, CA 92507
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/sci-fi-fantasy-book-club-klara-and-sun
Pages on Stages: Open Mic by CLI, featuring Dr. V, Shy But Flyy, Tommy Domino, Ravina at Sims Library of Poetry – In-Person Event
Join the Pages on Stages Readers & Open Mic event. Hosted by Hiram Sims & AKoldPiece, hear featured poets from Neverspeak Long Beach:
Dr. V is an internationally recognized educator, Spoken Word Artivist and published author. While her impact began in academia, her work has expanded into local communities to create opportunities for change through Social Justice education and the arts. On the day of the Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation in 2018, she was a main feature of the Amber Rose Slutwalk in Los Angeles and performed “Survivor Solidarity” in front of over 22,000 people. Her book, WOMXN, published by World Stage Press, gives voice to the struggles and resilience of an intersectional womxn’s existence in America as a survivor, a mother and more. Dr. V strongly believes in the power of music and art as a form of healing and to promote social change. Follow her @drnooshinv and Visit her at http://www.drnooshv.com.
Shy But Flyy is a singer-writer- poet. You can catch Shy performing locally with her blues band all around So Cal. Shy also runs a weekly open mic at roxannes in long beach every Monday open to all genres. Follow her schedule at http://www.shybutflyy.com and make sure to get a copy of her book, The Meaning of the Blues.
Tommy Domino is an Alumni from the Community Literature Initiative is a spoken blues poet raised in Northwest Pasadena. Member of the Stillwater’s Writers Collective since (2012). His work is featured in two Anthologies: Sounds for the Water (2013) & Poets, Allies for Resistance (2015) and Black Minds Publishing (2/2021). Co-Founder of Poetry Friends & Drinks in 2016. His book Switches, Hot wheel Tracks & Extensions Cords was published by World Stage Press (2018). He has performed at tributes for: The 50th Anniversary of The Watts Writers Workshop of 1965, The Watts Prophets and The Last Poets. Served as a member of Diverse Verses and Co-Producer of The Annual Pan African Film Spoken Word Festival from (2017-2021). He is a member of the poetry collective @NeverSpeakLB. Facilitates the Long Beach poetry cohorts for the Community Literature Initiative (2020-Pres.) Community Literature Initiative Teacher of the Year (2022).
Ravina is a Long Beach based spoken word poet, published author, & mental health therapist who made her way to the West Coast by way of the East Coast. Ravina was born and raised in the U.S. Virgin Islands and embraces her South Asian roots and multicultural upbringing. YELLOW is her first collection of published poetry and prose published by World Stage Press in 2021. RAVINA has been featured on national and international stages, most recently the United Nations & the BMW headquarters. Ravina strives to use poetry as a catalyst for inner healing and social change. RAVINA is the creator of the Poetry as Healing workshops & is an active member of Never Speak Long Beach & AIM 4 the Heart Org.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines and event details.
Where: Sims Library of Poetry
Date: Saturday 17th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 2702 W. Florence Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90043
Website: https://www.simslibraryofpoetry.org/event-details/pages-on-stages-neverspeak-long-beach
L.A. Book Launch Book Launch: Interstellar Theme Park by Jack Skelley & Guests at Beyond Baroque – In-Person Event
Join us to welcome Jack Skelley for an evening of celebration of a thrilling new poetry collection! Reunited with Beyond Baroque friends, poet Amy Gerstler and writer Benjamin Weissman, who will also read from their new works.
Exploding pop archetypes ancient to modern, Interstellar Theme Park assembles decades of perverse verse and prose by the Los Angeles writer Jack Skelley. It excerpts work from Monsters (Little Caesar Press) and Skelley’s “secretly legendary” novel Fear of Kathy Acker (Semiotext(e)). It adds music-history fiction on Brian Jones (Rolling Stones), Led Zeppelin, and the Beach Boys/Charlie Manson. And its thrill-ride poems and stories spotlight pop divas, punk epiphanies, good acid, bad brains, adverse adverts, legalized fascism, economic meltdowns, psychedelic cave drawings, schizoid pronouns, the hallucinations of romance, Catholic sex, Disneyland, and Catholic sex at Disneyland.
Jacks Skelley’s books include: Monsters (Little Caesar Press), Dennis Wilson and Charlie Manson (Fred & Barney Press), and Fear of Kathy Acker (Semiotext(e)). Jack’s work is widely anthologized. Collections include: Under 35: The New Generation of American Poets (ed. Nicholas Christopher, Anchor Books), and Sweet Nothings: An Anthology of Rock and Roll in American Poetry (ed. Jim Elledge, Indiana University Press. He was editor and publisher of Barney: The Modern Stone-Age Magazine, featuring major artists and writers. He is songwriter and guitarist for psychedelic surf band Lawndale (SST Records).
Amy Gerstler’s most recent book of poems is Index of Women (Penguin Random House, 2021). Her work has appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, including the New Yorker and Paris Review. She is currently collaborating with composer, actor, and arranger Steve Gunderson on a musical play. Her previous books of poems include Scattered at Sea, Dearest Creature, Ghost Girl, Medicine, Crown of Weeds, Nerve Storm, and Bitter Angel. Oren’s Forest, a children’s book Gerstler did with artist/Illustrator Lindsey Burwell, was published in 2022. In 2019, she received a Foundation for Contemporary Arts CD Wright Grant. In 2018, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. She has also written fiction, nonfiction, and journalism and art criticism.
Benjamin Weissman is the author of two books of short fiction, most recently Headless. His writing on books, art, and skiing have appeared in McSweeney’s, The Believer, and Powder. A recent exhibition of paintings and sculptures occurred at The Pit. He’s working on a new book of stories and a novel. He teaches Senior Studio & Advanced Drawing at UCLA.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidleines, and event details.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Saturday the 17th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291
September Focus on Craft Book Club at The Ripped Bodice Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us every 3rd Sunday of the month for Focus on Craft Book Club.
The book for discussion in September is For Butter or For Worse by Erin La Rosa.
Developmental editor and teacher Jeanne Devita leads this book club that focuses on examining popular romance novels from a writer’s viewpoint. But everyone is welcome, you don’t have to be a writer!
Meets at the store on the 3rd Sunday of the month at 1pm.
No membership necessary, feel free to show up!
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Ripped Bodice Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 18th
Time: 1 pm
Address: Main Street., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
Cellar Door Book Club & Hell of a Book: A Novel at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join the Cellar Door Book Club for a discussion of this month’s selection, Hell of a Book: A Novel, by author Jason Mott.
In Jason Mott’s Hell of a Book, a Black author sets out on a cross-country publicity tour to promote his bestselling novel. That storyline drives Hell of a Book and is the scaffolding of something much larger and more urgent: Mott’s novel also tells the story of Soot, a young Black boy living in a rural town in the recent past, and The Kid, a possibly imaginary child who appears to the author on his tour.
As these characters’ stories build and converge, they astonish. For while this heartbreaking and magical book entertains and is at once about family, love of parents and children, art and money, it’s also about the nation’s reckoning with a tragic police shooting playing over and over again on the news. And with what it can mean to be Black in America.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, link, and details.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 18th
Time: 2 pm
Address: 5225 Canyon Create Dr., #30A, Riverside, CA 92507
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/cellar-door-book-club-hell-book
Author Event: Maggie P. Chang & Geraldine Pu Series at Bel Canto Books at The Hangout – In-Person Event
Join Bel Canto at The Book Bench at The Hangout to meet Maggie P. Chang, author of the Geraldine Pu Series of children’s books, and a signing of Make & Take and others in the series.
Maggie P. Chang grew up in Kansas, where she constantly had her nose in a book and art supplies close by. She began her career in art education, but after teaching the most fabulous and talented teens at LaGuardia Arts High School (a.k.a. the Fame school), she was inspired to follow her own passion for children’s books. This Taiwanese American is the author-illustrator of the award-winning Geraldine Pu series and is also the cofounder of two education nonprofits. Maggie lives in California with her husband, their daughter, and their dog, Benihana.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines, and event details.
Where: Bel Canto Books at The Hangout
Date: Sunday the 18th
Time: 3 pm – 4 pm
Address: 2122 E, 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://shopthehangout.com/products/bcb-author-event-maggie-p-chang-sun-9-18-3pm
Jeannie Lin In-Person Event, with Jennifer Haymore & Sabrina Darby. at The Ripped Bodice Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us to meet Jeannie Lin on Sunday, September 18th at 3pm PT. She will discuss her Pingkang Li Mysteries series with fellow authors Jennifer Haymore and Sabrina Darby. There will be a book signing to follow.
This event is free to attend and tickets are not required. However, we do appreciate RSVPs when possible! For all events and browsing, we do ask you wear a mask.
About the book:
Murder and forbidden love in the Tang Dynasty. The latest in the bestselling Lotus Palace Mystery series.
Magistrate Li Chen harbors a secret. One that could destroy his hard-earned reputation, as well as his growing passion for the talented courtesan, Song Yi.
Li Chen’s duty to his family and the Emperor must come before the desires of his heart, but when a stranger to the city is found dead near the House of Heavenly Peaches, where Song Yi is indentured, the complicated nature of their relationship becomes the least of his troubles.
For Song Yi, Magistrate Li’s gentlemanly, late-night conversations provide a welcome change from the games of courtship she is accustomed to, but his reserved attention won’t pay the bills. When one of her courtesan sisters goes missing at the same time a stranger is killed in the pleasure quarter, she and Li Chen embark on an investigation as well as a passionate affair. But the riddle they uncover goes deeper than they could have imagined, and mysteries from their pasts may shatter any hope for the future.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Ripped Bodice Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 18th
Time: 3 pm
Address: Main Street., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
Poetry Workshop: Poets Lie: Contradiction as a Lyric Device, with Francesca Kritikosat Sims Library of Poetry – Online Free Event
Join a free poetry workshop on Zoom led by Francesca Kritikos, Poets Lie: Contradiction as a Lyric Device.
This 60-minute workshop seeks to reframe and reclaim contradiction from an error to be rectified into an opportunity for emotional exploration, depth and growth in lyric poetry. After exploring how other lyric poets utilize contradiction in their work to complicate binaries and create a space for more honest, raw and unfiltered poetics, participants will be able to select from numerous prompts as they look to interrogate what is within them that is both true and untrue. They will have the opportunity to share work and discuss their experience crafting poems that embrace contradiction and opposition as a device to create tension and expand what it means to write a lyric poem.
Francesca Kritikos is a Greek-American writer and editor based in Chicago. In her practice, she writes in both English and Greek, often translating her own writing back and forth. She believes that the simpler the language used, the more accessible a poem is, and therefore more powerful. In her work, and she is seeking to lyricize varying and contradicting states of being in modes ranging from erotic to ascetic. She is interested in personalizing the political and politicizing the personal, with a particular focus on societal consumption and labor practices.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines and event details.
Where: Sims Library of Poetry
Date: Sunday 18th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/poets-lie-contradiction-as-a-lyric-device-tickets-400314530537
NDA Autofiction Reading: Chris Kraus, Ottessa Moshfegh, Brontez Purnell and Kate Durbin at Stories Books & Cafe – In-Person Event
Join Stories Books & Café for the NDA Autofiction Reading Series, inspired by the forthcoming anthology from Archway Editions, featuring:
Chris Kraus is the author of If I Love Dick.
Ottessa Moshfegh is the author of My Year of Rest and Relaxation.
Brontez Purnell is the author of 100 Boyfriends.
Kate Durbin is the author of Hoarders.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Stories Books & Cafe
Date: Sunday the 18th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 1716 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: https://storiesla.com/events
Los Angeles Literature 