World Literature Book Club at West Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event
Join us for a spirited and engaging discussion of the world’s best short stories! All selections are from The Ecco Anthology of Contemporary American Short Fiction (HarperCollins, 2008), eds. Joyce Carol Oates and Christopher R. Beha. This month’s selections are:
October 7: The New Automaton Theater by Steven Millhauser
October 14: Library Closed: Indigenous Peoples Day
October 21: Paper Losses by Lorrie Moore
October 28: Stiches by Antonya Nelson
We meet every Monday morning (excluding holidays)
RSVP:
For the Zoom link, please send an e-mail request to wvally@lapl.org with “World Literature” in the Subject line.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: West Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Monday, the 7th
Time: 10 am
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/world-literature-book-club-42
World Literature Book Club at Robertson Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Writing a book, poem, or screenplay?
Need deadlines? Want constructive feedback?
Then this is the place for you.
Bring 5 – 10 double spaced typed pages to read. Everyone will get a chance to read.
This group mostly meets in person, but email rbrtsn@lapl.org if you’d prefer to join via Zoom.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Robertson Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Monday, the 7th
Time: 11 am
Address: 1719 S. Robertson Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90035
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/robertson-writers-group-0
Senior Writing Group at Palisades Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Kathy Katims, founder of Saved by a Story, leads an ongoing writing group for seniors. New members are welcome to all or any sessions.
Write to prompts, share (if you’d like), connect with fellow seniors in the neighborhood, hone your writing skills, and find your story.
RSVP:
RSVP to palsds@lapl.org is recommended but not required. If you RSVP we will send you a welcome packet, guidelines, and a reminder the day before the meeting.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Palisades Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Monday, the 7th
Time: 1 pm
Address: 861 Alma Real Dr., Pacific Palisades, CA
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/senior-writing-group-2
Kathleen Glasgow, with Alexa Donne, & The Glass Girl at Vroman’s – In-Person Event
Kathleen Glasgow, in conversation with Alexa Donne, will discuss her novel The Glass Girl.
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Girl in Pieces comes a raw, heart-wrenching novel about a teenager facing down her struggles with alcohol—and the journey she must take to heal Everyone in fifteen-year-old Bella’s life needs something from her. Her mom needs her to help around the house, her dad needs her to not make waves, her ex needs her to not be so much. The only person who never needed anything from her was her grandmother—and now she’s dead.
Gorgeously written and deeply compassionate, Kathleen Glasgow’s The Glass Girl is a candid exploration of the forces pushing young women toward addiction—and what it really takes to help them get better.
NOTE: See site for link and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Monday the 6th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Evening Book Club: The Last Murder at the End of the World at Manhattan Beach Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss the October selection The Last Murder at the End of the World by author Stuart Turton. For adults.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Manhattan Beach Library, LACL
Date: Monday, the 7th
Time: 5 pm
Address: 1320 Highland Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/11179093
Viva Hollywood: Book Talk by Luis Reyes at Chicano Resource Center, LACL – In-Person Event
Author/TV Personality Luis Reyes will discuss his latest book Viva Hollywood which celebrates the legacy of Latin and Hispanic artists in Hollywood.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Chicano Resource Center, LACL
Date: Monday, the 7th
Time: 5 pm
Address: 4837 E. 3rd St., Los Angeles, CA 90022
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/11650709
Reading Rainbow at Pomona Valley Pride – In-person LGBTQIA Event
Reading Rainbow is a safe space for participants to engage with novels, essays, articles, graphic novels, and/or comics that are written by and for the LGBTQIA+ community. Participants are encouraged to suggest pieces and participate in thought-provoking discussions regarding topics and issues that pertain to the queer community.
Where: Pomona Valley Pride
Date: Monday the 7th (and the 21st and the 28th)
Time: 5 pm – 6:30 pm
Address: 235 W Mission Blvd Pomona, CA 91766
Website: Reading Rainbow Tickets, Multiple Dates | Eventbrite
Zine Making: Open Studio at Tia Chucha’s – In-Person Event
Join us for a Zine Making Open Studio. Supplies will be provided, but you’re welcome to bring your own.
NOTE: See site for link and details.
Where: Tia Chucha’s Centro Cultural & Bookstore
Date: Monday the 7th (and the 21st and the 28th)
Time: 6 pm – 9 pm
Address:12677 Glenoaks Blvd., Sylmar, CA 91101
Website: https://www.instagram.com/p/DAXLlkAvG3G/?hl=en
Honoring Our Ancestors: Workshop with James Coats via Inlandia Institute – Online Event
(All Levels)
Alternating Mondays, 9/9, 9/23, 10/7, and 10/21, 6:30-8:30 PM PT, on Zoom, plus Saturday, 11/2, in person at White Park, Riverside.
White Park time to be determined.
$50. Registration required. To register: https://tinyurl.com/Fall2024CWW
Honoring Our Ancestors is a workshop designed to celebrate loved ones we have lost. We will be writing elegy and celebration of life pieces as well as learning performance skills. The workshop will culminate with a reading/performance at this year’s Day of the Dead event on Saturday, November 2 at White Park in Riverside.
James Coats is a poet, performer, and educator born in Los Angeles and raised in the Inland Empire. You can take a poetry workshop with him through his organization Lift Our Voices Education, which hosts an award-winning workshop monthly called Be the Change. He is the author of four poetry collections. His most recent is Midnight & Mad Dreams.
Where: Inlandia Institute
Date: Monday, the 7th (through 11/2)
Time: 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: Online Event
Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/events/ or https://inlandiainstitute.org/events/?month=10&yr=2024
John Macy & Djuna: The Extraordinary Life of Dijuna Barnes at Book Soup – In-Person Event
John Macy will present and discuss his book,Djuna: The Extraordinary Life of Dijuna Barnes.
A graphic biography of Djuna Barnes: writer, artist, and queer radical of the Lost Generation in the Roaring 20s.
Djuna Barnes lived in a dazzling world filled with literary salons, innovative writing, and daring new art styles. But it didn’t come easily. She managed to work her way out of an abusive childhood growing up in a polygamous rural utopian community on Long Island. She was determined to live an extraordinary life, and found herself socializing with the likes of James Joyce, Natalie Barney, Peggy Guggenheim, and T.S. Eliot in 1920s literary Paris. Called the most famous unknown of the century, Djuna Barnes stood out for her brilliant writing, her biting wit, and her unique style. Her novel, Nightwood is considered by some to be one of the greatest lesbian love stories ever written. But as the stock market crashed and the Lost Generation left Paris, her life began to unwind.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Monday, the 7th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/jon-macy
Author Launch Event: Christie Havey Smith & Threads of Us at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event
Christie Havey Smith will present and discuss her new novel, Threads of Us, which explores the self-discovery that comes to us not despite our hardships but because of them, and the mysterious connections that help us recreate ourselves.
The night before the dance performance that could determine Gracie Wilder’s career, her father unexpectedly dies, leaving behind a curious gift with ties to a myth told to her as a child. Desperate to understand her father’s unspoken words, she puts her greatest dream on the line for an opportunity to remember the childhood she tried so hard to forget.
Christie Havey Smith’s love of story was shaped in the film business, and for over a decade she has been helping people explore their own narratives. She has taught creative and contemplative writing at Loyola Marymount University and at The Greenhouse—a local retreat she founded. She is also the author of the narrative nonfiction work From Three Feet Off the Ground.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: pages: a bookstore
Date: Monday, the 7th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/special-author-event-christie-havey-smith
R.U.P.O. Open Mic at Back to the Grind in Riverside – In-Person Event (Check to Verify)
RUPO Open Mic is every Monday Night at Back to the Grind in Riverside.
Every Monday at: 7pm to 9pm. Sign-ups are at 6:30pm and in person only, $4 cash admission. See you then!
NOTE: See site for link and details.
Where: Back to the Grind, Riverside
Date: Monday the 7th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3575 University Ave. Riverside, CA 92501
Website: https://www.facebook.com/backtothegrind
At Skylight: Emily Witt, with Michelle Lhooq, & Health and Safety at Stories Books & Café – In-Person Event
From the New Yorker staff writer and acclaimed author of Future Sex.
In the summer of 2016, a divisive presidential election was underway, and a new breed of right-wing rage was on the rise. Emily Witt, who would soon publish her first book on sex in the digital age, had recently quit antidepressants for a more expansive world of psychedelic experimentation. From her apartment in Brooklyn, she began to catch glimpses of the clandestine nightlife scene thrumming around her.
In Health and Safety, Witt charts her immersion into New York City’s dance music underground. Emily would come to lead a double life. By day she worked as a journalist, covering gun violence, climate catastrophes, and the rallies of right-wing militias. And by night she pushed the limits of consciousness in hollowed-out office spaces and warehouses to music that sounded like the future. But no counterculture, no matter how utopian, could stave off the squalor of American politics and the cataclysm of 2020.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Skylight
Date: Monday the 7th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-emily-witt-presents-health-and-safety-w-michelle-lhooq
Monday Night Fiction Workshop via Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – Online Event
This free Monday Night Community Writing Workshop led by Raquel Baker is a 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 an Assistant Professor of Postcolonial and Transnational Literatures at California State University Channel Islands, teaching courses on creative writing and contemporary African literatures. Raquel has published poetry in Africology and The Arrow; fiction in Enculturation, The Daily Palette, The Womanist, and Crux; and non-fiction in Little Village; and has done readings with the Ventura County Poetry project. Raquel lives for talking about all things about the craft and social meanings of literature!
Where: Beyond Baroque – Online event
Date: Monday the 7th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: Zoom Online Event (see site)
Website: https://www.beyondbaroque.org/free_workshops or https://www.eventbrite.com/e/monday-night-fiction-workshop-tickets-1034855309087
Under Mic Influence: Featured Readings & Open Mic at LB Unified – In-Person Event
If you need an open mic, beautiful people, tasty eats, dope inspiration, good libations, and good vibrations, we have you covered!
Join host Kuahmel Alyeeus KuahAllah and @djkevjam for poetry, Open Mic, rare grooves, cocktails, tasty bites.
Every 1st & 3rd Monday of the month.
Featured guest TBA.
NOTE: See site for tickets and details.
Where: LB Unified
Date: Monday the 7th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm (Doors at 7:30 pm)
Address: 2222 E. Anaheim St., Long Beach, CA 90804
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/mic-influence-tickets-388452220047
Lit Angels Morning Writing: 12 Questions with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Francesca Lia Block is the author of more than thirty books of fiction, non-fiction, short stories and poetry, and has written screenplay adaptations of her work. She received the Spectrum Award, the Phoenix Award, the ALA Rainbow Award and the 2005 Margaret A. Edwards Lifetime Achievement Award, as well as other citations from the American Library Association, and from the New York Times Book Review, and Publisher’s Weekly. Currently she teaches creative writing at UCLA Extension, Antioch University, Pocket MFA, and numerous workshops across the country. Francesca edits Lit Angels, a literary journal available on Substack runs Lit Angels Writing Studio at the Village Well. https://www.francescaliablock.com/
Come make some magic at the Village Well! All genres and levels are welcome!
Date: Tuesday the 8th
Time: 10 am – 11 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42641
Celena’s Scribes: Workshop with Wil Clarke via Inlandia Institute – Online Event
(All Levels)
Tuesdays, 9/10, 9/17, 9/24, 10/8, 10/15, 10/22, 11/5, 11/12, and 11/19/24, 11:30 AM-1:00 PM PT, on Zoom.
Registration required. To register: https://tinyurl.com/Fall2024CWW
Participants respond to prompts about universal themes related to the human condition and are encouraged to explore all genres of writing. Individual writing is shared with a friendly, supportive group who do their best to encourage each member’s success.
Wil Clarke was born in Africa to missionary parents. He lived a total of 27 years in Africa. He is a career mathematician and is enjoying writing memoirs of his various experiences. His motto is, “You only live life once, so you may as well enjoy it the first time around and do all the good you
Where: Inlandia Institute
Date: Tuesday, the 8th (through 11/19)
Time: 11:30 am – 1 pm
Address: Online Event
Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/events/ or https://inlandiainstitute.org/my-calendar/?mc_id=2385
Poetry Writing Workshop: The Writer’s Shadow: A Process of Self-Permission via The Poetry Lab – Online Event
In this course, you will go from feeling stuck in the shadows and invalidated to embracing your freedom and self-expression as an artist. Through guided prompts, you will speak head-on with the enemies of your creative self-worth, name the voices of the monsters that have heretofore kept you from the fullness of your creativity, and from a position of understanding and liberation, explore your vibrant imaginative being. As writers, the very act of writing is what permits us as qualified. Regardless of any external (or internal) conflict. What does life look like when you say yes to yourself? Let’s explore.
Keimahney Carlisle (she/her) is a writer and poet currently based in Philadelphia, originally from California. She earned her B.S. in Business Administration with a minor in Multicultural Leadership Studies. She was a Get Lit-Words Ignite Fellow in the Summer of 2021 and served as an AmeriCorps member with the Educational Nonprofit City Year Philadelphia (’21-’23). Keimahney is passionate about human expression and social advocacy.
Where: The Poetry Lab
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://www.thepoetrylab.com/braintrust
Poetry Open Mic at Westwood Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event
Share a poem you wrote or a poem you love. You are also welcome to just listen and enjoy. Emceed by Wyatt Underwood.
RSVP:
To receive a Zoom invitation, please contact wwood@lapl.org
Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 6 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/poetry-open-mic
Silver Lake Book Club: at Silver Lake Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for engaging book discussions. Copies are available at the reference desk.
Participants will discuss The Fox Wife by author Yangsze Choo.
Where: Silver Lake Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 2411 Glendale Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90039
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/silver-lake-book-club-6
Poetry Reading at Arroyo Seco Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for an evening of poetry as three L.A. area poets share their work. Enjoy poems by Carlos Lara, Taos Lopez, and Will Alexander as read by the poets themselves. Everyone is welcome.
Where: Arroyo Seco Regional Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 6145 N. Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90042
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/poetry-reading
World Cultures Reading Circle at Westchester – Loyola Village Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join the World Cultures Reading Circle to discuss Four Treasures of the Sky by Jenny Zhang.
New members welcome!
Where: Westchester – Loyola Village Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 7114 W. Manchester Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90045
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/world-cultures-reading-circle-6
Conchas y Café Zine Workshop with DSTL Arts – Online Event
Be a part of a new fall bilingual writing workshop series with DSTL Arts online.
2024 – 2025 Publishing Year
Conchas y Café Zine; Vol. 10
Series/Issue 1: 9/3/24–12/17/24
Theme: Life’s Paths/Los caminos de la vida
Google Classroom Enrollment Code: rvdizwy
See links for details.
Where: DSTL Arts
Date: Tuesday, the 8th (through 12/17/24)
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: Online Google Classroom Event (see site)
Website: https://www.dstlarts.org/calendar or https://www.dstlarts.org/conchasycafezine
Heather White, with Leslie Carr and Andrea Ambriz, & Eco-Anxiety: Saving Our Sanity, Our Kids, and Our Future at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event
Heather White in conversation with Leslie Carr and Andrea Ambriz, will discuss her new book,Eco-Anxiety: Saving Our Sanity, Our Kids.
Where: Diesel, A Bookstore
Date: Tuesday, the 8tht
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 225 26th St., # 33, Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://www.dieselbookstore.com/event/Heather-White-Andrea-Ambriz-Leslie-Carr-Author-signing
Ryan Mac, with Alex Winter, & Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Ryan Mac, in conversation with Alex Winter, will discuss his book,Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter.
New York Times technology reporters, Kate Conger and Ryan Mac, tell for the first time the full and shocking inside story of Elon Musk’s unprecedented takeover of Twitter and the forty-four-billion-dollar deal’s seismic political, social, and financial fallout.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/ryan-mac
Open Mic Poetry at Library Coffee House, Long Beach – In-Person Event
This event is hosted by Chad Brian Poetry.
Sign-ups at 6:45 pm. All ages.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Library Coffee House
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3418 E. Broadway, Long Beach, CA 90803
Website: https://www.lbpoetry.com/
Adult Book Group: The Secret Book of Flora Lea at Once Upon a Time – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Join our discussion of Callahan Henry’s novel The Secret Book of Flora Lea
Whether you loved it, hated it, or haven’t finished it, we want to see you at our Adult Book Club that has been going strong for 40+ years at America’s Oldest Children’s Bookstore!
When a woman discovers a rare book with connections to her past, long-held secrets about her missing sister and their childhood in the English countryside during World War II are revealed.
Where: Once Upon a Time
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Mystery Book Club: In the Blink of an Eye at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event
Mystery Book Club meets monthly, generally on the second Tuesday of each month at 7:00 pm.
Participants will discuss the novel In the Blink of an Eye by author Jo Callaghan.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: pages: a bookstore (on the Patio)
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/mystery-book-club-27
Kate Golden, with Karina Hall, & A Reign of Rose at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
Join us to celebrate Kate Golden, in conversation with Karina Hall, for her romance novel A Reign of Rose.
There will be a book signing following the event.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
At Skylight: Nico Lang, with Zeke Smith, & American Teenager at Skylight – In-Person Event
From an award-winning journalist comes a vivid and moving portrait of eight trans and nonbinary teenagers across the country, following their daily triumphs, struggles, and all that encompasses growing up trans in America today.
From the tip of Florida’s conservative panhandle to vibrant queer communities in California, and from Texas churches to mosques in Illinois, American Teenager gives readers a window into the lives of Wyatt, Rhydian, Mykah, Clint, Ruby, Augie, Jack, and Kylie, eight teens who, despite what some lawmakers might want us to believe, are truly just kids looking for a brighter future.
Nico Lang (they/them) is a nonbinary award-winning journalist with over a decade of experience covering the transgender community’s fight for equality. Their work has appeared in major publications, including Rolling Stone, Esquire, the New York Times, Vox, the Wall Street Journal, Salon, Harper’s Bazaar, Time, The Washington Post, and the L.A. Times. Lang is the creator of Queer News Daily and previously served as the deputy editor for Out magazine, the news editor for Them, the LGBTQ+ correspondent for VICE, and the editor and cofounder of the literary journal In Our Words. Their industry-leading contributions to queer media have resulted in a GLAAD Media Award and 10 awards from the National Association of LGBTQ Journalists (NLGJA). Lang is also the first-ever recipient of the Visibility Award from the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund (TLDEF), an honor created to recognize their impactful contributions to reporting on the lives of LGBTQ+ people.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Skylight
Date: Tuesday the 8th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-nico-lang-presents-american-teenager-w-zeke-smith
Environmentalist Book Club: A Children’s Bible at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Are you passionate about the environment? Do you love to read? Do you want to engage in meaningful discussions about pressing environmental issues with likeminded folks? Look no further! The Central Group and West LA Group of the Sierra Club Angeles Chapter are thrilled to announce the launch of its Environmentalist Book Club!
This month participants will discuss A Children’s Bible by author Lydia Millet.
Bring your enthusiasm, questions, and a passion for the environment.
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Tuesday the 8th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42351
Dan Jones, with Grace McKagan, & Henry V at Vroman’s – In-Person Event
Dan Jones, in conversation with Frace McKagan, will discuss his book Henry V.
The New York Times bestselling author returns with a biography examining the dramatic life and unparalleled leadership of England’s greatest medieval king.
In 1413, when Henry V ascended to the English throne, his kingdom was hopelessly torn apart by political faction and partisanship. Public finances and law and order were in a state of crisis. Pirates tormented the coast; plots, conspiracies, and heresy threatened society. The lingering effects of the worst pandemic in human history continued to menace daily life. And then, in less than ten years, Henry turns it all around.
As an exceptional leader, Henry V transcends the Middle Ages which produced him, and his life story has much to teach us today. Drawing on the latest scholarship and writing with his characteristic wit and style, Dan Jones examines the king’s legendary life—and he puts Henry’s claim to greatness very vigorously to the test.
NOTE: See site for link and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Tuesday the 8th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2024-10-08/dan-jones-conversation-grace-mckagan-discuss-henry-v-0
The Virtual Cobalt Series & Open Mic: Rick Lupert & Guest TBA – Online Zoom Event
The Virtual Cobalt Series & Open Mic with host Rick Lupert presents guest reader Lory Bedikian and an open mic.
Lory Bedikian’s collection The Book of Lamenting won the Philip Levine Prize in Poetry and her forthcoming book Jagadakeer: Apology to the Body won the 2023 Raz/Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry, forthcoming September, 2024 from the University of Nebraska Press.
Bedikian earned a BA from UCLA, with an emphasis in Creative Writing, Poetry and an MFA from the University of Oregon. She teaches poetry workshops.
Where: Cobalt Poets – Online Zoom Event
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: Online event (see site)
Website: https://www.poetrysuperhighway.com/cobalt
Communicator Series #6 at the Poetic Research Bureau – In-Person Event
Sharpen your stilettos for the return of Communicator Series. Pull up with your polycule. Valet your delicately constructed emotional invalidation and check your authenticity at the door. Performances by Los Angeles-based artists Tyler Holmes and Page Person auto-cosplay trauma in a spiral of haptic dissolution and absurdist, electric autobiography…in the process, transforming architectures of isolation into otherworldly intimacies.
Communicator Series highlights queer and trans* performance artists whose practice is situated in-between. We’re here for work that is switchy, vers, and language-curious. Work that can’t resist approaching the potential of failure, that the teases the edges of form as a poetic strategy of becoming otherwise, that fucks around and sometimes finds out, or at least challenges you to.
NOTE: RSVP at link at site.
Where: Poetic Research Bureau
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
Time: 8 pm (7:30 pm Doors)
Address: 2220 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90057
Website: https://www.poeticresearch.com/events
Da Poetry Lounge Open Mic Night at Greenway Court – In-Person Event
The nation’s largest weekly Open Mic event is 25 years strong. They hold open mic nights. At an open mic, all are welcome to share their poetry or sit in their audience.
Every 5th Tuesday of the month we celebrate Women and Femme voices only on the mic. This open mic is hosted by Yesika Salgado and Jasmine Williams, with music and vibes by DJ Faucet.
NOTE: See sign-ups, details, and guidelines at website link.
$10 donation. Do NOT line up prior to 7:30 p.m. Free parking adjacent to the theater.
Masks are encouraged. All ages are welcome.
Where: Greenway Court Theatre
Date: Tuesday, the 8th
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/events
Mystery Book Club: The Bat at West Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Participants will discuss the novel The Bat by author Jo Nesbo. New members welcome!
RSVP:
Please email wvally@lapl.org with “Mystery Book Club” in the subject line for information on the title to be discussed and the Zoom link.
Where: West Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 10:30 am
Address: 19036 Vanowen St., Reseda, CA 91335
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-43
Wilmington Book Club: The Bat at West Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Glass Forest by Cynthia Swanson. All are welcome! RSVP:
For more information please contact: klarson@lapl.org
Where: Wilmington Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 11 am
Address: 1300 N. Avalon Blvd., Wilmington, CA 90744
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/wilmington-book-club-13
Wednesday Book Club: Songbirds: A Novel at Westchester – Loyola Village Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Participants will be discussing Songbirds: A Novel by Christy Lefte. All are welcome!
Where: Westchester – Loyola Village Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 12 pm
Address: 7114 W. Manchester Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90045
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/wednesday-book-club-10
Adult Mystery Book Club: Everyone Here Is Lying at Sylmar Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Participants will be discussing Everyone Here Is lying by Shari La Pena. All are welcome!
Where: Sylmar Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 2 pm
Address: 14561 Polk St.,Sylmar, CA 91342
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/adult-mystery-book-club-2
Poets Café: Celebrating Poetry via KPFK 90.7 FM – Live On-Air Event
Poets Café celebrates Poetry. This program is a weekly half-hour literary arts discussion and reading program featuring guest authors and their works.
NOTE: Poetry From Around the World is a segment of this series offered monthly on the 2nd Monday of the month on KPFK Los Angeles 90.7 FM.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: KPFK 90.7 FM
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 2 pm – 2:30 pm
Address: On-air Event (live)
Website: https://www.kpfk.org/on-air/poets-cafe/
Not So Secret Society Book Club: An Ember in the Ashes at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Book Club participants will discuss the book An Ember in the Ashes by author Sabaa Tahir.
Under the Martial Empire, defiance is met with death. Those who do not vow their blood and bodies to the Emperor risk the execution of their loved ones and the destruction of all they hold dear.
It is in this brutal world, inspired by ancient Rome, that Laia lives with her grandparents and older brother. The family ekes out an existence in the Empire’s impoverished backstreets. They do not challenge the Empire. They’ve seen what happens to those who do…
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/not-so-secret-society-ember-ashes-sabaa-tahir
2nd & 3rd Grade Book Club: Dogtown (Dogtown Book #1) at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Kids Event
Participants will discuss Dogtown by authors Katherine Applegate and Gennifer Choldenko.
Dogtown is a shelter for stray dogs, misbehaving dogs, and discarded robot dogs, whose owners have outgrown them.
Chance, a real dog, has been in Dogtown since her owners unwittingly left her with irresponsible dog-sitters who skipped town.
Metal Head is a robot dog who dreams of being back in a real home.
And Mouse is a mouse who has the run of Dogtown, pilfering kibble, and performing clever feats to protect the dogs he loves.
When Chance and Metal Head embark on an adventure to find their forever homes, there is danger, cheese sandwiches, a charging station, and some unexpected kindnesses along the way.
Where: pages: a bookstore
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 4:30 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/2nd-and-3rd-grade-book-club-8
Reading in Bed with Jessica: L.A. Poet Society via 101.5 FM – Live On-Air Event
Reading in Bed with Jessica hosts poets and writers in conversation and is aired weekly on 101.5 FM.
Jessica Wilson Cardenas is the founder of the Los Angeles Poet Society.
Guests TBA
This program is offered weekly on radioollin Los Angeles 101.5 FM.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: 101.5 FM
Date: Wednesday the 9th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: On-air Event (live at 101.5 FM)
Website: https://www.lapoetsociety.org/events
All Genres Workshop with Victoria Waddle via Inlandia Institute – Online Event
(Int.-Adv.)
Alternating Wednesdays, 9/11, 9/25, 10/9, 10/23, and 11/6/24, 6:00-9:00 PM PT, on Zoom.
$50. Registration required. To register: https://tinyurl.com/Fall2024CWW
In this multi-genre workshop, participants submit poetry and prose for biweekly critiques and receive feedback from other group members. Discussions include the craft of writing and the challenges writers face. The workshop leader provides biweekly articles and links related to participants’ work, particularly to problems that were discussed in the previous session.
Victoria Waddle is a Pushcart Prize-nominated writer, with fiction and nonfiction published in literary journals and anthologies, including in Best Short Stories from The Saturday Evening Post Great American Fiction Contest. A collection of her short fiction, Acts of Contrition, is available from Los Nietos Press and her chapbook, The Mortality of Dogs and Humans, is available from Bamboo Dart Press. Her YA novel about a teen escaping a polygamist cult is coming from Inlandia Books. Previously the managing editor of Inlandia: A Literary Journey, she helped to establish a yearly teen issue. In a previous life, she was a high school English teacher and librarian.
Where: Inlandia Institute
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 6 pm – 9 pm
Address: Online Event
Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/events/?month=10&yr=2024
WWS Panel Discussion: Voices of Contemporary Women Writers in Southern California at Pasadena Heritage, with Women Who Submit – In-Person Event
This WWS event is an in-person panel discussion moderated by Daria E. Topousis, author and Book Club board member. Featuring: Tisha Marie Reichle-Aguilera, Carla Sameth, Romaine Washington, and Desiree Zamorano.
GO HERE for advance registration (clickable link in bio): https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScN3IOgl7YR-DD9vFvxTjGAAqt-_RHLaLHCQtJDm_RJhOuKcQ/viewform
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Pasadena Heritage
Date: Wednesday the 9th
Time: 6 pm – 7:15 pm
Address: 160 N. Oakland Ave., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://www.instagram.com/p/DAbkzLOSwpC/
Poetry at DiPiazza’s, Long Beach – In-Person Event
Poetry & Open Mic at DiPiazza’s is hosted by Tamara Madison.
Ages 21+.
More info at site.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: DiPiazza’s Pizza
Date: Wednesday the 9th
Time: 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 5205 E. Pacific Coast Hwy., Long Beach, CA 90804
Website: https://www.lbpoetry.com/ or https://www.facebook.com/groups
WeHo Reads Event: Creating Queer Families and Communities via City of West Hollywood Arts Division – Online Event
In Celebration of National Coming Out Day, we gather authors and poets to discuss coming out and creating queer families and communities.
Participants will reflect on the evolution of coming out with the rise in equality and visibility of LGBTQ+ individuals and families. Our conversation will address giving and receiving love in the families we build or choose, pathways to LGBTQ parenting, as well as the power of being out, the power of community, and the power of storytelling for families and folks in the margins.
Our guests include:
Meliza Bañales, poet and author of the 90s coming-out/coming-of-age novel Life Is Wonderful, People Are Terrific (Ladybox Books 2015), which was a 2016 Lambda Literary Finalist;
Lane Igoudin, author of the foster-adoptive memoir A Family, Maybe (Ooligan Press, Portland State University 2024);
Hazel Kight Witham, author of the memoir-in-verse The Truth About Secrets (Strikethrough Press 2024).
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: WeHo Reads
Date: Wednesday the 9th
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Doug Brod & Born with a Tail: The Devilish Life and Wicked Times of Anton Sandor Lavey, Founder of the Church of Satan at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Doug Brod will discuss his book Born with a Tail: The Devilish Life and Wicked Times of Anton Sandor Lavey, Founder of the Church of Satan.
A provocative, irreverent biography of Anton Szandor LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan, this book chronicles a time when Americans welcomed a macabre showman into their living rooms via The Tonight Show, before a ginned-up hysteria known as the Satanic Panic would put a target on his shiny, shaven head.
When Anton LaVey burst onto the San Francisco scene right before the Summer of Love, he parlayed his eerie obsessions into a philosophy and lifestyle that capitalized on a New Age rage. With his signature cape, horn-studded hood, and Ming the Merciless beard, LaVey was a media-savvy provocateur who took what he did seriously, but was always in on the joke.
Later, his bestselling book The Satanic Bible (still in print since 1969) struck an ominous chord with both the hip and the alienated—the fringe dwellers who were goth before there were goths. But LaVey’s influence could be felt far beyond his flock, namely in the nightmarish and supernatural entertainment that dominated pop culture in the 1970s and continues to make an impact today.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/doug-brod
Book Launch: Johanna Hedva, with Lena Waithe and Traci Thomas, & How to Tell When We Will Die at Rep Club Off-site at Barnsdall Gallery Theater – In-Person Event
Join Rep Club at Barnsdall Gallery Theater on Wednesday, Oct92 to celebrate the launch of How To Tell When We Will Die by Johanna Hedva.
The event will be moderated by Traci Thomas, the creator and host of the critically acclaimed literary podcast, The Stacks, contributor on NPR’s Here & Now, and the creator of the LAist live literary series, One for the Books.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines and details.
Where: Rep Club Off-site at Gallery Barnsdall Theater
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 4800 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/how-to-tell-when-we-will-die-johanna-hedva-lena-waithe-traci-thomas-tickets-1014252776357?aff=oddtdtcreator
Verse 4 Verse Poetry Open Mic at Heavy Manners Library – In-person LGBTQIA Event
Join The Heavy Manners Library for an evening of poetry on Wednesday October 9th! Verse 4 Verse is a poetry open mic hosted by Karla Lamb. This inaugural reading will feature guest poets Lorde Destroyer and Daviel Shy.
Where: Heavy Manners Library
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 1200 N. Alvarado St., L.A, CA 90026
RECESS Open Mic is at SIPA HQ, Palms Up Academy – In-Person Event
RECESS Open Mic is at SIPA HQ on Wednesdays.
This dynamic open mic is the most accessible public program in the Palms Up Academy curriculum and manifests their mission statement in a physical (and digital) space.
Join them at the intersection of Historic Filipinotown & The World: Search to Involve Pilipino Americans.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, cost, guidelines, and details.
Where: SIPA HQ
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7 pm – 9:30 pm (Doors at 6:30; Open Mic at 8 pm)
Address: 3200 W. Temple St., Ste. 100, Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: https://www.palmsupacademy.com
At Skylight: Carson Ellis, with Jon Klassen, & One Week in January at Skylight – In-Person Event
Carson Ellis, in conversation with Jon Klassen, will discuss his book, One Week in January.
Award-winning, beloved children’s book author and illustrator Carson Ellis makes a stunning adult debut with an illustrated memoir that evocatively captures a specific cultural moment of the early 2000s and in her journey as an artist.
In January 2001, the young artist Carson Ellis moved into a warehouse in Portland, Oregon, with a group of fellow artists. For the first week she lived there, she kept a detailed diary full of dry observations, mordant wit, hijinks with friends (including her future husband, Decemberists frontman Colin Meloy), and turn-of-the-millennium cultural touchstones. Now, Ellis has richly illustrated this two-decade-old journal with extraordinary new paintings in the signature style that has made her an award-winning picture book author today.
This beautiful volume offers a snapshot of a bygone era, a meticulous re-creation of quotidian frustrations and small, meaningful moments, and a meditation on what it means both to start your journey as an artist and to look back at that beginning many years later.
Carson Ellis is a Caldecott award-winning author and artist known for her work in the Wildwood Chronicles, The Mysterious Benedict Society, and beyond and the longtime illustrator-in-residence for the band The Decemberists. People who love her children’s books will be thrilled to discover this new book—especially parents who are nostalgic for the days of the early 2000s.
Jon Klassen is an author and illustrator of books for children. His work includes I Want My Hat Back and its follow-up books This Is Not My Hat which won the Caldecott medal, and We Found a Hat. Other books include The Rock From The Sky and, most recently The Skull.
He has also worked in animation, most recently as co-creator and Executive Producer on “Shape Island”, a stop-motion series based on books he made with frequent collaborator Mac Barnett. He has loved Carson Ellis’ work since long before they knew each other, and he mentions that to her sometimes. He lives with his wife and their two boys in Los Angeles.
Where: Skylight
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-carson-ellis-presents-one-week-january-w-jon-klassen
Poetry Reading at Stories Books & Café – In-Person Event
Poetry reading featuring:
Carlos Lara is a Mexican-born artist currently based in New York City. He is co-founder of the artist-duo SANGREE which he has worked on actively since 2009. During this time he has explored different kinds of media like concrete, paper and stone, mostly oriented towards sculpture.
Taos Lopez is a writer who refers to himself as obsessed with Los Angeles. He is the author of Damaged.
Yves B Golden is an artist, writer and DJ based in Los Angeles. She is Feminist Center for Creative Work’s 2024 artist in residence and her upcoming collection of poetry, prose and essays will be published by Tabloid Press (DE) and La Escocesa (ESP). She is calling all angels and envisioning a Free Palestine in her lifetime.
Marcel Monroy is a Los Angeles based poet and cellist, a queer femme Latinx person with he/him pronouns. His writing is inspired by a blend of personal experiences with addiction, growing up in the repressive and racist American South, and the works of authors such as James Baldwin, Allen Ginsburg, Audre Lorde, and Gloria Anzaldúa. He currently attends the University of California Santa Cruz and is apart of an artist collective called Family Dinner located in LA, where he is working on his first collection of poems and an EP. His work has previously been published in Mixed Life, a digital magazine, and will be featured in The Whole Alphabet, an anthology of queer contemporary poets released by So Say We All publications.
Ceremonial Abyss is the stage name of Brian Amsterdam, a writer, sound designer, and ambient artist based in Portland, Oregon.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Stories Books & Café
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1716 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: https://storiesla.com/events
Hype Book Club: Haunted Ever After at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
October’s Hype Book Club will discuss Haunted Ever After by author Jen DeLuca.
This event is led by bookseller Paola, every 2nd Wednesday of the month.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
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.
- 7:30 pm – 8:30 pm – Formal workshop;
- 8:30 pm – 9:00 pm — TBA;
- 9:05 pm – 10:00 pm — 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@gmail.com or call (323) 293-2451.
Where: The World Stage
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: 4321 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008
Website: https://www.instagram.com/anansiwritersworkshop/ or https://www.facebook.com/anansiwritersworkshop/
Wednesday Night Poetry Workshop at Beyond Baroque – Online Event
The West Coast’s longest-running free poetry workshop is offered by Beyond Baroque on Zoom and welcomes new and seasoned poets to share their work and provide feedback. Please be prepared to share one poem. This workshop will be hosted via the Zoom video-conferencing platform. Please be prepared to share one poem.
Please spend some time before the workshop learning how to share documents via Zoom. It will keep the session moving if you’re able to make your poem viewable quickly and easily. An instructive video is available at the site.
The workshop can sometimes reach high levels of attendance, which means not everyone will get a chance to read every session.
The workshop facilitator this quarter is Arthur Kayzakian.
Arthur Kayzakian is the finalist for the 2024 Kate Tufts Award, and the winner of the 2021 inaugural Black Lawrence Immigrant Writing Series for his collection, The Book of Redacted Paintings. He is also a recipient of the 2023 creative writing fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: Online event (see site)
Website: https://www.beyondbaroque.org/free_workshops or https://www.eventbrite.com/e/wednesday-night-poetry-workshop-tickets-1037816425867
LiveTalks LA: An Evening with Chase Jarvis & Never Play It Safe at New Roads School – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Safety is an illusion, says Chase Jarvis in his new book, Never Play it Safe: A Practical Guide to Freedom, Creativity and a Life You Love. After years of conversation with the world’s top entrepreneurs, artists, athletes and performers, he shares the secrets he’s learned to living boldly and authentically.
Reclaim the playful, courageous part of yourself that’s been waiting to shine. Jarvis’ book will equip you with the tools, insights and inspiration to take bold action and create the life of your dreams.
Chase Jarvis is an award-winning artist, an entrepreneur, a bestselling author, and one of the most influential photographers of the past twenty years. As a lifelong creative pioneer, he’s crafted campaigns for Apple, Nike, and over one hundred other iconic brands. He’s also an Emmy-nominated director, the author of Creative Calling, and the host of the Chase Jarvis LIVE podcast, which has over fifty million downloads. Previously, Chase was founder and CEO of CreativeLive, which boasted more than $100 million in revenue and a public-company acquisition track record.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Ann and Jerry Moss Theatre, New Roads School
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: 3131 Olympic Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90404
(Free Parking available at the venue)
Website: https://livetalksla.org/events/chase-jarvis/
Poetry Reading & Open Mic by Two Idiots Peddling Poetry with Ben Trigg and Guests Jeremy Ra and Aruni Wijesinghe at The Ugly Mug – In-Person Event
Host Ben Trigg and Two Idiots Peddling Poetry at the Ugly Mug on Wednesday Nights will feature Jeremy Ra and Aruni Wijesinghe.
Jeremy Ra is a queer, Chinese-Korean-American poet living in Los Angeles. A Best-of-the-Net and multiple Pushcart nominee, his poems have appeared in Spillway, I-70 Review, Cultural Daily, San Diego Poetry Annual, and Catamaran Literary Reader, among others. He was a twice-finalist for the Steve Kowit Poetry Prize and the recipient of the Morton Marcus Poetry Prize. His first chapbook, Another Way of Loving Death, was published by Moon Tide Press. He is a co-host of the video series, Poetry.la.
Aruni Wijesinghe lives and writes in Southern California and can usually be found shelving books in the local public library. A project manager, ESL teacher, former sous chef and occasional belly dance instructor, she is a multiple Pushcart Prize and Best-of-the-Net nominee. Her work has been published in Spillway, Cultural Daily, Redshift, a moon of one’s own, The Journal of Radical Wonder, and elsewhere.
She has multiple published collections including 2 Revere Place (Moon Tide Press), The Litany of Missing and Bedside Manners (Arroyo Seco Press), and co-authored The Undulating Line (Picture Show Press). You can follow her on social media @aruniwrites (Instagram and Twitter) or on her website http://www.aruniwrites.com.
$4 cover fee, cash only
NOTE: See site for further details.
Where: The Ugly Mug, Orange
Date: Wednesday, the 9th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: 261 N. Glassell St., Orange, CA 92866
Website: https://www.facebook.com/events or https://www.facebook.com/events/316486151518308/?ref=newsfeed
Lit Angels Morning Writing: Write Because You Love It with Tracey Simmons at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Lit Angels offers classes that provide just that—a fun and freeing way to work out the creative muscles and eliminate the stumbling blocks that might be holding you back, not only in your writing, art, or performance projects, but in all areas of your life—uplifting and refreshing your mind and soul, improving relationships, work, and your outlook on the future. Taught by top-level working professionals, Lit Angels classes cultivate community and connection, something we all desperately need in these challenging times.
Come make some magic at the Village Well! All genres and levels are welcome!
Tracey Simmons has an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University LA. Her writing has been published in Aunt Chloe: A Journal of Artful Candor, Wussy Magazine, Reclamation Magazine, Lit Angels, and she leads writing groups at various wellness and recovery centers. Tracey is currently finishing her debut novel, Specimen.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 10 am – 11 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42645
Book Club for Adults: Lab Girl at Lawndale Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss the memoir Lab Girl by author Hope Jahren, about plant life and the passion of a woman in science.
Books are available for check out at the library. For adults.
Where: Lawndale Library, LACL
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 11 am 12 pm
Address: 14615 Burin Ave., Lawndale, CA 90260
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/11631567
Mystery Book Club for Adults: Death Comes to Pemberley at Culver City Julian Dixon Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss the memoir Death Comes to Pemberley by author P.D. James.
Books are available for check out at the library. For adults.
Where: Culver City Julian Dixon Library, LACL
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 3:30 pm 4:30 pm
Address: 4975 Overland Ave., Culver City, CA 90230
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/11695788
Mystery Book Club via Venice – Abbot Kinney Memorial Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us on Zoom the second Thursday of each month for a thoughtful discussion of our latest selection. Copies available at the front desk. For Zoom link and more information please email venice@lapl.org.
Where: Venice – Abbot Kinney Memorial Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 5 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club
Diverse Romance Book Club: Love, Lies, and Cherry Pie at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Book Club participants will discuss the novel Love Lies, and Cherry Pie by author Jackie Lau.
Jackie Lau, author of the “full of heart” (Ali Hazelwood, New York Times bestselling author) The Stand-Up Groomsman, returns with a charming rom-com about a young woman’s desperate attempts to fend off her meddling mother…only to find that maybe mother does know best.
She studied engineering and worked as a geophysicist before turning to her first love of writing. She is now the author of over twenty romantic comedies including Donut Fall in Love and The Stand-Up Groomsman. When she’s not writing, she enjoys gelato, gourmet donuts, cooking, and reading. She lives in Toronto with her husband. Find out more at JackieLauBooks.com.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/diverse-romance-book-club-love-lies-and-cherry-pie
Book Talk & Signing: Kate Sweeney, with Kate Spencer, & This Is Not a Dead Gril Story at Chevalier’s – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss this new provoking mystery sure to be a hit with true-crime podcast fans.
A dark and powerful mystery perfect for fans of Courtney Summers and true crime podcasts, in which a teen girl must do whatever it takes to find her missing cousin—who everyone else thinks is dead.
Remy Green is missing. Eight days after the death of her boyfriend, River O’Dell, the magnetic, golden-haired girl disappeared in the dead of night. Jules Green, Remy’s cousin, is her opposite in every way. The only place she has ever belonged is with River and Remy. Now she’s on her own—and everyone around her believes that Remy is dead. But Jules can still hear Remy’s voice in her head, urging her to keep looking. With the help of River’s cousin Sam, a troubled and mysterious boy, Jules starts untangling the truth of what exactly happened. Can Jules find a way to save her from it? Or is this a dead girl story after all?
Kate Sweeney was born in Athens, Georgia, and has since lived many places, including Los Angeles, New York, and Salt Lake City. She began writing when she was sixteen. Her father—a novelist and screenwriter—had died five years prior, and in writing she found a way of bringing his voice back to her ears. For the past fifteen years she has resided in the Bay Area, where she spends her time making music with her bands, Magic Roses and July, and working in Education. She is also the author of Catch the Light and This One’s for You.
Kate Spencer is the co-host of the award-winning podcast Forever35 and author of the memoir The Dead Moms Club. In a New York Minute is her first novel. She writes a bi-monthly column for InStyle and her work has been published by the Washington Post, Rolling Stone, Esquire, Cosmopolitan, Buzzfeed, and numerous other places. Previously she worked as a senior editor and producer at VH1. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two daughters.
Where: Chevalier’s
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Thrival Open Mic at Hot Java Coffee, Long Beach – In-Person Event
This event is an all arts community Open Mic for all ages.
More info on Instagram @thrivalopenmic
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Hot Java
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 2101 E. Broadway, Long Beach, CA 90803
Website: https://www.lbpoetry.com/
Author Event: Paul Haddad, with Tom Hoffarth, & Inventing Paradise at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event
Paul Haddad, in conversation with Tom Hoffarth, will discuss his new book Inventing Paradise: The Power Brokers Who Created the Dream of Los Angeles.
Haddad is the author of perennial {pages} favorite, 10,00 Steps a Day in LA: 57 Walking Adventures. His new book, Inventing Paradise: The Power Brokers Who Created the Dream of Los Angeles traces the improbable rise of Los Angeles through the prism of six visionaries who had outsize influence on the city’s growth: Phineas Banning, Harrison Gray Otis, Henry Huntington, Harry Chandler, William Mulholland, and Moses Sherman.
This is a free event. RSVPs are appreciated and we hope you’ll consider supporting the author and {pages} by purchasing a book.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: pages: a bookstore
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/special-author-event-paul-haddad
Scott Dominic Carpenter & Paris Lost and Found: A Memoir of Love at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Scott Dominic Carpenter will discuss his book Paris Lost and Found: A Memoir of Love.
Following his hilarious introduction to Paris in French Like Moi, Midwesterner Scott Dominic Carpenter returns to the scene of the crime with more tales of intrigue.
This time, though, the story starts with sorrow as Carpenter’s wife struggles with dementia. Humor may be the best medicine, but even the antics of a vandal in their building can’t cement the tiles of her memory for long. Before he expects it, the author finds himself alone in a capital that is also blighted by the pandemic.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/scott-dominic-carpenter
Tony Tulathimutte, with Miles Klee, & Rejection at North Figueroa Bookshop – In-Person Event
Tony Tulathimutte, in conversation with Miles Klee, will discuss his new novel, Rejection.
Sharply observant and outrageously funny, Rejection is a provocative plunge into the touchiest problems of modern life. The seven connected stories seamlessly transition between the personal crises of a complex ensemble and the comic tragedies of sex, relationships, identity, and the internet.
These brilliant satires explore the underrated sorrows of rejection with the authority of a modern classic and the manic intensity of a manifesto. Audacious and unforgettable, Rejection is a stunning mosaic that redefines what it means to be rejected by lovers, friends, society, and oneself.
Tony Tulathimutte is the author of Private Citizens and Rejection. His work has appeared in The Paris Review, n + 1, The Nation, The New Republic, and New York Times. The recipient of an O. Henry Award and a Whiting Award, he runs the writing class CRIT in Brooklyn.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: North Figueroa Bookshop
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 6040 N. Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90042
Website: https://northfigbookshop.com/event/#calendar-8a0f87f6-17d6-4f10-9815-04df4c8251ba-event-m0r8apgy
Trenches Full of Poets Reading Series & Open Mic: Rita Wakefield, Grace & Electra Eliopoulos at Page Against the Machine, Long Beach – In-Person Event
October’s Trenches Full of Poets reading event, hosted by Nikolai Garcia and Mauricio Andres Moreno, will feature three local poets and an Open Mic.
Rina Wakefield is a Spoken Word Poet, Podcast Producer, Poetry/Storytelling event Producer/Host, Human Rights & Arts Activist, and a collaborative member of Myrtle Tree Arts. Currently a freelance reporter for 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘔𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘯 𝘋𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘵, she has also written and produced for 𝘔𝘴. 𝘔𝘢𝘨𝘢𝘻𝘪𝘯𝘦.𝘤𝘰𝘮. Her articles have been featured in 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘊𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘢 𝘉𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘑𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘯𝘢𝘭, 𝘥𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘳.𝘤𝘰𝘮, and 𝘗𝘦𝘳𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘦𝘳 𝘔𝘢𝘨𝘢𝘻𝘪𝘯𝘦. Her poetry has been featured in the literary journals 𝘊𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘚𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘭𝘰𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘦𝘴, 𝘓𝘢𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘯 𝘔𝘢𝘨𝘢𝘻𝘪𝘯𝘦, and 𝘊𝘰𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘤𝘦. She holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in English Literature from Sacramento State University and is currently a Masters Degree candidate studying Library Science with a focus on Cultural Archives at San Jose State University.
Grace is a poet and storyteller who has been sharing her poetry and prose at open mics since 2008. She printed her first chapbook collection of poems in 2009 and was awarded the Powell Grant for Art In the Public Places by the City of Santa Fe Springs. From 2015 to 2019 she co-facilitated and was part of writing workshops for and with women through the Prison Education Project. Her 2017 college radio show at Cal Poly Pomona, “Water for Tea,” featured music by artists such as Corinne Bailey Rae, The Internet, and Little Simz. Her current writing continues to explore many life themes and reflections on love, society, religion, relationships, longing, and long distance. Find her on IG @water4tea.
Electra Eliopoulos a writer of purpose, passion, truths, wants and needs. She is a local poet born and raised in Long Beach. Observing experiences, holding a barrier of charisma externally through zines. Creating Segments of adventures and endeavors. Find her on IG @elektraelio.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Page Against the Machine
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 2714 E 4th St, Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://www.facebook.com/events/1603619917253345
Sarah Chamberlain, with Elissa Sussman, & The Slowest Burn at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
Sarah Chamberlain, in conversation with Elissa Sussman, will discuss her debut romance The Slowest Burn.
AS Ellie and Kieran work closely together in a hot kitchen for weeks on end their sharp edges and harsh judgments soften and sweeten into a delicious attraction.
There will be a book signing to follow. This is a ticketed event.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
At Skylight: Nemonte Nenquimo and Mitch Anderson, & We Will Be Jaguars at Skylight – In-Person Event
We Will Be Jaguars is an astonishing memoir by an equally astonishing woman. Nenquimo Nenquimo is a winner of TIME magazine’s Earth Award, and MS. magazine named this book among the Most Anticipated Feminist Books of 2024.
Born into the Waorani tribe of Ecuador’s Amazon rainforest—one of the last to be contacted by missionaries in the 1950s—Nemonte Nenquimo had a singular upbringing.
She was taught about plant medicines, foraging, oral storytelling, and shamanism by her elders. At age fourteen, she left the forest for the first time to study with an evangelical missionary group in the city. Eventually, her ancestors began appearing in her dreams, pleading with her to return and embrace her own culture. She listened.
Two decades later, Nemonte has emerged as one of the most forceful voices in climate change activism. She has spearheaded the alliance of indigenous nations across the Upper Amazon and led her people to a landmark victory against Big Oil, protecting over a half million acres of primary rainforest. Her message is as sharp as a spear—honed by her experiences battling loggers, miners, oil companies and missionaries.
In We Will Be Jaguars, she partners with her husband, Mitch Anderson, founder of Amazon Frontlines, digging into generations of oral history, uprooting centuries of conquest, hacking away at racist notions of indigenous peoples, and ultimately revealing a life story as rich, harsh, and vital as the Amazon rainforest herself.
Where: Skylight
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Lit Angels – Re-Write Your Life, Transform Your Story with Susy Porter at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
This class is designed to prepare you to Re-Write Your Life! Susy’s approach is intuitive, engaging, and deeply supportive. Her classes are friendly, fun, and inviting—perfect for anyone looking to explore the magic and joy of creative writing. You’ll learn practical tools to develop confidence in your ability to script your Happily Ever After. Don’t miss this opportunity to discover the power of YOUR story, and to shift painful narratives into empowering stories.
Susy Porter is a writer, performer, and teacher who combines her skills as a spiritual life coach with creative writing to help participants heal their lives.
When she wrote and performed her solo show: “Wake Up Little Susy”, she experienced firsthand the transformative power of telling her story. She is a gifted and sensitive teacher who helps you uncover what’s hidden in your biography and gently guides you to re-write your story in a way that is transformative and liberating.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42393
Maha Abouelenein & 7 Rules of Self Reliance: How to Stay Low, Keep Moving, Invest in Yourself, and Own Your Future at Vroman’s – In-Person Event
Author Maha Abouelenein will present and discuss her book, 7 Rules of Self Reliance: How to Stay Low, Keep Moving, Invest in Yourself, and Own Your Future.
Embrace the journey of self-reliance with global communications strategist Maha Abouelenein as she shows you how to deploy your greatest asset—yourself—to achieve your dreams and beyond.
Maha Abouelenein is an American Egyptian with more than 30 years of global communications experience advising global corporate giants, start-ups, governments, CEOs, and high-net-worth individuals. She is the CEO of Digital & Savvy, a strategic communications consulting firm with offices in the USA and Dubai. Maha is on the global board of directors of the Associated Press and hosts the Savvy Talk podcast. To learn more about Maha, visit: digitalandsavvy.com
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91001
LiveTalks LA: Clara Bingham, with Elise Loehnen, & The Movement: How Women’s Liberation Transformed America 1963-1973 at New Roads School – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
A comprehensive and engaging oral history of the decade that defined the feminist movement.
Award-winning journalist Clara Bingham is a former Washington, DC, correspondent for Newsweek whose work has appeared in Vanity Fair, The Guardian and The Daily Beast. Her previous books include Witness to the Revolution and Women on the Hill.
Elise Loehnen is a New York Times bestselling author and the host of the podcast Pulling the Thread, where she interviews cultural luminaries about the big questions of today. She’s the author of the New York Times bestselling On Our Best Behavior: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to be Good. Elise has also co-written 12 books, including five New York Times Best Sellers. Previously, she was the chief content officer of goop. While there, Elise co-hosted The goop Podcast and The goop Lab on Netflix, and led the brand’s content strategy and programming, including the launch of a magazine with Condé Nast and a book imprint.
Clara Bingham’s The Movement: How Women’s Liberation Transformed America 1963-1973 is the first oral history of the decade that built the modern feminist movement.
Through the captivating individual voices of the people who lived it, Bingham tells the intimate inside story of what it felt like to be at the forefront of the modern feminist crusade. She artfully weaves together the fragments of an explosive ten years, bringing to life the emotions of this personal, culture and political revolution—when women insisted on being treated as first class citizens and changed the fabric of American life.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Ann and Jerry Moss Theatre, New Roads School
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: 3131 Olympic Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90404
(Free Parking available at the venue)
Website: https://livetalksla.org/events/clara-bingham-with-elise-loehnen/
Poetry in the Valley – Open MIc @ Fratelli’s Pizza – In-Person Event
Come join Poetry in the Valley for a night of poetic expression at Fratelli’s Pizza! Whether you’re a seasoned poet or just looking to share your thoughts, their open mic event is the perfect platform. Grab a slice of pizza, sip on some drinks, and enjoy the creative vibes in the valley. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to connect with fellow poetry enthusiasts and showcase your talent. See you there!
Where: Fratelli’s Pizza
Date: Thursday, the 10th
Time: 8 pm – 11 pm
Address: 16153 Parthenia Street Los Angeles, CA 91343
Website: Poetry in the Valley- Open MIc @ Fratelli’s Pizza Tickets, Thu, Oct 10, 2024 at 8:00 PM | Eventbrite
Spectacular Storytime at Once Upon a Time Bookstore – In-Person Kids Event
Spectacular Storytime is our most popular story time and is ready to delight and dazzle! This is also the prime time to see Pippi Longstocking, our bookstore cat in action.
Open to all ages. Free to attend.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Once Upon a Time Bookstore
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 9:30 am
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event
Drag Queen Story Hour at Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for an extra sparkly storytime with a drag performer bringing costume, humor, and play to read inclusive children’s books to delight families and kids of all ages.
Due to limited space capacity, no adults will be admitted unless accompanied by a child.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 5027 Caspar Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90041
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/drag-queen-story-hour
Current Events Nonfiction Book Club at Studio City Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us on the second Friday of every month for the current events nonfiction book club.
Participants will discuss A Mystery of Mysteries: The Death and Life of Edgar Allan Poe by Mark Dawidziak.
RSVP:
Please email studio@lapl.org for participation details.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Studio City Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 12 pm
Address: 12511 Moorpark St., Studio City, CA 91604
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/current-events-nonfiction-book-club-1
Self-Care Book Club: Spirit Talker at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Book Club participants will discuss the book Spirit Talker: Indigenous Stories and Teachings from a Micmaq Psychic Medium by Shawn Leonard.
This teaching memoir by an Indigenous spirit talker includes stories about the author’s reconnection with his Mi’kmaq heritage along with techniques for connecting to Spirit and developing your own intuition and psychic abilities.
In this teaching memoir, Shawn Leonard shares his personal story of developing his abilities as a spirit talker, revealing incredible stories from his childhood to the present. Along the way, he shares experiences he has had with elders from his aboriginal tribe, the Mi’kmaq, and his journey learning more about his heritage.
Shawn Leonard is a heart-centered Mi’kmaq psychic medium and the star and host of APTN TV’s show Spirit Talker. Taking an authentic approach to the spirit world in his readings, live shows, and media appearances, Shawn imparts enormous wisdom and knowledge of the spirit world and spirit communication. He teaches the Spirit Talker Online Course to hundreds of students annually.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/self-care-book-club-spirit-talker
Swing Set Open Mic at The Center, Long Beach – In-Person LGBTQIA Event
We’re calling all poets, musicians, comedians, storytellers for another magical night. Performers and artists of all kinds, come through!
Swing Set isn’t just about performance—it’s about real connection and finding mirrors in the people all around you. We’re so excited to share space with y’all again.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: The Center Long Beach
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 2017 E. 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://www.lbpoetry.com/
Planeta Poeta: Book Presentations & Open Mic – Online Zoom Event
Diosa Xochiquetzalcoatl and Riot of Roses Publishing present book presentations by:
Scott Russell Duncan & Carlos Mitru
NOTE: See link for details.
Where: Zoom
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: Online Event (see above)
Website: Zoom Link or https://www.instagram.com/p/DAeQAntILy8/
Jason Schreier, with Tom Bissell, & Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future of Blizzard Entertainment at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Jason Schrier, in conversation with Tom Bissell, will discuss and sign his book Play Nice: The Rise, Fall and Future of Blizzard Entertainment.
For video game fans, the name Blizzard Entertainment was once synonymous with perfection. The renowned company celebrated the joy of gaming over all else, and every product it released was an instant classic: StarCraft, Diablo, Overwatch, Hearthstone, and World of Warcraft, which forever changed the video game landscape. What was once two UCLA students’ simple mission—to make games they wanted to play—launched an empire with thousands of employees, millions of fans, and billions of dollars.
Based on firsthand interviews with more than 300 current and former employees, PLAY NICE chronicles the creativity, frustration, beauty, and betrayal across the epic 33-year saga of Blizzard Entertainments of dollars.
Jason Schreier is the New York Times bestselling author of Press Reset and Blood, Sweat, and Pixels and a reporter at Bloomberg News, where he covers the video game industry. Jason is also the popular host of the Triple Click Podcast. He lives in Westchester, New York with his wife and two children.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/jason-schreier
Book Launch: Marcia Dernie with Sam Tokita, & Movement for Every Body at Reparations Club – In-Person Event
Join us to celebrate the launch of Movement for Every Body, with author and gender-fluid yoga instructor and strength athlete Marcia Dernie, in conversation with photographer and model Sam Tokita.
With humor, empathy, and expertise, a Black, femme, disabled, and neurodivergent physical therapist retraces their journey through a weaponized fitness culture, sharing an alternative path to honor all bodies and needs.
An inclusive, full-color guide to improving mobility, building strength, and increasing flexibility for every body and any size, shape, and ability.
NOTE: See site for tickets, guidelines and details.
Where: Reparations Club
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 3054 S. Victoria Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90016
An Evening of Poetry at Heavy Manners Library – In-Person Event
Join us for an evening of poetry on Friday October11th! Listen to readings from local poets Ceremonial Abyss, Yves B Golden, Will Alexander, and Losarc Raal.
Ceremonial Abyss (1987–) is an aleatoric tape artist, curator and writer based in the Pacific Northwest. He has toured the U.S. extensively in support of his releases 23, Betrayal, and Tape Study for Four Variants. Along the way, he has performed with musicians and authors such as Pete Swanson (Yellow Swans), Jennifer Soong, Zan da Perry, Vi Khi Nao, DIIV and Will Alexander.
Yves B Golden (1993) is an artist whose work gleams at multiple intersections of media, including sculpture and embodiment, activism and curation, written word and sound, installation and performance. She is working with many others towards a world free from settler colonialism, a free Palestine, a free Sudan, a Free Haiti in her lifetime.
Losarc Raal (b. 1983) is a writer and publisher. He was tyrant over the controversial poetry and arts journal NOMATERIALISM (2020–2022), and he currently oversees the Creative Writing Department. He is the author of several chapbooks, and his first full-length book, No Material, was published by Black Sun Lit in 2023. His second book, a collection of poems called The Pact of Non-Self, is out now with NEW Books. He has lived in Brooklyn, Greece, Argentina, and Saudi Arabia, and he currently resides with his wife and sons in San Diego, CA. Instagram @creativewritingdepartment
Born in 1948 in Los Angeles, Will Alexander is a poet, novelist, playwright, philosopher, visual artist, and musician. He has published over two dozen books in a variety of genres and has earned many honors and awards including a Whiting Fellowship for Poetry, a California Arts Council Fellowship, the PEN/Oakland Josephine Miles Award, a Before Columbus Foundation American Book Award, and the 2016 Jackson Poetry Prize. He has also exhibited his artwork in group and solo shows. His work is known for its visionary, oracular surrealism and the influence of Negritude. Among his publications are Refractive Africa (New Directions, 2021/Granta, 2022), which was named a finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry and won the California Book Award for Poetry, The Combustion Cycle (Roof, 2021), Across the Vapor Gulf (New Directions, 2017), and The Sri Lankan Loxodrome (New Directions, 2009). His book Compression & Purity (2011) was volume five in the City Lights Spotlight Poetry Series. He is currently the poet-in-residence at Beyond Baroque in Venice, California. He has lived his entire life in Los Angeles.
Where: Heavy Manners Library
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1200 North Alvarado Street Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: An Evening of Poetry (10/11) Tickets, Fri, Oct 11, 2024 at 7:00 PM | Eventbrite
R.K. Ashwick, with Emma R. Alban, & A Captured Cauldron: Rules of Compulsory Brews at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
R.K. Ashwick, in conversation with Emma R. Alban, will discuss her romance novel A Captured Cauldron: Rules of Compulsory Brews.
There will be a book signing to follow. This is a ticketed event.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
Open Mic Night at Village Well Books & Coffee – 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!
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42354
Jason Reynolds & Twenty-Four Seconds from Now…: A LOVE Story at Vroman’s – In-Person YA Event
Jason Reynolds tackles it—you know…it—from the guy’s perspective in this unfiltered and undeniably sweet stream of consciousness story of a teen boy about to experience a huge first.
Twenty-four months ago: Neon gets chased by a dog all around the parking lot of a church. Not his finest moment. And definitely one he would have loved to forget if it weren’t for the dog’s owner: Aria. Dressed in sweats, a t-shirt, hair in a ponytail. Aria. Way more than fine.
Twenty-four weeks ago: Neon’s dad insists on talking to him about tenderness and intimacy. Neon and Aria are definitely in love, and while they haven’t taken that next big step…yet, they’ve starting talking about.
Note: the subject matter of this book contains PG-13 material and is not recommended for the youngest of readers.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Grief & Gratitude Open Mic with L.A. Grief Support Group at Rita House – In-Person Event
You’re Going to Die: Poetry, Prose & Everything Goes… is an open mic event, the communal offering for us to explore the conversation of death & dying, to embrace our losses & mortality, to grieve, bereave & honor those we’ve lost & love… while all the while making room for simply being ALIVE.
Hosted by Caitlin Jemma
Featuring music from Moorea Masa
Where: Rita House
Date: Friday, the 11th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: 5971 W. 3rd St., Los Angeles, CA
Website: https://www.meetup.com/los-angeles-grief-support-group/events/303157818/
Walton Well Press Triple Book Launch: Chuck Rosenthal, David St. John, & Sarah Maclay at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person & Live YouTube Online Hybrid Event
Walton Well debuts three new books by Chuck Rosenthal, David St. John, and Sarah Maclay. Readings & Book Signings.
Led by Editor and Publisher, Theresia de Vroom, Walton Well is named after a once working well in Oxford, England that provided water to the “artisan” population of the neighborhood of Jericho and any who might pass by. Images of the prophet Elijah, who was fed by ravens in the desert, adorn the street where the Well resides to this day. This press publishes work by writers and “artisans,” for solace and sustenance. They are ravens; presses, no matter how small, are wells—between them they give life.
David St. John’s Prayer for my daughter, is his latest poetry collection. St. John’s poetry has been described by Robert Haas in the L.A. Times as a cross between late nineteenth-century symbolist lushness and the intensity and wistfulness of 60s European films.
Sarah Maclay’s The H.D. Sequence–A Concordance comes in a season of unexpected distress, phrases of Modernist poet Hilda Doolittle, along with inspirations from paintings, photographs and dreams, become touchstones and lifeboats, anchoring a framework for navigating shifting love in a world of impinging power imbalance: the “laserlike” poems of Sarah Maclay will leave readers with special interests in contemporary poetry, ekphrastic poetry, surrealism, or literature by women.
Chuck Rosenthal’s Awake For Ever in a Sweet Unrest follows 19-year-old high school dropout Beatriz, who upon taking an internship at Beyond Baroque—the iconic poetry venue in Venice, California where all electronics mysteriously fail—becomes entwined with the spirits of Mary Shelley, John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and Lord Byron. As Beatriz navigates this liminal space between the 19th century and the present, she experiences the Romantic landscapes of the past, engages in perilous exploits, and discovers the transformative power of poetry, art, and self-expression.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Friday the 11th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291
Harry Potter Book Club (for Tweens!) at Lancaster Library, LACL – In-Person Kids/Tweens Event
Welcome to the Harry Potter Book Club! For this first session, you will be receiving the first book to read and we will be making a wand and playing games.
Fun activities await! Costumes are welcomed. For kids ages 10 – 14.
Where: Lancaster Library, LACL
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 10:30 am
Address: 601 W. Lancaster Blvd., Lancaster, CA 93534
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/11878043
Bilingual Storytime/Hora de Cuentos at Central Library, LAPL – In-Person Kids Event
Join us to enjoy stories and songs in Spanish and English. This program is intended for ages 3-8, but all children and their caretakers are welcome!
Acompáñenos para disfrutar de cuentos y canciones en inglés y español. Este programa está destinado a niños de 3 a 8 años, ¡pero todos los niños y sus cuidadores son bienvenidos!
Where: Central Library, LAPL, Children’s Literature
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 11 am
Address: 630 S. 5th St., Los Angeles, CA 90071
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/bilingual-storytime-hora-de-cuentos
Intensive Writing Workshop: Composting Language for Unexpected Poems, with Ash Goodat Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person & Live YouTube Hybrid Event
In ash good’s playful workshop, writers dive into the art of harvesting lines from their own writing and mixing them with others’ words.
Anything written and unpolished, be it from old drafts, free-writes, journal entries, or the like are all ripe for composting! Together, we’ll select phrases to remix into poems that reflect your unique voice while honoring the original sources. Just as composting turns organic matter into rich soil, by “turning the pile,” we’ll blend lines from personal writing with outside texts. Along the way, we’ll surely uncover unanticipated images and surprising language mashups. Whether you’re a seasoned poet or simply curious, come ready to play with words, get your hands dirty (metaphorically, of course), and grow something vibrant and entirely your own.
ash good is a poet, book designer, and community catalyst. They collaborate with independent writers, small presses, art/literature institutions, and universities to nurture publishing projects centering collective liberation, under-represented voices, children’s literacy, eco-consciousness, and expression through literary craft. ash is the author of us clumsy gods (What Books Press 2022) and four previous books of poetry. They are co-founding editor of First Matter Press, recipient of Literary Arts’ 2024 Oregon Literary Fellowship for publishers, where they uplift first-time publishing poets and genre-expanding writers.
NOTE: See site for further details and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 11 am – 2 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd Venice Beach Los Angeles, CA 90291
Bilingual Storytime: Cindy Montenegro & My Mind Is a Mountain at Casita Books – In-Person Event
Join us for a bilingual storytime to hear My Mind Is a Mountain with Cindy Montenegro.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Casita Books
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 11 am
Address: 1440 E. 4th St., Long Beach, California 90803
Website: https://www.instagram.com/casitabookstore/
Storytime: Illustrator Gabby Zapata & The Ofrenda That We Built at Once Upon a Time – In-Person Kids Event
Illustrator Gabby Zapata will read and discuss The Ofrenda That We Built, a simple and joyful story that brings family generations together to honor a cultural tradition. After the story, Gabby will lead attendees through a simple craft and then be able to sign books. Best for ages 3+.
Learn about and celebrate the Day of the Dead! With warmth and energy, this spirited picture book is a joyful ode to family traditions and the memory of loved ones who have passed but whom we continue to remember.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Once Upon a Time Bookstore
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 11 am
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event
Special Storytime: Laura Obuobi & What Love Looks Like at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
Laura Obuobi will read and discuss What Love Looks Like.
From Laura Obuobi, author of Black Gold and NAACP Image Award nominee, and illustrator Anna Cunha comes a whimsical bedtime story about the love between a Black father and his daughter.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 11 am – 12:30 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Teen Poetry Club: Moderated by WriteGirl/Bold Ink Writers at Altadena Main Library – In-Person Teen Event
Moderated by WriteGirl/Bold Ink Writers, this is a wonderful trans and LGBTQ friendly space to learn and build poetry writing skills, share your work, and get inspired by fellow writers. Bring your imagination and love of writing and join the club!
https://www.writegirl.org/teaching-artists
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Altadena Main Library
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 12 pm – 2 pm
Address: 600 E. Mariposa St., Altadena, CA 91001
Website: https://www.altadenalibrary.org/programs/?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D175806661
Book Club: Mexikid at Live Oak Library, LACL – In-Person Kids/MG Event
Join us as we discuss the book Mexikid by Pedro Martin. This is a middle-grade, graphic memoir about a Mexican American boy’s family and their adventure-filled road trip to bring their abuelito back from Mexico to live with them. For ages 9 – 13.
Pedro Martín has grown up hearing stories about his abuelito—his legendary crime-fighting, grandfather who was once a part of the Mexican Revolution! But that doesn’t mean Pedro is excited at the news that Abuelito is coming to live with their family. After all, Pedro has 8 brothers and sisters and the house is crowded enough! Still, Pedro piles into the Winnebago with his family for a road trip to Mexico to bring Abuelito home, and what follows is the trip of a lifetime, one filled with laughs and heartache. Along the way, Pedro finally connects with his abuelito and learns what it means to grow up and find his grito.
Books are available at the Customer Service Desk.
Where: Live Oak Library, LACL
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 12 pm
Address: 22 W. Live Oak Ave., Arcadia, CA 91007
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/11498830
Book Club: Southland at Benjamin Franklin Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for a conversation about Southland by Nina Revoyr. Revoyr examines the gritty, colorful, sometimes tumultuous history of Los Angeles’s Crenshaw district—once a truly integrated neighborhood but now predominantly African American.
As Jackie Ishida helps her aunt deal with her grandfather’s will, she finds out that a beneficiary named Curtis Martindale died in the searing 1965 Watts riots. When she subsequently discovers that Curtis and three other young men died in her grandfather’s grocery store, she is alarmed and shaken. She locates one of Curtis’s cousins, and together, they launch an investigation into what happened and whether her grandfather was involved. The storyline takes more twists and turns than a road full of hairpin curves as possible suspects in the four boys’ deaths—murders, to be precise—are identified and dismissed, and some long-held secrets are revealed. The result is foremost a meditation on race, cultural beliefs, opportunity, prejudice, and family obligation that drives home its messages by way of presenting and solving the murders. Though her writing can be stilted, Revoyr (of Japanese and Polish American descent) has crafted a provocative, absorbing story with fully realized characters.
You can check out a copy by asking at the service desk.
Where: Benjamin Franklin Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 12:30 pm
Address: 2200 E. 1st St., Los Angeles, CA 90033
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-club-southland
Kids Book Club: Elf Dog and Owl Head at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Kids Event
Participants will discuss the children’s book Elf Dog and Owl Head by author M.T. Anderson and illustrator Junyi Wu.
This story is a magical adventure about a boy and his dog—or a dog and her boy—and a forest of wonders hidden in plain sight.
Clay has had his fill of home life. A global plague has brought the world to a screeching halt, and with little to look forward to but a summer of video-calling friends, vying with annoying sisters for the family computer, and tuning out his parents’ financial worries, he’s only too happy to retreat to the woods.
M. T. Anderson is the author of Feed, a National Book Award Finalist; the National Book Award winner The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume I: The Pox Party and Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves, which were both Michael L. Printz Honor Books; Symphony for the City of the Dead; Yvain: The Night of the Lion; Landscape with Invisible Hand; and many other books for children and young adults, including The Assassination of Brangwain Spurge, cocreated with Eugene Yelchin, which was a National Book Award Finalist. M. T. Anderson lives near Boston, Massachusetts.
Junyi Wu is the illustrator of several books, including Two Bicycles in Beijing by Teresa Robeson; Beatrix Potter, Scientist by Lindsay H. Metcalf; and the Newbery Honor Book Scary Stories for Young Foxes by Christian McKay Heidicker. Junyi Wu is a graduate of ArtCenter College of Design and is based in Orange County, California.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 1 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/kids-book-club-elf-dog-and-owl-head
Voices in the Well Presents: What Am I Doing Here? A Literary Cabaret Show at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person & Live YouTube Hybrid Event
Enjoy a thoroughly entertaining, thought-provoking afternoon of music and comedy at What Am I Doing Here? This literary cabaret show brings to light the inherent absurdity of living life in modern day America. As tensions rise with the coming election, A Voice In The Well invites us all to simply sit and be together, both recognizing our negatives and appreciating all of our positives – like theater shows! Collectively, the audience will wonder about where we are, and who we are…
Talented performers Suzy Williams and Vinnie Caggiano will amaze you with their rendition of “Moon River.” Catherine Allison and Brian Knudson will knock your socks off with their satire! Jenny Zepp and Eddie Montes will sing Cat Stevens classic, “Miles From Nowhere.” Last, but certainly not least, Frank Strasser will get his metaphorical kicks on Route 66! The one and only Eric Vollmer hosts this month’s literary cabaret in the Wanda Coleman Theater! Refreshments will be provided before and after the performances.
NOTE: See site for further details and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 2 pm – 4 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd Venice Beach Los Angeles, CA 90291
Lit Angels-Jung, Dreamwork, Creativity, and the Collective Unconscious with Ann Hadlock at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 2 pm – 3 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42530
Horror for Young Audiences: Panel featuring Moss Lawton and Aaron Alexovich, in conversation with Justine Pucella Winans at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
Hear from renowned writers of television, graphic novels, and kids’ lit as they give you the exclusive rundown of how to write things that go bump in the night!
Moss Lawton (Halloween: Spellbent) is a comic creator and storyboard artist from the Bay Area They’ve worked as a story artist for TV and features at studios including Netflix, Nickelodeon, Disney, Dreamworks, and WB on projects such as Invader ZIM: Enter the Florpus, Trollhunters: Rise of the Titans, Monsters at Work, and Monster High, as well as Bidoof’s Big Stand with The Pokémon Company. Moss makes comics with the help of their very loud cat, Vincent, and has been told they decorate way too early for Halloween. You can find them online at dinolich.com and follow them on Twitter and Instagram @Dinolich.
Comic artist, writer, and character designer Aaron Alexovich’s first professional art job was building hideous children for Nickelodeon’s Invader Zim. Since then he’s been building hideous children for various animation and comic projects, including Avatar: The Last Airbender, Randy Cunningham: 9th Grade Ninja, Disney’s Haunted Mansion, DC’s Fables, Kimmie66, Confessions of a Blabbermouth, Stitched, the Lovecraftian horror/comedy Eldritch! (with art by Drew Rausch), IT’S NOT SCARY!, and three volumes of Serenity Rose. He also worked on the Zim comic series and movie. (Don’t let Jhonen plant explosive chips in your brain, kids!)
Aaron was born and raised under seventeen beautiful miles of ice in Chicago, Illinois, but currently lives in Southern California, where the bright light makes him sneeze for mysterious reasons. He is the author of Shock City: A Graphic Novel.
Justine Pucella Winans (they/she) (Wishbone) is a queer and nonbinary writer who lives in Los Angeles with their husband and incredible Halloween-colored cats. Their books include YA novels like the critically acclaimed Indies Introduce title, Bianca Torre is Afraid of Everything, Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection, One Killer Problem, and How To Survive a Slasher. Their MG speculative horror titles include the acclaimed Stonewall Honor Book, The Otherwoods, Wishbone, and A Little too Haunted. When not writing queer, creepy, and funny fiction for kids and teens, they can be found training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, reading (a lot of) manga and webcomics, and actively avoiding real life scary situations.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 2 pm – 3 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Creative Writing Group at Central Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Calling all writers of fiction, screenplays, poetry, etc. Get feedback on your writing in a fun, supportive environment. Meetings include a writing prompt/exercise, snacks, and a rollicking good time! Whether you are just starting out or well on your way to glory, join us and banish (at least temporarily) those Lonely Writer Blues!
RSVP:
Please RSVP by emailing fiction@lapl.org today.
This group meets every other Saturday.
Where: Central Library, LAPL, Meeting Room B
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 3 pm – 5 pm
Address: 630 W. 5th St., Los Angeles, CA 90071
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/writers-group-0
October Book Discussion: The September House at North Hollywood Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join our monthly book discussion, held on the second Saturday of each month. The discussion will be led by a different member of our staff and the book of their choice. Pick up the next book a month before the discussion.
October’s book discussion will be on The September House by Carissa Orlando. Pick up a copy from the library today!
The September House is about a house that is haunted by the ghosts of its former inhabitants, who are all afraid of something in the basement. The story follows Margaret, who stays in the house even though the ghosts appear, and her daughter Katherine, who arrives to look for her missing father, Hal.
Where: North Hollywood Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 3 pm – 4 pm
Address: 5211 Tujunga Ave., North Hollywood, CA 91601
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/october-book-discussion-september-house-carissa-orlando
Beyond Hispanic Heritage Month: Afro-Hispanic Writers y Mas with OC Poet Laureate Gustavo Hernandez at Bristol Court – In-Person Event
Orange County Poet Laureate Gustavo Hernadez, author of the collection Flower Grand First, hosts Afro-Hispanic poets and writers as part of Beyond Hispanic Heritage Month events is Santa Ana.
Featuring:
Camille Hernandez is the Poet Laureate of the city of Anaheim. She is the author of the bestselling book The Hero and the Whore. Her poems are in So to Speak, FIYAH, Braving the Body, Spoken Black Girl Magazine, and Anaheim Poetry Review.
David Heredia has worked for Walt Disney Animation, Warner Bros. Animation, and DC Collectibles. His six-time award-winning education video series “Heroes of Color” has been featured in the New York Times, on NPR, and on PBS Online. He lives in Santa Clarita, California, with his wife and three children.
Jenise Miller is a Black Panamanian writer and urban planner from Compton, California. Her work explores art, archives, mapping, and intersectional history. She is the author of The Blvd.
Tamika Burgess is the award-winning middle grade fiction author of Sincerely Sicily and Danilo Was Here.
Where: LibroMobile at Bristol Mall Food Court
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 3 pm – 4 pm
Address: 1180 S. Bristol St., Santa Ana, CA 92704
Website: https://www.libromobile.com/event-details/beyond-hispanic-heritage-month-weekly-events-2024-10-05-15-00 or https://www.instagram.com/p/DAvrHmwPFrL/
Saturday Afternoon Poetry: Deep Critique Workshop led by Don Kingfisher Campbell – Online Zoom Event
Poetry Writing Workshop led by DKC (Submit up to 3 poems totaling no more than 150 lines including the subject of or at least mentioning still or night for Four Feathers Press online edition: Still Night by emailing donkingfishercampbell@gmail.com by 11:59pm, October 18th)
Don Kingfisher Campbell hosts and curates these events.
Where: Saturday Afternoon Poetry
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 3 pm – 5 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://saturdayafternoonpoetry.blogspot.com/
Dulce Stein & Diosa X Presents: Conversations with the Dead: A Bilingual, Gothic Poetry Book at El Camino College Art Gallery – In-Person Event
Xixcana! Exhibit curated by Dulce Stein will feature Conversations with the Dead, presented by Diosa X with readings by:
Bernadette McCormish (Prophets of Angeles);
Sandy Shakes (Scribble Scrabbles eBook);
Carlos Ornelas (Villains Vernacular);
Lisbeth Coiman (I Asked the Blue Heron, Uprising/Alzamiento).
Plus, Quetzalcoatl Band.
Where: El Camino College Art Gallery, Art & Behavioral Science Building
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 16007 Crenshaw Blvd., Torrance, CA 90506
Website: https://www.instagram.com/p/DAReybsz3cp/
The New Series: Mimi Tempestt, Janet Fitch, & Natalie Shapero at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person & Live YouTube Hybrid Event
Beyond Baroque presents The NEW Series, a series of programs debuting new commissioned writing from nine authors through Fall 2024.
Across three installments, an entirely different set of authors respond to one unique theme for the evening. For the second installment, writers Mimi Tempestt, Janet Fitch, & Natalie Shapero respond to the theme, Querencia.
Audiences will experience the debut of original work from emerging and established authors in the contemporary literary landscape. Through a combination of prose, poetry, and multidisciplinary work, each evening will be filled with exceptionally unique performances in the Wanda Coleman Theater.
Before and after the readings, L.A.-based DJ Eddie, will be spinning tunes for the night. Latest book titles from the authors will be available for purchase & author signings at the Scott Wannberg Bookstore & Lounge.
Mimi Tempestt (she/they) is a multidisciplinary artist, writer, and daughter of California. She has a MA in Literature from Mills College and is currently a doctoral candidate in the Creative/Critical PhD in Literature at UC Santa Cruz. Her first book, the monumental misrememberings, was published with Co-Conspirator Press//The Feminist Center for Creative Work (2020). She was selected for participation in the Lambda Literary Writers Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices & writers in 2021. Her second book, The Delicacy of Embracing Spirals, was published with City Lights (2023). Her works can be found in Foglifter, Interim Poetics, The Brooklyn Rail, and The Studio Museum in Harlem.
Janet Fitch is an American author and teacher of fiction writing. She is the author of the #1 national bestseller White Oleander, a novel translated into 24 languages, an Oprah Book Club book and the basis of a feature film, Paint It Black, also widely translated and made into a 2017 film, and her epic novels of the Russian Revolution, The Revolution of Marina M. and Chimes of a Lost Cathedral. She taught creative writing for 14 years in the USC Master of Professional Writing program, as well as VCFA’s Writing and Publishing program, A Room of Her Own (AROHO), the UCLA Writer’s Program, and Pomona College. She lectures frequently on fiction writing.
Natalie Shapero’s writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The London Review of Books, The New York Review of Books, The Paris Review, The Nation, and elsewhere. She is the author of the poetry collections Popular Longing (2021), Hard Child (2017), and No Object (2013), and she has performed at The Pulitzer Arts Foundation, The Poetry Project at St. Mark’s, and elsewhere. She lives in Los Angeles and teaches writing at UC Irvine.
DJ Edie is a Los Angeles-based musician and music selector. She’s curated music for restaurants, dive bars, exclusive members-only creative spaces, museums, weddings, and more. Global grooves from Nigeria to Spain, post-punk out of NYC, West Coast freestyle and lowrider jams, West End Records disco heat, indie artists of today – all can be found in her record bag. She’s brought her distinct sound to the beachside of San Diego, vibrant Las Vegas, bustling cities of NYC and Miami, and the Coachella Arts and Music Festival.
NOTE: See site for further details and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd Venice Beach Los Angeles, CA 90291
Obsidian Tongues Open Mic at Café con Libros, Pomona – In-Person Event
Please join host Caesar K. Avelar, Pomona Poet Laureate for Obsidian Tongues Poetry Readings & Open Mic Night.
Open Mic Night is for everyone-play a song on your guitar, read a poem, or share a story. The spoken word is celebrated!
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Café Con Libros, Pomona
Date: Saturday, the 12th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9 pm
Address: 280 W. 2nd St., Pomona, CA 91766
Website: https://cafeconlibrospress.org/event-calendar/
Melrose Trading Post Event by Greenway Arts Alliance at Melrose Trading Post at Fairfax H.S. – In-Person Event
The Melrose Trading Post is a pioneering arts-based marketplace held every Sunday at Fairfax High School in Los Angeles, CA with 275 local creative small business vendors, delicious food booths and local live music.
MTP was founded in 1997 with a mission to champion small businesses, art and community. The market funds Greenway Arts Alliance’s arts education programming and provides employment and leadership development opportunities for students at Fairfax High School.
NOTE: Check every Sunday for story time and reading events
Where: Melrose Trading Post, Greenway Main Stage at Fairfax HS
Date: Sunday, the 13th (Every Sunday)
Time: 10 am – 5 pm
Address: 7850 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90046
Website: https://melrosetradingpost.org/tickets/
Lit Angeles – Mindful Mornings: Journaling Workshop at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Growth Club is a dynamic community for high achievers redefining success on their terms.
Join us for a weekly journaling event to reflect, write, and connect with our inner selves and each other. Designed for those who seek to slow down and find clarity in the chaos of everyday life.
We’ll guide you through prompts that inspire deep introspection and personal growth. Whether you’re a seasoned journaler or new to the practice, this event is a safe haven to express your thoughts, set intentions and uncover the wisdom within.
Bring your favorite journal and a pen and be ready to dive into an enriching experience that nurtures your mind, body, and soul.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 10 am – 11 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42668
Kids Storytime: Devin Ellie Kurtz & The Bakery Dragon at Chevalier’s – In-Person Kids Event
Join us for this special spooky Sunday storytime with Devin Ellie Kurtz, author of The Bakery Dragon.
The heroic tale of a tiny dragon with a heart of gold and a taste for treats! A scrumptious picture book for fans of funny fairytales and fantastic beasts.
Ember has always been different from the other dragons. His fearsome roar sounds more like a polite sneeze, and when he breathes fire, the villagers just pat his head and say awwww.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Chevalier’s
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Kids Storytime: Heather Alexander & Wallace and Grace and the Owl-o-ween Mystery! at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Kids Event
Join us for this special spooky Sunday storytime with Heather Alexander, author of Wallace and Grace and the Owl-o-ween Mystery!
When Lukas the fox, Ava the opossum, and Mateo the squirrel all show up to the Owl-o-ween party with the same costume, no one knows whooo had the idea first—or whooo should win the delicious boo-berry pie. Can Wallace and Grace uncover clues to solve this costume mystery?
Heather Alexander is the author of numerous books for children, both fiction and nonfiction, including The Good Luck Book, Only in California, Only In America, A Child’s Introduction to Egyptology, and the Wallace and Grace early chapter book series. She lives in Los Angeles with her family and a lucky beagle named Luna May.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42507
Mystery Book Club at West Los Angeles Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
We meet on the first Sunday of each month to discuss a mystery, thriller, or suspense book picked by the group. For current titles, please contact the West LA Library at westla@lapl.org or 310-575-8323.
Where: West L.A. Regional Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday, the 6th
Time: 2 pm – 4 pm
Address: 11360 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90025
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-32
Armenian Poetry Day / Ասմունքի օր at Central Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Los Angeles Public Library presents “Armenian Poetry Day,” celebrating Armenian heritage, as well as the legacy of Komitas, the revered Armenian composer and ethnomusicologist.
Լոս Անջելեսի հանրային գրադարանը ներկայացնում է «Ասմունքի օր»՝ նվիրված հայկական մշակույթին, ինչպես նաև հայ մեծարգո երգահան և էթնոերաժշտագետ Կոմիտասի ժառանգությանը։
Where: Central Library, LAP, Mark Taper Auditorium
Date: Saturday, the 13th
Time: 2 pm – 4:30 pm
Address: 630 W. 5th St., Los Angeles, CA 90071
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/armenian-poetry-day-1
Cellar Door Book Club: Weyward at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss the book Weyward: A Novel by author Emilia Hart.
Weaving together the stories of three extraordinary women across five centuries, Emilia Hart’s Weyward is an astonishing debut, and an enthralling novel of female resilience.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 1 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/cellar-door-book-club-weyward
Halloween Mystery Storytime: Heather Alexander & Wallace and Grace at Once Upon a Time Bookstore – In-Person Kids Event
Halloween Mystery Storytime and Craft presents author Heather Alexander to present her book Wallace and Grace and the Owl-o-ween Mystery.
Great for ages 5+.
Free to attend.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: Once Upon a Time Bookstore
Date: Sunday, the 6th
Time: 2 pm
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/owl-o-ween-mystery
Elizabeth Ai, with Oliver Wang, & New Wave: Rebellion and Reinvention in the Vietnamese Diaspora at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
Fifty years of the Vietnamese Diaspora as seen through the New Wave movement, showing how young Vietnamese refugees in Orange County found rebellion and reinvention through music, fashion, and community.
As Vietnamese refugees sought safety in the United States in the wake of the fall of Saigon, a generation of Vietnamese teenagers and young adults struggled to adjust to a new life in America. Many of these young people in Southern California found a new life and a new identity in New Wave music, a type of Euro Disco that became enormously popular in this community.
New Wave: Rebellion and Reinvention in the Vietnamese Diaspora celebrates the rebellion, reinvention, and rebirth of joy in this young generation in cultural limbo. Featuring essays from prominent Vietnamese scholars, critics, and stars, New Wave explores how music, fashion, and rebellion can be a force for healing. New Wave is a love letter to the first generation of Vietnamese punks and rebels who came of age in the 1980s.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 2 pm – 3 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Book Launch Event: Ryane Nicole Granados & The Aves, with bridgette bianca and Mike Sonksen at Vacancy Avenue – In-Person Event
Ryane Nicole Granados was aformer WWS Chapters Director for 4+ years. She has always called Los Angeles her home and her writing finds its roots in her love of her community. She is inspired to write stories of survival that magnify the marginalized while also unearthing the splendor of second chances. Ryane earned her MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University, Los Angeles and she was named the 2021 Established Writer and Individual Arts Fellow by the California Arts Council. Her debut book: The Aves.
Featured guest readers:
bridgette bianca is a poet and professor from South Central Los Angeles. Her debut book of poetry, be/trouble, was released by Writ Large Projects.
Mike Sonksen is a 3rd-generation Southern Californian. Poet, professor, journalist, historian & tour-guide, his latest book Letters to My City was published by Writ Large Press.
WINNER: 2023 Leapfrog Global Fiction Prize!
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Vacancy Avenue
Date: Sunday the 13th
Time: 2 pm – 4 pm
Address: 1323 N. La Brea Ave., Inglewood, CA 90302
Website: https://www.instagram.com/p/DAqv2cZx-oc/
An Afternoon with Randy Rainbow, with Pamela Adlon, & Low Hanging Fruit: Sparkling Whines, Champagne Problems, and Pressing Issues from My Gay Agenda at Robert Frost Auditorium – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
You devour his delicious parody videos as soon as they drop. Now, see Randy Rainbow in person.
As a savvy social commentator tuned into the public discourse, comedian Randy Rainbow has a few things on his mind.
Low-Hanging Fruit, his new book of essays, is a bold manifesto for a nation desperately in need of a makeover—filled with sparkling whines, a few flutes of Champagne problems and a Birkin bag of the most pressing issues facing the United States, from dancing TikTok grandmas to Elon Musk to the GOP, and, of course, Donald Jessica Trump.
Randy knows that what the country needs to get back on its high heels is a hard-hitting gay agenda. Come laugh out loud as he shares his thoughts on the Live Talks stage.
Randy Rainbow is a comedian, producer, actor, singer, writer, satirist, host and best-selling author known for his web series, The Randy Rainbow Show. His musical parodies and political spoofs have garnered him worldwide acclaim and four consecutive Emmy nominations for Outstanding Short-Form Variety Series. His debut solo album, A Little Brains, A Little Talent, earned him a 2022 Grammy nomination for Best Comedy Album. He lives in New York City.
Pamela Adlon is an Emmy Award-winning creator, actor, writer, producer, and director. Her groundbreaking, Peabody Award-winning & Critic’s Choice Award nominated comedy series, FX’s Better Things, showcases her raw, insightful point of view and an unapologetic, elevated commentary on motherhood, feminism and the complexity of modern life. Better Things marks Adlon’s shift into directing, showrunning, writing, producing and more, all at the highest level of her craft. In addition to her screen work—both in front of and behind the camera—Adlon also leads her own all-female production company, Slam Book Inc., where she currently oversees more than a dozen projects in development, each focused on unique characters sharing their own personal stories. She has been vocal in her support of women and many other under-represented groups, putting her activism into practice at Slam Book by elevating these stories and empowering others to use their own voices as well.
NOTE: See site for tickets and details.
Where: Robert Frost Auditorium
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 4401 Elenda St., Culver City, CA 90230
(Free Parking available at the venue)
Website: https://livetalksla.org/events/randy-rainbow/
Second Sunday Poetry Series & Open Mic: Christian Georgescu, S.A. Griffin and Christine Jordan at The Studio Theatre at St. Denis Building – In-Person Event
Join host Alex M. Frankel to welcome three poets and writers to Second Sunday Poetry, where every month great poets perform their work, sell and sign books, plus mingle with audience members and open mic participants.
Award-winning designer, writer and performer, Christian Georgescu has appeared in Poetry Brothel, his writing anthologized in It’s Animal But Merciful (Great Weather for Media), Seflie (NYSAI Press) and Chicago Story Press among others. His current multi-media theater production House of The Highest and Most Pious, HOTHAMP, is a culmination of material published in the DADA Maintenant Journals #9-#17 (2015-2024) by NYC’s Three Room Press.
S.A. Griffin lives, loves and works in Los Angeles. He has been accused of being a poet and / or an actor and performance artist. Among other things, he believes that God is a left-handed cheeseburger.
Christine Jordan has trained and performed in modern dance and ballet, and knows a lot about Tai Chi, gardening and Shakespeare. As a part of Story Chicks, created in 2014, she has told true tales of her childhood and entertained folks of all ages in many settings. As a poet and teacher, she loves sharing the arts and uncovering the artist in everyone.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
RSVP
Where: The Studio Theatre at St. Denis Building
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 5 am – 7 pm
Address: 3433 Cahuenga Blvd. West, Los Angeles 90068
(Near Universal Studios)
Website: https://www.secondsundaypoetry.com/
Culinary Zine Launch: Joy at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Join us for the launch of a culinary zine!
Join us for the exclusive launch of the first issue, entitled JOY, some tasty treats from within its pages, and a community of food lovers.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
RSVP
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 6 am – 8 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/42858
Library Girl 15th Anniversary Show: People of the Valley Part 2 at Ruskin Group Theatre – In-Person Event
Library Girl + Todd Lawrence Present: People of the Valley – Part 2, Deluxe 15 Year Anniversary Soirée!
Remember Sunday brunch at Encino Deli, Saul’s, Art’s, Mort’s or Brent’s? Later Oak Tree, Bagel Nosh, Fromin’s, now Uncle Bernie’s? Remember the Poodle Lady at Pour la Pooch? The batting cage at Flooky’s? Theee Movies of Tarzana? The goings-on behind the fake slope at Phil Gerard Ski World? Paul Fegen + his purple Excalibur?
Join Susan Hayden + co-curator Todd Lawrence for another look back! Show #174. Featuring readings by Bryan Behar, Veronica Jauregui, Bonnie S. Kaplan and a “monologue in parts” by Sharon Yablon, performed by Mickey Swenson. Featuring words and music by Todd Lawrence (aka Milo Binder)!!
SUNDAY NIGHT, OCTOBER 13th. Taco cart: 6pm. Show: 7pm. $20 includes dinner, dessert, free parking and souvenirs. Limited seating. Get your tickets NOW at ruskingrouptheatre.com. Click “Shows” at top of page + look for Library Girl icon. https://www.facebook.com/events/1959719924500584/
All box office proceeds donated to Ruskin Group Theatre.
NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.
RSVP (May be SOLD OUT)
Where: Ruskin Group Theatre
Date: Sunday, the 13th
Time: 6 am – 9 pm (Taco Cart at 6 pm, Show at 7 pm)
Address: 3000 Airport Ave., Santa Monica, CA 90405
Website: https://www.facebook.com/groups/288785622940/
Fantasy Romance Book Club: Something You Can Build a Nest in at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
October’s Fantasy Romance Book Club’s selection for discussion is Something You Can Build a Nest In by author John Wiswell.
This book club is led by bookseller Taylor C and reads widely in the fantasy and paranormal the romance genre. Discover this creepy, charming monster-slaying fantasy romance—from the perspective of the monster—by Nebula Award-winning debut novelist John Wiswell.
Everyone is welcome!
RSVP required.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Sunday the 13th
Time: 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 3806 Main Street, Culver City, CA 90323
Website: https://www.therippedbodicela.com/events-and-tickets
Los Angeles Literature 