Robertson Writers Group at Robertson Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

Writing a book, poem, or screenplay?

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.

Where: Robertson Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 11 am

Address: 1719 Robertson Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90035

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/robertson-writers-group-0

Book Club: Heartburn at Fairfax Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Join us for a conversation about Heartburn, by Nora Ephron.

A 40th anniversary reissue of the national bestselling author’s hilarious first novel that memorably mixed food, heartbreak, and revenge into a comic masterpiece—now with a new foreword by Stanley Tucci.

Is it possible to write a sidesplitting novel about the breakup of the perfect marriage? If the writer is Nora Ephron, the answer is a resounding yes. In this inspired confection of adultery, revenge, group therapy, and pot roast, the creator of Sleepless in Seattle and When Harry Met Sally… reminds us that comedy depends on anguish as surely as a proper gravy depends on flour and butter.

Seven months into her pregnancy, Rachel Samstat discovers that her husband, Mark, is in love with another woman. The fact that the other woman has “a neck as long as an arm and a nose as long as a thumb and you should see her legs” is no consolation. Food sometimes is, though, since Rachel writes cookbooks for a living. And in between trying to win Mark back and loudly wishing him dead, Ephron’s irrepressible heroine offers some of her favorite recipes.

Heartburn is a sinfully delicious novel, as soul-satisfying as mashed potatoes and as airy as a perfect soufflé.

Where: Fairfax Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 11 am

Address: 161 S. Gardner St., Los Angeles, CA 90036

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-club-heartburn

Seniors Writing Group at Studio City Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Danny Stone, a member 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 want), connect with fellow seniors in the neighborhood, hone your writing skills and find your story.

RSVP:

An RSVP to studio@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.

Where: Studio City Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 1 pm

Address: 12511 Moorpark St., Studio City, CA 91604

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/senior-writing-group-2

Big Read Book Club: The House on Mango Street at Robert Louis Stevenson Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Únase a nosotros para discutir la selección de Big Read de 2025, La Casa en Mango Street de Sandra Cisneros.

Where: Robert Louis Stevenson Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 4 pm

Address: 803 Spence St., Los Angeles, CA 90023

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/big-read-book-discussion-house-mango-street-0

Big Read Bilingual Book Club: The House on Mango Street at Mark Twain Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Join us for a bilingual English/Spanish discussion of The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, this year’s Big Read selection for 2025.

The House on Mango Street is a collection of short pieces narrated from the perspective of Esperanza, a young Latina girl. As she grows up, Esperanza describes the people who come in and out of her life on Mango Street. Copies will be available in the branch while supplies last.

Acompáñenos al club de lectura bilingüe en inglés y español sobre el libro La casa en Mango Street, de Sandra Cisneros, seleccionado para la Gran Lectura de este año.

The House on Mango Street es una colección de breves relatos narrados desde la perspectiva de Esperanza, una joven latina que, a medida que crece, describe a las personas que entran y salen de su vida en la calle Mango Street. Tenemos copias del libro disponibles en la sucursal hasta agotar existencias.

Where: Mark Twain Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 4 pm

Address: 9621 S. Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90003

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/big-read-bilingual-book-discussion-house-mango-street-0

Teen Book Club: Lunar New Year Love Story at Frances Howard Goldwyn – Hollywood Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

This month’s Teen Book Club selection is Lunar New Year Love Story by Gene Luen Yang and Leuyen Pham. This is a heartwarming rom-com about fate, family, and falling in love. This is a hybrid program and will take place both in person and online via Zoom.

RSVP:

Registration is required for program link. Please contact Holywd@lapl.org to sign up.

Where: Frances Howard Goldwyn – Hollywood Regional Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6 pm

Address: 1623 Ivar Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90028

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/teen-book-club-0

LGBTQ+ Book Club: The Argonauts at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event

Participants will discuss the novel, The Argonauts by author Maggie Nelson.

An intrepid voyage out to the frontiers of the latest thinking about love, language, and family

Maggie Nelson’s The Argonauts is a genre-bending memoir, a work of “autotheory” offering fresh, fierce, and timely thinking about desire, identity, and the limitations and possibilities of love and language. It binds an account of Nelson’s relationship with her partner and a journey to and through a pregnancy to a rigorous exploration of sexuality, gender, and “family.” An insistence on radical individual freedom and the value of caretaking becomes the rallying cry for this thoughtful, unabashed, uncompromising book.

Maggie Nelson is a poet, critic, and award-winning author of The Argonauts, Bluets, The Art of Cruelty, Jane: A Murder and The Red Parts. She lives in Los Angeles, California.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508

Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/lgbtq-book-club-argonauts

Writing for Children with José Chávez via Inlandia Institute – Online Event

(All Levels)

Alternating Mondays, 1/13, 1/27, 2/10, 2/24, and 3/10/25, 6:00-8:00 pm PT, on Zoom.

$50. Registration required. https://tinyurl.com/Winter2025CWW

This workshop is designed to meet the needs of those who wish to write or are writing for children. We’ll explore the writing voice for children, define a “picture book,” story arc, story introductions, appropriate vocabulary, children’s poetry, and more. There will be time to flex our writing muscles and develop the beauty and strength of our “voice” for children.

José Chávez is a retired bilingual teacher who dedicates his life to writing. His poetry has been published in the Multilingual Educator Journal, Acentos Review, and the Inlandia anthology, and he is the author of two award-winning bilingual poetry books for children. José lives in Riverside, California, is married, and has three grown children.

NOTE: See site for link and details.

Where: Inlandia Institute

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6 pm – 8 pm

Address: Online Event (see site)

Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/my-calendar/?mc_id=2473

Sherman Oaks Book Club: The Art Thief at Sherman Oaks Martin Pollard Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event

Participants will discuss The Art Thief by author Michael Finkel.

Stéphane Bréitwieser is the most prolific art thief of all time. He pulled off more than 200 heists, often in crowded museums in broad daylight. His girlfriend served as his accomplice. His collection was worth an estimated $2 billion. He never sold a piece, displaying his stolen art in his attic bedroom.

He felt like a king. Until everything came to a shocking end.

In this spellbinding portrait of obsession and flawed genius, Michael Finkel gives us one of the most remarkable true-crime narratives of our times, a riveting story of art, theft, love, and an insatiable hunger to possess beauty at any cost.

Please email shrmno@lapl.org for the Zoom link.

Where: Sherman Oaks Martin Pollard Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: Online Event (see site)

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/sherman-oaks-book-club-art-thief-michael-finkel

Messiah Jacobs, Nicole Beckett, Jaxson Beckett Williams, Jason Pierre, and Chris Robinson present ODB: Oddities, Discord & B-Sides—Lyrical Ruckus in the City at Book Soup – In-Person Event

From an all-star cast of creative talents comes a volatile, genre-defying homage to hip-hop icon Ol’ Dirty Bastard that reimagines New York City’s Five Boroughs through the eyes of the maverick MC and Wu-Tang Clan co-founder.

In a fractured New York City, an elemental impact event has caused different versions of the city’s most infamous neighborhoods from across the multiverse to converge together into a single reality. Spectral apparitions now haunt the streets of Queens. In the Lower East Side, a rogue artificial intelligence has seized the streets. A hundred blocks north, time travelers are throwing a block party in Harlem. And that’s only the beginning…Our guide through this splintered mutation of New York’s past, present, and future is none other than Ol’ Dirty Bastard himself. Follow him as he leads us through odd, urgent, and powerful tales that cast freedom and oppression, wealth and poverty, love and loss, and even life or death like so many dice in a cosmic game of chance.

Jason Pierre is a Los Angeles–based filmmaker and writer born to first-generation Jamaican immigrants and raised in the South Bronx. He received a BFA in creative writing from Brooklyn College. He was a production supervisor for BuzzFeed Motion Pictures, where he produced videos across several BuzzFeed YouTube channels and series. He has written four episodes of BuzzFeed’s animated The Good Advice Cupcake Show for Facebook Watch, and all the episodes of The Era, BuzzFeed’s Cocoa Butter channel’s show on Facebook Watch. He was then a staff writer on Season 3 of the CW show In The Dark, and co-wrote episode 6, “Arcade Fire.” He returned for Season 4 and wrote episode 8, “Tequila Mockingbird.” His 2018 short film Existential Donut follows a man on a quest to help a donut find its hole and has screened at thirteen film festivals. He has a passion for art, animation, science fiction, and discovering ‘80s movies he never knew existed.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069

Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/messiah-jacobs-nicole-beckett-and-jaxson-beckett-williams

Under the Tree We Dream: a Monthly Writing Circle with Alex Petunia at Holy Grounds Coffee – In-Person Event

An Invitation to write and dream with generative props and creative community.

Hosted by Alex Petunia.

All writing levels welcome.

Entrance requires a drink purchase.

Where: Holy Grounds

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm

Address: 5371 Alhambra Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90032

Website: https://www.instagram.com/p/DEOGc5KSBsC/?img_index=1

R.U.P.O. Open Mic at Back to the Grind in Riverside – In-Person Event

RUPO Open Mic is every Monday Night at Back to the Grind in Riverside.

Every Monday at 7 pm to 9 pm. Sign-ups are at 6:30 pm 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 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 3575 University Ave. Riverside, CA 92501

Website: https://www.facebook.com/backtothegrind

Monday Night Fiction Workshop via Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – Online Zoom 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 Literary Arts Center – Online event

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm

Address: Zoom Online Event (see site)

Lit Angels: Healing Through Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Peerson 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 also edits LIT ANGELS, a literary journal available on Substack. Her latest novel is HOUSE OF HEARTS now out in paper ack. https://www.francescaliablock.com/

Note: Please RSVP at site.

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 10 am – 11 am

Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232

Between life and death there is a library. When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change. The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren’t always what she imagined they’d be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.

Where: Stevenson Ranch Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 11:30 pm – 1 pm

Join us to discuss My Brilliant Friend by author Elena Ferrante, one of the Neapolitan novels. For adults.

Where: Agoura Hills Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 2 pm – 3 pm

Join us to discuss the Big Read Book of 2025, The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros.

Book Club Discussion takes place at the Westchester Senior Center.

Where: Westchester – Loyola Village Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 3 pm

Address: 7114 W. Manchester Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90045

This is a hybrid event. Please register at the link below to receive the link to the meeting via email.

https://library-lacounty-gov.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0pd-Goqz4uGNNbzVuW720zsRrGxTK1VeLG

West Hollywood Library’s LGBTQ+ Book Club meets on the last Tuesday of the month to discuss literary works of relevance and interest to the LGBTQ+ community.

Please contact the library to borrow a print copy of the book. eBook and eAudiobook are available through Libby app/OverDrive.

Summary provided by the publisher:

April 5, 2019: In a cozy brownstone in Brooklyn, the veneer of domestic bliss is beginning to crack. Dan and Isabel, troubled husband and wife, are both a little bit in love with Isabel’s younger brother, Robbie. Robbie, wayward soul of the family, who still lives in the attic loft; Robbie, who, trying to get over his most recent boyfriend, has created a glamorous avatar online; Robbie, who now has to move out of the house—and whose departure threatens to break the family apart. Meanwhile Nathan, age ten, is taking his first uncertain steps toward independence, while Violet, five, does her best not to notice the growing rift between her parents.

April 5, 2020: As the world goes into lockdown, the brownstone is feeling more like a prison. Violet is terrified of leaving the windows open, obsessed with keeping her family safe, while Nathan attempts to skirt her rules. Isabel and Dan communicate mostly in veiled jabs and frustrated sighs. And beloved Robbie is stranded in Iceland, alone in a mountain cabin with nothing but his thoughts—and his secret Instagram life—for company.

April 5, 2021: Emerging from the worst of the crisis, the family reckons with a new, very different reality—with what they’ve learned, what they’ve lost, and how they might go on.

Where: West Hollywood Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Join us to discuss Project Hail Mary by author Andy Weir.

Copies of the book will be available at the customer service desk. This program is for adults.

Where: Angelo M. Iacoboni Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

On Tuesday, January 28th at 6:00 pm, we will be hosting the second conversation on Jessica Pishko’s The Highest Law in the Land, in partnership with the American Civil Liberties (ACLU)! We will only be discussing the second part of the book during this meeting.

The Highest Law in the Land: How the Unchecked Power of Sheriffs Threatens Democracy by Jessica Pishko, is a leading authority on sheriffs investigates the impunity with which they police their communities, alongside the troubling role they play in American life, law enforcement, and, increasingly, national politics.

Jessica Pishko is a journalist and lawyer with a JD from Harvard Law School and an MFA from Columbia University. She has been reporting on the criminal legal system for a decade, with a focus on the political power of sheriffs since 2016. In addition to her newsletter Posse Comitatus, her writings have been featured in The New York Times, Politico, Rolling Stone, The Atlantic, The Appeal, Slate, and Democracy Docket. She has been awarded journalism fellowships from the Pulitzer Center and Type Investigations and was a 2022 New America Fellow. A longtime Texas resident, she currently lives with her family in North Carolina.

NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm

Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508

Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/highestlawintheland2

Phy-Sci Book Club: The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2024 at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event

Participants will discuss The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2024 by Bill McKibben, Jaime Green.

Award-winning environmentalist, author, and journalist Bill McKibben selects twenty science and nature essays that represent the best examples of the form published in the previous year.

Bill McKibben is the author of more than a dozen books, including the bestsellers Falter, Deep Economy, and The End of Nature, which was the first book to warn the general public about the climate crisis. He is also the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and the winner of the Gandhi Prize, the Thomas Merton Prize, and the Right Livelihood Prize, sometimes called “the alternate Nobel.”

Jaime Green, series editor, is a science writer and essayist. Her work has appeared in The Atlantic, Slate, The Nation, The New York Times Book Review, Astrobites, and elsewhere. She is a lecturer at Smith College and the Johns Hopkins master’s program in Science Writing as well as the author of The Possibility of Life: Science, Imagination, and Our Quest for Kinship in the Cosmos.

NOTE: See site for guidelines and details.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm

Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508

Where: Inlandia Institute

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 8 pm

Address: Online Event (see site)

Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/my-calendar/?mc_id=2478

Mystery Book Club: Ordinary Grace at Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Join us to discuss Ordinary Grace by author William Kent.

Where: Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6:30 pm

Address: 6400 Playa Vista Dr., Los Angeles, CA 90094

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-56

La Crescenta Book Club: Lies & Wedding at La Crescenta Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us to discuss Lies & Wedding by author Kevin Kwan. For adults.

Rufus Leung Gresham, future Earl of Greshambury and son of a former Hong Kong supermodel has a problem: the legendary Gresham Trust has been depleted by decades of profligate spending, and behind all the magazine covers and Instagram stories manors and yachts lies nothing more than a gargantuan mountain of debt. The only solution, put forth by Rufus’s scheming mother, is for Rufus to attend his sister’s wedding at a luxury eco-resort, a veritable who’s-who of sultans, barons, and oligarchs, and seduce a woman with money.

Should he marry Solène de Courcy, a French hotel heiress with honey blond tresses and a royal bloodline? Should he pursue Martha Dung, the tattooed venture capital genius who passes out billions like lollipops? Or should he follow his heart, betray his family, squander his legacy, and finally confess his love to the literal girl next door, the humble daughter of a doctor, Eden Tong?

When a volcanic eruption burns through the nuptials and a hot mic exposes a secret tryst, the Gresham family plans-and their reputation-go up in flames.

Where: La Crescenta Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 29901 Ladyface Ct., Agoura Hills, CA 91301

This book is a myth-busting, action-focused guide that will transform your relationship with food for good. Good habits are powerful. Repeated actions bring about change one step at a time and help us ensure that these changes become part of our lives. But when it comes to fat loss, too often the focus is on bad habits. The better solution is to maintain stronger, positive motivators that make us want to stay healthy; the easiest way to do this is through simple, effective habits.

Ben Carpenter is a fitness coach and trusted source of no bullshit fat loss information who has spent his entire adult life working in the fitness industry, researching the real science and studies behind fat loss and answering questions with simplified, unbiased answers. Ben is a self-confessed ‘research nerd’. As a personal trainer who is devoted to helping his clients and social media followers get the best results possible, his work isn’t just about being up to date on the latest scientific research, but actually helping people put this information into practice. Ben was born in the UK but now lives in California with his wife.

Sohee Carpenter has been a fitness coach and content creator since 2010. She has a B.A. in Human Biology from Stanford University and an M.S. in Psychology from Arizona State University. She is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist through the National Strength and Conditioning Association with Distinction (NSCA-CSCS,*D). Currently, she is pursuing her PhD in sports science through the distance program at Auckland University of Technology (AUT) and is serving as the Fitness Advisor for Women’s Health magazine.

Note: Please RSVP at site. Seating is limited.

Where: Diesel, A Bookstore

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 225 26^th St., #33, Santa Monica, CA 90402

Website: https://www.dieselbookstore.com/event/Ben-Carpenter-Author-signing

Conchas y Café Bilingual Writing Zine Workshop via DSTL Arts – Online Event

 Our Conchas y Café bilingual community writing workshop series is a 15-week virtual course that explores skills in poetry and other forms of creative writing. Writers of all skill levels are welcome to join.

The SPRING 2025 SEMESTER will culminate with the publishing of Conchas y Café Zine; Vol. 10, Issue 2.

The theme we will be exploring during this series and zine is the concept: “TBD.”

Class Dates: 1/28/25 – 5/6/25

Days and Times: Tuesdays (weekly); 6:30 pm–8:00 pm

To enroll in our series, visit: https://classroom.google.com/c/NzAzMDE4NzMyODY4?cjc=ixjqfbg

Nuestra serie de clases bilingües comunitarias de escritura ‘Conchas y Café’ es un curso virtual de 15 semanas que explora técnicas poéticas y otras formas de escritura creativa. Autores de todo nivel técnico son bienvenidos a participar.

Where: DSTL Arts

Date: Tuesday the 28^th (through May 6, 2025)

Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm

Address: Online Event

Website: https://www.dstlarts.org/calendar

Open Mic Readings Every Tuesday at the Aftermath Bar, Sherman Oaks – In-Person Event

CALLING ALL WRITERS! Every Tuesday we’ll be having Open Mic Readings open to the public! Read your poems, fiction, and spoken word at our open mic reading EVERY TUESDAY NIGHT from 7 pm – 10 pm!

Read your poetry, fiction, spoken word, or lyrics.

Free event. 21+

Note: Please RSVP at site.

Where: The Aftermath Bar

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 10 pm

Address: 14537 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks, CA 91403

A group of high schoolers get more than they bargained for when the drag show they’re attending is attacked by monsters in this funny YA graphic novel from acclaimed queer comics creator Sina Grace.

Marvin Matocho just wanted to have a simple night out with his friends at the local drag show. But when a mysterious pink snow starts to fall, Marvin finds himself the hero of his own story when Los Angeles suddenly becomes overrun by monsters.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069

Participants will discuss Kingmaker: Pamela Harriman’s Astonishing Life of Power, Seduction, and Intrigue by author Sonia Purnell.

At age 20 Churchill’s beloved daughter-in-law became a “secret weapon” during World War II, strategically wining, dining, and seducing diplomats and generals to help win over American sentiment (and secrets) to the British cause against Hitler. After the war, she helped to transform Fiat heir Gianni Agnelli into Italy’s ‘uncrowned king’ on the international stage and after moving to the US brought a struggling Democratic party back to life, hand-picking Bill Clinton from obscurity and vaulting him to the presidency.

Picked as Ambassador to France, she deployed her legendary subtle powers to charm world leaders and help efforts to bring peace to Bosnia, playing her part in what was arguably the high-water mark of American global supremacy.

There are few at any time who have operated as close to the center of power over five decades and two continents, and there is practically no one in 20th Century politics, culture, and fashion whose lives she did not touch, including the Kennedys, Truman Capote, Aly Khan, Kay Graham, Gloria Steinem, Ed Murrow, and Frank Sinatra.

Where: pages: a bookstore

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm

Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266

Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/2025-01-28/nonfiction-book-club

Sci-Fi Fantasy Book Club: She Who Knows at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event

Participants will discuss She Who Knows, by author Nnedi Okunafo.

To the Tolkien nerds, SJM stans, and R.F. Kuang enjoyers, this group is for you! On the fourth Tuesday of every month, we will come together and discuss a story that falls within the realms of either science fiction or fantasy.

Note: Please RSVP at site.

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Pico Iyer, in conversation with Vijay Gupta, will discuss Alame: Learning From Silence.

From the bestselling author of The Art of Stillness, a revelatory exploration of the abiding clarity and calm to be found in quiet retreat.

Pico Iyer has made more than one hundred retreats over the past three decades to a small Benedictine hermitage high above the sea in Big Sur, California. He’s not a Christian—or a member of any religious group—but his life has been transformed by these periods of time spent in silence. That silence reminds him of what is essential and awakens a joy that nothing can efface. It’s not just freedom from distraction and noise and rush: it’s a reminder of some deeper truths he misplaced along the way.

In Aflame, Iyer connects with inner stillness and joy in his many seasons at the monastery, even as his life is going through constant change: a house burns down, a parent dies, a daughter is diagnosed with cancer. He shares the revelations he experiences, alongside wisdom from other non-monastics who have learned from adversity and inwardness. And most profoundly, he shows how solitude can be a training in community and companionship. In so doing, he offers a unique outsider’s view of monastic life—and of a group of selfless souls who have dedicated their days to ensuring there’s a space for quiet and recollection that’s open to us all.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd.,, Pasadena, CA 91101

Let’s get the community together, drink wine, and listen to some amazing work by some amazing writers:

Morgan Parker is a poet, essayist, and novelist. She is the author of the young adult novel Who Put This Song On?; and the poetry collections Other People’s Comfort Keeps Me Up At Night, There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyoncé, and Magical Negro, which won the 2019 National Book Critics Circle Award. She is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship, winner of a Pushcart Prize, and has been hailed by The New York Times as “a dynamic craftsperson” of “considerable consequence to American poetry.” Parker’s debut book of nonfiction is You Get What You Pay For,

Katja Grober has been eating breakfast since she could eat and writing poetry since she could write. Find her @fitbabytea.

Nikolai Garcia is a poet, writer, and the author of Nuclear Shadows of Palm Trees, as well as a forthcoming chapbook from DSTLA Arts.He is co-host of the Trenches Full of Poets Reading Series held in Long Beach.

Bri Stokes (she/her) is a writer, curator and poet living in Los Angeles, on unceded Tongva land. Her work, which explores love, identity, depression, anxiety, and the Sacred Feminine, has been featured in BuzzFeed, Visual Verse, The Myriad, Livina Press, SKEW Magazine and The Winged Moon Magazine.

Elise Runkel is a writer based in Los Angeles, California. She grew up in Austin, Texas before moving to California at eighteen where she received her bachelor’s of fine arts in Television Writing and Production with a minor in English from Chapman University. Her work largely explores the female experience, identity, and mental health.

Ryan Mosts is a poet who seeks wisdom and authentic connections. His debut book, Mindscape of the Land, is a collection of poetry and photography.

Victoria Alejandro is an audio producer and writer with an M.A. from USC in arts journalism. She’s produced for KCRW and KEXP and LAist Studios. She’s won a couple LA Press Club awards for her work on race, music, and identity, and is passionate about continuing to tell those stories.

Where: Tabula Rosa Bar

Date: Tuesday, the 28^th

Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm

Address: 5125 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90027

Lea Deschenes is a graphic designer with over 50 books of poetry under her belt and the author of The Constant Velocity of Trains on Write Bloody Press. She has a long history in web design with an eye toward clean, functional sites, and so many print projects she can’t remember them all.

Where: Cobalt Poets – Online Zoom Event

Date: Tuesday, the 28^th

Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm

From comedy legend Eric Idle, the fascinating inside story of bringing Monty Python and the Holy Grail to Broadway as the unlikely theatrical hit Spamalot.

Long before Spamalot was the toast of Broadway and the winner of three Tony awards, it was an idea threatening to fizzle out before it could find its way into existence. In The Spamalot Diaries, Eric Idle shares original journal entries and raw email exchanges that reveal the sometimes bumpy, always entertaining path to the show’s unforgettable run.

Eric Idle is a comedian, actor, author, and singer-songwriter who found immediate fame on television with the sketch-comedy show Monty Python’s Flying Circus. Following its success, the group began making films that include Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Monty Python’s Life of Brian, and Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life. Eric wrote, directed, and created The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash, the world’s first-ever mockumentary, as well as the Tony Award–winning musical Spamalot. His memoir, Always Look on the Bright Side of Life was a New York Times bestseller.

Watch videos of Eric Idle’s three previous appearances at Live Talks Los Angeles—interviewing John Cleese and Alan Zweibel; and interviewed by Bob Saget..

Writer & actor Alex Edelman is best known for solo shows that blur the line between his stand-up comedy roots and narrative-driven storytelling. His last offering, JUST FOR US, played more than 500 performances all over the world before premiering as an HBO original comedy special. In 2024 Alex was the recipient of a special Tony Award, was named to the Time100 list of most influential people, and won an Emmy. His debut non-fiction collection, I Don’t Belong Here, recently sold to Avid Reader at auction. Alex will next be seen starring in Greg Daniels’ THE PAPER for Peacock. He also writes on the show as a Consulting Producer.

Where: Robert Frost Auditorium

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 8 pm – 10 pm

Address: 4401 Elenda St, Culver City, CA 90230

The nation’s largest weekly Open Mic event is 25 years strong. At an open mic, all are welcome to share their poetry or sit in their audience.

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 28^th

Time: 9 pm – 11 pm

Poets Café celebrates Poetry. This program is a weekly half-hour literary arts discussion and reading program featuring guest authors and their works.

Poetry From Around the World is a segment of this series offered monthly on the 2^nd Monday of the month on KPFK Los Angeles 90.7 FM.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: KPFK 90.7 FM

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 2 pm – 2:30 pm

Address: On-air Event (live)

Website: https://www.kpfk.org/on-air/poets-cafe/

Iacobani Book Club: Project Hail Mary at Iacobani Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Iacobani Book Club participants will discuss Project Hail Mary by author Andy Weir.

Copies of the book will be available at the customer service desk. This program is for adults.

Where: Iacobani Library, LACL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 3 pm – 4 pm

Join our Science Fiction Book Club where we will discuss Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein. Copies of this novel are available at the library.

Synopsis: Valentine Michael Smith was born on Mars and raised by the mysterious inhabitants of the red planet. Is he a messiah or a menace?

Where: Van Nuys Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 5 pm

Address: 6250 Sylmar Ave., Van Nuys, CA 91401

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/sci-fi-book-club-stranger-strange-land-robert-heinlein

Book Club: Lunar Love at El Monte Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Book Club participants will discuss Luna Love by author Lauren Kung Jessen.

Bibliophiles are welcomed! Join us each month for a facilitated discussion of fiction and non-fiction titles. A limited number of copies are available for book club attendees at the library. For adults.

Please note that light refreshments will be served during the program. A list of ingredients will be available upon request

Where: El Monte Library, LACL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 5 pm – 6 pm

(All levels)

Alternating Wednesdays, 1/15, 1/29, 2/12, 2/26, and 3/12/25, 6:00-8:00 pm PT, on Zoom.

$50. Registration required.

In this workshop, participants will explore moments from their lives and use research to uncover connections between themselves and the wider world – topics can include nature, science, travel, culture, history – to write personal essays that ring with humanity.

J.D. Mathes grew up a feral child in the deserts of the American Southwest who loved to read library books and take photographs. He is a 2019-2020 PEN America Writing for Justice Fellow, a Jack Kent Cooke Scholar alumnus, an award-winning author of four books, photographer, screenwriter, and arts reporter. Although Mathes still struggles with subject-verb agreement and where to put commas, he is finishing work on his memoir Of Time and Punishment.

NOTE: See site for link and details.

Where: Inlandia Institute

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6 pm – 8 pm

Address: Online Event (see site)

Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/my-calendar/?mc_id=2483

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 radio in Los Angeles 101.5 FM.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: 101.5 FM

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6 pm – 8 pm

Address: On-air Event (live at 101.5 FM)

Website: https://www.lapoetsociety.org/events

Mystery & Thriller Book Club: The girl next door at Studio City Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Join our Mystery & Thriller Book Club where we will discuss The Girl next door by Ruth Rendell. Copies of this novel are available at the library.

RSVP:

Please email studio@lapl.org for details.

Where: Studio City Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6:30 pm

Address: 12511 Moorpark St., Studio City, CA 91604

Austria-Hungary, 1909. From the moment Yuri Moroz sets out on an evening patrol of the Ukrainian village where he lives, he’s plunged into memories of the eerie circumstances that forced him to flee London and the priesthood to seek safety far from home. Eugenie, his wife, is having bad dreams and worries that he’s restless and misses his old life. That couldn’t be farther from the truth, but his protests have failed to convince her. Now, as he walks the village’s dusty lanes … Yuri recalls his early years as a Catholic priest, his triumphs in the pulpit, a strange relic left for him by his father, his encounters with artists, dandies, ghosts, and spiritualists, and a selfish act that led to disaster … [as] he struggles to figure out an explanation that will satisfy her by the time the sun rises—if the strange perils waiting for him in the dark don’t get him first.

A page-turning gothic tale, A Walker in the Evening brings together the contrasting worlds of 1880s literary London and a struggling Eastern European village in the life of one unforgettable character.

Nick Owchar is former deputy editor of books coverage and a columnist (“The Siren’s Call”) for the Los Angeles Times. Currently he serves as editorial director at Pitzer College, a member of The Claremont Colleges. His writing has appeared in numerous publications and publishing outlets, including the Los Angeles Review of Books, Kirkus Reviews, and Chronicle Books. A Walker in the Evening is his first novel.

Marc Weingarten writes for The Atlantic, Wall St Journal, and The Boston Globe. He is the author of Thirsty: William Mulholland, California Water and The Real Chinatown.

Note: Please RSVP at site. Seating is limited.

Where: Diesel, A Bookstore

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 225 26^th St., #33, Santa Monica, CA 90402

Many of us didn’t have a perfect childhood. But it’s never too late (or too early!) to transform into the parent you were always meant to be—grounded, present, intentional, compassionate, and confident. In Parent Yourself First, licensed marriage and family therapist Bryana Kappadakunnel argues that the secret to successful parenting is to UN-learn the wounded patterns you grew up with and create new ways to connect with your child. Parenting from a place of connection may feel unlike anything you experienced as a child or what you thought parenting was meant to be. But the results can be remarkable—and transformative.

As the founder of the popular Conscious Mommy community on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, Kappadakunnel explains that your upbringing is probably impacting your parenting style in ways you don’t even fully recognize, from how you manage your own emotions to how you connect with your kids in their vulnerable moments. In Parent Yourself First, she shares powerful stories from the families she’s counseled and practical tools for managing common parenting woes like tantrums and defiance. Her promise: You can break free of past patterns that no longer serve you and liberate your soul from old traumas and wounds.

Everyone has baggage. But it’s your responsibility to make sure your baggage doesn’t become your child’s problem. Healing yourself allows you to truly connect with your child; understand their needs; and guide them to live the happy, authentic life that they deserve.

Where: pages: a bookstore

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266

Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/2025-01-29/special-author-event-bryana-kappadakunnel

Big Sean Signs Go Higher: Five Practices for Purpose, Success, and Inner Peace at Book Soup – In-Person Event

Multi-platinum artist, entrepreneur, and philanthropist, Big Sean shares his five key practices for- inner work and self-acceptance in this interactive guidebook on maintaining daily mental wellness.

Sean Anderson, better known as Big Sean, has reached incredible levels of success in his music career. And while, from the outside, his life looks like a collection of enviable achievements, in truth, he has experienced the highest highs and the lowest lows that come with anxiety and depression.

At the age of eighteen, Sean decided to forgo college to sign with Kanye West’s record label. Even though he saw his wildest dreams coming true, almost like a rap fairytale, he found himself contemplating taking his own life. It was in this, his darkest moments, that he started applying the spiritual practices he’d witnessed his mother embrace throughout his childhood from books like The Four Agreements, The Secret, and many more.

From that moment on, Sean has been on a journey of inward reflection, self-acceptance, and continual work to become the best version of himself every day. In these pages he walks you through the five practices—accepting, strategizing, trying, trusting, and manifesting—that have given him the skills and confidence to become the beloved father, musician, and man that he is today. This book is a clarion call for the next self-help movement, poised to meet the complexities of the moment we’re in.

Go Higher dares to ask the question: If we worked on our self-care regularly, instead of only when we were in crisis, how much higher could we go? Filled with step-by-step instructions for the tools Sean has been using on a daily basis for the last decade—journaling, agreements, affirmations, and meditation, as well as prompts to guide you on your own journey of self-reflection, This is a spiritual guidebook for our times, proving that investing in yourself isn’t something that drains your energy, but is something that gives you the energy to reach your fullest potential.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

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 Filipino town & The World: Search to Involve Pilipino Americans.

NOTE: See site for RSVP, cost, guidelines, and details.

Where: SIPA HQ

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

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

After her best friend dies in a coal mine, Benethea “Bennie” Mattox sacrifices her job, her relationship, and her reputation to uncover what’s killing miners on Kire Mountain. When she finds a half-drowned white woman in a dirty mine slough, Bennie takes her in because it’s right—but also because she hopes this odd, magnetic stranger can lead her to the proof she needs.

Instead, she brings more questions. The woman called Motheater can’t remember her true name, or how she ended up inside the mountain. She knows only that she’s a witch of Appalachia, bound to tor and holler, possum and snake, with power in her hands and Scripture on her tongue. But the mystery of her fate, her doomed quest to keep industry off Kire Mountain, and the promises she bent and broke have followed her a century and half into the future. And now, the choices Motheater and Bennie make together could change the face of the town itself.

Linda H. Codega is a nonbinary queer Virginian living in the hills of the San Gabriel Mountains, where they can often be found hiking, sailing, or haunting the local movie theater. They are a writer and entertainment journalist currently working in television production. Their articles appear on Rascal, i09, Reactor, Polygon, and The Observer. They are a Hugo Award-winning first reader at Strange Horizons. You can find them at lincodega.com.

Where: Skylight

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027

Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-linda-h-codega-presents-motheater

Jorge Cham & Out of Your Mind at Vroman’s – In-Person Event

Jorge Cham presents his book Out of Your Mind.

 From the creator of WE HAVE NO IDEA, an introductory journey into your own mind—if your inner voice had a Ph.D. in brain science, cracked jokes, and drew cartoons.

Why do you love? Why do you lie? What makes you happy? Every single thought you have comes from one place: your brain. But what makes it tick? How much of it have we decoded, and how much of it remains an impenetrable mystery?

Join best-selling author and online cartoonist Jorge Cham and neuroscientist Dwayne Godwin on a deep dive into the fascinating world of the human brain, in which they will explore questions such as: What is consciousness? Where are you in the brain? And do we have free will? All while illuminating everything we know (and DON’T know) about one of the most complex objects in the known universe. Think of it as conversation-ammunition for your next cocktail party, or a quick fascinating read while you’re in the bathroom (don’t worry, the chapters aren’t that long). Centered around questions we all ask ourselves at some point but don’t usually have answers to, Out of Your Mind is an illustrated book about the brain that isn’t too brainy. Playful, accessible, and deeply insightful, it’s the one brain book that’s truly accessible and suitable for all brains.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101

• 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 29^th

Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm

Address: 4321 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008

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.

NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information. 

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 8 pm – 10 pm

Address: Online event (see site)

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/wednesday-night-poetry-workshop-tickets-1219430582699#search

Poetry Nights with East Los Soul at East Los Angeles Rising Youth Club – In-Person Event

East Los Soul presents Poetry Nights every Wednesday from 8 pm – 9:45 pm at East L.A. Rising Youth Club. Poetry starts at 8:15 pm.

Every 2^nd Wednesday will be a poetry contest with a $200 prize for the poet winner, via unanimous vote.

Every 4^th Wednesday will be an art contest with a $200 prize for the artist winner, via unanimous vote.

$2 entrance fee

Where: East Los Angeles Rising Youth Club

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 8 pm – 9:45 pm

Address: 324 N. McDonnell Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90022

Website: N/A

Poetry Reading & Open Mic by Two Idiots Peddling Poetry with Ben Trigg and Guest Juan Amador at The Ugly Mug – In-Person Event

Host Ben Trigg and Two Idiots Peddling Poetry at the Ugly Mug on Wednesday Nights and the January feature is Juan Amador.

Juan Amador is a writer and performer from South Central Los Angeles.

He released his first poetry book titled Pimping My Trauma with Riot of Roses Publishing House.

His poems have been included in the literary journal Mobile Data Mag and anthologies from Beyond The Veil Press, Golden Foothill Press and Poetic Underground LLC Press.

$4 cover fee, cash only

NOTE: See site for further details.

Where: The Ugly Mug, Orange

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 8 pm – 10 pm

Address: 261 N. Glassell St., Orange, CA 92866

Thursdays, 11:15 am-1:15 pm, In person at the Redlands Community Center, 111 W. Lugonia Ave, Redlands, Ongoing. Meets Weekly. (A Zoom option may be available; contact Inlandia for details.)

This ongoing writing workshop meets weekly at Redlands Community Center. Memoir writing, poetry, fiction, and nonfiction writing are all encouraged and welcome. Discover the pure joy of writing and creating with others in a supportive environment.

Mae Wagner Marinello has been a part of Inlandia since a 2008 writing workshop with Ruth Nolan. In 2014, she began facilitating a weekly writing workshop called Joslyn Joy Writers, at the Joslyn Senior Center in Redlands. During the pandemic lockdown, the weekly workshop continued on Zoom; it is now a hybrid class averaging between 10-20 combined participants on Zoom and in-person.

NOTE: All Levels. See site for details.

Where: Inlandia Institute at the Redlands Community Center

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 11:15 am – 1:15 pm

Address: 111 W. Lugonia Ave, Redlands, CA 92374

Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/my-calendar/?mc_id=2501

Marina del Rey Book Club: The Dinner at Lloyd Taber – Marina del Rey Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join participants to discuss The Dinner by Herman Koch.

Where: Lloyd Taber Marina del Rey Library, LACL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 2 pm – 3 pm (& at 6 pm – 7 pm)

Address: 4533 Admiralty Way, Marina Del Rey, CA 90292

Attendance is limited, and advance registration is required.

Where: Manhattan Beach Library, LACL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 4 pm – 5 pm

Do you love graphic novels? Does your family get tired of having to talk about Watchmen—again? Looking for someone to geek out with you over the new stuff from Brian K. Vaughan? Then this is the club for you!

This month, we’ll discuss The Road by Cormac McCarthy and Manu Larcenet. The story of a nameless father and son trying to survive with their humanity intact in a postapocalyptic wasteland where Earth’s natural resources have been diminished, and some survivors are left to raise others for meat, The Road is one of Cormac McCarthy’s bleakest and most prescient novels. This first official graphic novel adaptation of McCarthy’s work is illustrated by acclaimed French cartoonist Manu Larcenet, who ably transforms the world depicted by McCarthy’s spare and brutal prose into stark ink drawings that add an additional layer to this haunting tale of family love and human perseverance. You can grab this title on Hoopla with your library card.

The intended audience for this monthly Zoom event is teens aged 16+ and adults.

RSVP:

Email wwood@lapl.org to be included on the monthly mailing list and for the Zoom link.

Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 1246 Glendon Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90024

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/cookies-comics-graphic-novel-book-club-7

Robert Crais & The Big Empty at Deisel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event

Join us to welcome Robert Crais to discuss his novel The Big Empty (Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel).

Elvis Cole and his enigmatic partner, Joe Pike, race to find a terrifying, unidentified killer in this twisting, unpredictable thriller from #1 New York Times bestselling author Robert Crais.

Traci Beller was thirteen when her father disappeared in the sleepy town of Rancha, not far from Los Angeles. The evidence says Tommy Beller abandoned his family, but Traci never believed it. Now, ten years later, Traci is a high-profile influencer with millions of followers and the money to hire the best detective she can find: Elvis Cole.

Elvis heads to Rancha where an ex-con named Sadie Givens and her daughter, Anya, might have a line on the missing man. But when Elvis finds himself shadowed by a gang of vicious criminals, the missing persons cold case becomes far more sinister. Elvis calls his ex-Marine friend, Joe Pike, for help, and they follow Tommy Beller’s trail into the depths of a monstrous, hidden evil. The case flips on its head, victims become predators, predators become prey, and the question becomes: Can Elvis Cole save them all from this nightmare?

Robert Crais is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of twenty-four novels, twenty of them featuring private investigator Elvis Cole and his enigmatic partner, Joe Pike. Crais was named a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America and has received numerous awards, among them an Anthony Award from the World Mystery Convention, multiple Shamus and Barry Awards, and a Falcon Award from the Maltese Falcon Society of Japan. His novels have been translated around the world and have received dozens of rave reviews and the highest praise. The Philadelphia Inquirer says it all: “Robert Crais is one of those rare, treasured writers who combine genuine humanity with tales of crime and detection—not to mention the steadily building tension that always manages to pile up till his books can’t be put down.” A native of Louisiana, Robert Crais lives in Los Angeles.

Note: Please RSVP at site. Seating is limited.

Where: Diesel, A Bookstore

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 225 26^th St., #33, Santa Monica, CA 90402

The eternal singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell is seen anew, portrayed through a witty and comprehensive exploration of anecdotes, quotes, and lyrics by Henry Alford, “the most graceful of humorists” (Vanity Fair) and a writer for The New Yorker.

Presented in the impressionistic vein of Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret, I Dream of Joni explores in fifty-three essays, with the author’s trademark wit and verve, the life of the legendary singer-songwriter.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90069 

We all need some TLC right now. Bring yr agender agenda, LGBTQIA+ care package, & your mutual-aid mic-drop poem! Join us 4 a heartfelt night of Queer AF poetry, where we’ll bask in Leather Love & Collective Care!

$10 suggested donation.

Where: Heavy Manners Library

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90069 

We are specifically aimed at the kink community to explore yourself, your partners, and use your findings to explore the power of creative expression through poetry.

Format: Inspiration Hour: 7 pm – 8 pm; Readings: 8 pm – 9 pm.

Moderator: Rubix has been a member of the SoCal BDSM community for 8 years. She started writing poetry at age 13, decided to combine her two passions at age 20, and Kink & Ink was born four year later.

See site for details.

Where: Legacy Studios, Suite B (entrance behind building)

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 8762 W. Pico Blvd., Suite B, Los Angeles, CA 90035

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/kink-ink-poetry-readings-january-tickets-1134942827549

Sports Book Club: Barbarian Days at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event

Meets quarterly, check here for next meeting information. Join {pages} for our newest book club, Sports Page Turner! This club will meet quarterly to discuss the best of sports writing.

Participants will discuss: Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life (Pulitzer Prize Winner) by William Finnegan.

Barbarian Days is William Finnegan’s memoir of an obsession, a complex enchantment. Surfing only looks like a sport. To initiates, it is something else: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous pastime, a way of life.

RSVP

Where: pages: a bookstore

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266

Website: https://www.pagesabookstore.com/event/2025-01-30/sports-book-club

Defrost: An Open Mic Reading Series at The Pop Hop – In-Person Event

Every Thursday until February 6!

Defrost, an open-mic prose series every Thursday January 16th to February 6th. Sign-ups begin at 7 pm. Read aloud festering thoughts, completed pieces, poetry, essays, excerpts, grocery lists, and more. All are welcome. 5 min reading cap encouraged.

Where: The Pop Hop

Date: Thursday, the 30^th

Time: 7 pm

Address: 5002 York Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90042

Arabella gets an unexpected chance at love when she’s thrust into a conflict and history she’s tried to avoid all her life.

Zoya is playing matchmaker for her last unmarried granddaughter and stirring up buried memories.

Naya is keeping a secret from her children that will change all their lives.

Thirty-five-year-old Arabella, a New York theatre director whose dating and career prospects are drying up, is offered an opportunity to direct a risqué cross-dressing interpretation of a Shakespeare classic—that might garner international attention—in the West Bank. Her mother, Naya, and grandmother, Zoya, hatch a plot to match her with Aziz, a Palestinian American doctor volunteering in Gaza. Arabella agrees to meet Aziz, since her growing feelings for Yoav, a celebrated Israeli American theatre designer, seem destined for disaster…

With biting hilarity, Too Soon introduces us to a trio of bold and unforgettable voices. This dramatic saga follows one family’s epic journey fleeing war-torn Jaffa in 1948, chasing the American Dream in Detroit and San Francisco in the sixties and seventies, hustling in the New York theatre scene post-9/11, and daring to stage a show in Palestine in 2012. Upon learning one of them is living on borrowed time, the three women fight to live, make art, and love on their own terms. A funny, sexy, and heart-wrenching literary debut, Too Soon illuminates our shared history and asks, how can we set ourselves free?

Betty Shamieh (she/her) is a Palestinian American writer and the author of fifteen plays. She is the playwright-in-residence at the Classical Theatre of Harlem. Her six New York play premieres include the sold-out off-Broadway runs of Roar and Malvolio, a sequel to Twelfth Night, which were both New York Times Critic’s Picks. Shamieh was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship and named a UNESCO Young Artist for Intercultural Dialogue. She is a founding artistic director of The Semitic Root, a collective that supports innovative theatre cocreated by Arab and Jewish Americans. A graduate of Harvard College and the Yale School of Drama, she lives with her family in San Francisco.

Where: Skylight

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027

Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-betty-shamieh-presents-too-soon

Lit Angels: Breaking and Entering 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 also edits LIT ANGELS, a literary journal available on Substack. Her latest novel is HOUSE OF HEARTS now out in paperback. https://www.francescaliablock.com/

NOTE: See Eventbrite for tickets.

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Thursday, the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. 1B, Culver City, CA 90232

Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/1660520250130 

Walter Mosley & Been Wrong So Long it Feels Like Right: A King Oliver Novel at Vroman’s – In-Person Ticketed Event

Walter Mosley will discuss his bookBeen Wrong So Long it Feels Like Right: A King Oliver Novel.

Joe King Oliver’s beloved Grandma B has found a tumor, and at her age, treatment is high-risk. She’s lived life fully and without regrets, and now has only a single, dying wish: to see her long-lost son. King has been estranged from his father, Chief Odin Oliver, since he was a young boy. He swore to never speak to the man again when he was taken away in handcuffs. But now, Grandma B’s pure ask has opened King’s heart, and through his hunt, he gains a deeper understanding of his father as a complicated, righteous man—a man defined by women, a man protected by women, a man he wants to know. Although Chief was released from prison years ago, he’s been living underground ever since. Now, King must not only find his father, but prove his innocence, and protect the future of his entire family.

Simultaneously, King finds himself in a moral bind. Marigold Hart, the wife of a powerful Californian billionaire, has gone missing, along with their seven-year-old daughter. Orr is brutish and dangerous, and King realizes after locating her that it’s in her best interest to stay hidden. But are his motives pure? There is something magnetic about Marigold; he can’t help but want her near.

In the latest installment in the Joe King Oliver series, no good deed goes unpunished. Emotionally stirring, pulse-pounding, and undeniably sexy, Been Wrong So Long It Feels Like Right shows Walter Mosley at his best.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-01-30/walter-mosley-discusses-been-wrong-so-long-it-feels-right-king-oliver-novel

L.A Book Launch: Labor by Cecilia Woloch, with Harry Northrup, at Beyond Baroque – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

RESCHEDULED FROM JANUARY 16^th:

Cecilia Woloch, in conversation with Harry Northrup, will present and discuss Labor: The Testimony of Ted Gall, an extended poem in the voice of coal miner and activist Ted Gall, weaving one man’s personal story into the history of work and justice in America.

Hear selections from LABOR featuring performances and multi-media art by Harry Northup and Cecilia Woloch, presented in the Wanda Coleman Theater.

Book signing and reception to follow the performances in the theater.

Cecilia Woloch comes from a long line of fortune tellers and labor activists. She was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and grew up there and in rural Kentucky, one of seven children of a homemaker and an airplane mechanic. She is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Fulbright Foundation, and the author of six previous collections of poems: Sacrifice, a Book Sense 76 Selection in 2001; Tsigan: The Gypsy Poem, which has been given multi-disciplinary presentations across the U.S. and Europe; Late, for which she was named Georgia Author of the Year in Poetry in 2004; Narcissus, winner of the Tupelo Press Snowbound Prize in 2006; Carpathia, a finalist for the Milton Kessler Award in 2010; Earth, winner of the 2015 Two Sylvias Press chapbook prize, as well as a novel, Sur la Route (On the Road). She collaborates regularly with musicians, dancers, visual artists and theatre artists. Her work has been translated and published in French, German, Polish, Romanian, Bulgarian, Hungarian, Ukrainian, Hebrew, and Romanes. She’s based in Los Angeles.

Harry Northup, an original member of the free Wednesday night poetry workshop, which began early 1969, Northup’s first featured reading was with Michael C Ford at Beyond Baroque in 1974. A founding member of Cahuenga Press, a poet’s publishing cooperative, Northup has published 12 books of poetry including Enough the Great Running Chapel (Momentum Press, 1982), and his most recent, Love Poem to MPTF (Cahuenga Press, 2020). A member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences since 1976, Northup made a living as an actor for 34 years appearing in 37 films including Martin Scorsese’s first six movies, among them Mean Streets and Taxi Driver, and was the star of the acclaimed cult film Over the Edge directed by Jonathan Kaplan, and Fighting Mad, written and directed by Jonathan Demme. Harry was married to the late Holly Prado, poet, author, and teacher.

NOTE: See site for further information. 

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center

Date: Thursday, the 30^th

Time: 8 pm – 9:30 pm (Doors at 7:30 pm)

Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/la-book-launch-labor-the-testimony-of-ted-gall-by-cecilia-woloch-tickets-1200476781369

How a Book Changed My Life Student Essay Contest: Letter to an Author at Diamond Bar Library, LACL – In-Person Teen Event

 If you’re a book lover, you’ve likely read something, fiction or non-fiction, classic or contemporary, that has left its mark on you. Now’s your chance to express your appreciation to the author with an essay in the form of a letter.

In this letter, you’ll describe how the author’s work has altered your worldview or personal life. Who knows—the author may even read it!

Don’t miss out on the opportunity.

Three (3) winners will be chosen and will each be awarded $300.

Contest Rules:

* Open to students ages 13-18

* Entries must be 1,000 words or less

* Must be mailed or dropped off at Diamond Bar Library

* All entries become the property of LA County Library

* A completed entry form must accompany all essay submissions

Sponsored by the Diamond Bar Friends of the Library

NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details. 

Where: Diamond Bar Library, LACL

Date: Friday, the 31^st

Time: All Day (see site)

Author Oliver Chin will introduce and read his newest children’s picture book, The Year of the Snake, in the popular series Tales from the Chinese Zodiac.

In this story, Suzie the snake wants to explore the colorful world but meets others who may not like serpents. However, she befriends the girl Lily and together they discover how valuable the qualities of a snake can really be: flexible, strong, sensitive…and clever!

For ages 5 – 12.

Where: San Dimas Library, LACL

Date: Friday, the 31^st

Time: 3 pm – 3:45 pm

Address: 13800 La Mirada Blvd., La Mirada, CA 90638

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/12647462

Author & Family Storytime: Oliver Chin & The Year of the Snake at San Dimas Library, LACL – In-Person Kids Event

Author Oliver Chin will introduce and read his newest children’s picture book, The Year of the Snake, in the popular series Tales from the Chinese Zodiac.

In this story, Suzie the snake wants to explore the colorful world but meets others who may not like serpents. However, she befriends the girl Lily and together they discover how valuable the qualities of a snake can really be: flexible, strong, sensitive…and clever!

For ages 5 – 12.

Where: San Dimas Library, LACL

Date: Friday, the 31^st

Time: 3 pm – 3:45 pm

Address: 13800 La Mirada Blvd., La Mirada, CA 90638

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/12647462

Horror Book Club: Devolution at Compton Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Participantswill discuss Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre by author Max Brooks. For Ages 18+

Do you find yourself attracted to the strange and unusual? Do you enjoy what others may find frightening? If so, join the Horror Book Club where each month we’ll provide you with diverse horror authors and titles to discuss with people who enjoy the same genre as you.

A modern retelling of the Bigfoot legend is presented as a gripping journal by a woman from a high-tech Pacific Northwest community who becomes cut off from civilization by a volcanic eruption before witnessing the flight of starving humanoid beings. Part survival narrative, part bloody horror tale, part scientific journey into the boundaries between truth and fiction.

Attendance is limited, and advance registration is required. This will be used to save your spot in the program. We cannot guarantee availability for any unregistered adult.

Where: Compton Library, LACL

Date: Friday, the 31^st

Time: 4 pm – 5 pm

Address: 240 W. Compton Blvd., Compton, CA 90220

Drawing on extensive research about polarization and partisanship, Talisse argues that certain core democratic capacities can be cultivated only at a distance from the political fray. If we are to meet the responsibilities of democratic citizenship, we must occasionally step away from our allies and opponents alike. We can perform this self-work only in secluded settings where we can engage in civic reflection that is not prepackaged in the idiom of our political divides, allowing us to contemplate political circumstances that are not our own.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Friday the 31^st

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069

Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/dr-robert-talisse

Sonora Reyes, with Emma R, Alban, & The Broposal at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event

Sonora Reyes, in conversation with Emma R. Ablan, will discuss The Broposal by author Chencia C. Higgins.

There will be a book signing to follow the event.

Everyone is welcome. RSVP required.

NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.

Where: The Ripped Bodice

Date: Friday the 31^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 3806 Main Street, Culver City, CA 90323

All ages.

Where: Wrigley Coffee Co.

Date: Friday the 31^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 437 W. Willow St., Long Beach, CA 90806

Website: https://www.lbpoetry.com/

John McMahon & Head Cases at Vroman’s – In-Person Event

John McMahon will discuss his novel Head Cases.

Head Cases follows an enigmatic group of FBI agents as they hunt down a murderer seeking his own justice in this electrifying—and commercial—series debut.

FBI Agent Gardner Camden is an analytical genius with an affinity for puzzles. He also has a blind spot on the human side of investigations, a blindness that sometimes even includes people in his own life, like his beloved seven-year-old daughter Camila. Gardner and his squad of brilliant yet quirky agents make up the Patterns and Recognition (PAR) unit, the FBI’s hidden edge, brought in for cases that no one else can solve.

When DNA links a murder victim to a serial killer long presumed dead, the team springs into action. A second victim establishes a pattern, and the murderer begins leaving a trail of clues and riddles especially for Gardner. And while the PAR team is usually relegated to working cold cases from behind a desk, the investigation puts them on the road and into the public eye, following in the footsteps of a killer.

Along with Gardner, PAR consists of a mathematician, a weapons expert, a computer analyst, and their leader, a career agent. Each of them must use every skill they have to solve the riddle of the killer’s identity. But with the perpetrator somehow learning more and more about the team at PAR, can they protect themselves and their families…before it’s too late?

Time: 7 pm

Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-01-25/vromans-ed-fiction-writing-class-diana-wagman-8-weeks

Find Me When You’re Ready: Perry Janes, Jackson Burgess, Elena Karina Byrne at Beyond Baroque – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

A Reading & Conversation in celebration of Perry Janes’s poetry collection, Find Me When You’re Ready

Poet and filmmaker Perry Janes celebrates his recently published poetry collection Find Me When You’re Ready. The poet will be joined by Jackson Burgess, author of Atrophy, winner of Write Bloody Publishing’s 2017 Submissions Contest and a 2016 National Poetry Series Finalist. After the readings, Elena Karina Byrne will moderate a conversation with the authors in the Wanda Coleman Theater. Reception with light refreshments and book signings to follow after the reading & conversation.

In Find Me When You’re Ready, Perry Janes traces a sweeping journey from Detroit to Los Angeles. As he leaves home and forges toward California, the speaker in these poems considers how we learn and mis-learn ideas about manhood, confronts the aftershocks of childhood sexual abuse, and questions the human need for belonging. By embracing the touchstones of youth—movies, lore, graphic novels—these poems assert the speaker’s defiant right to childhood even amid damage. As the collection arcs toward adulthood, the speaker embodies a vision of healing that refuses easy binaries and embraces the joys of intimacy. Across each of its five acts, Janes’s debut collection is driven by an interest troubling our creation myths, asking who built them, why we carry them, and how we might set them aside.

NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information. 

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center

Date: Friday, the 31^st

Time: 8 pm – 10 pm

Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/find-me-when-youre-ready-perry-janes-jackson-burgess-elena-karina-byrne-tickets-1209237775739?aff=oddtdtcreator

CA Writers Club Presents: Tod Goldberg: Writing Series Characters at Anaheim Packing House – In-Person Event

CA Writers Club presents author and educator Tod Goldberg to discuss Writing Series Characters.

What do you need to know about using a continuing character in both crime fiction and literary fiction, short stories and novels?

Tod Goldberg is the New York Times bestselling author of fifteen books, including the acclaimed Gangsterland quartet—Gangsterland, Gangster Nation and many more.

Where: Anaheim Packing House

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 9 am – 11 am

Address: 440 S Anaheim Blvd., Anaheim, CA 92805

Please email eaglrk@lapl.org for the writing prompt.

Where: Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 10 am

Address: 5027 Caspar Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90041

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/western-edge-writers-1

Book Club: On the Beach at Los Feliz Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

 Join the discussion of On the Beach, a novel by Nevil Shute.

Where: Los Feliz Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 11 am

Address: 1874 Hillhurst Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027

Quinton Peters was the golden boy of the Rosewood low-income housing projects, receiving full scholarship offers to two different Ivy League schools. When he mysteriously goes missing, his little sister, 13-year-old Amari Peters, can’t understand why it’s not a bigger deal. Then Amari discovers a ticking briefcase in her brother’s old closet. A briefcase meant for her eyes only. There was far more to Quinton, it seems, than she ever knew. He’s left her a nomination for a summer tryout at the secretive Bureau of Supernatural Affairs. Amari is certain the answer to finding out what happened to him lies somewhere inside.

Where: Agoura Hills Library, LACL

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 11 am – 12 pm

Address: 29901 Ladyface Ct., Agoura Hills, CA 91301

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/12486445

Kids Storytime with Josh Oaktree & Do You Speak Bee? at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Kids Event

Join us for an Author Storytime event with Josh Oaktree.

Josh Oaktree is an author and the managing director and founder of Oak Tree Comics, an independent publisher where imagination meets environmentalism. His books include Thorn the Unicorn, The Weird Animal Hour, and the picture book series Art & Oakie Ask. He will read aloud from his picture book Do You Speak Bee?

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 11 am – 12 pm

Participants will discuss the book Sorceline by author Paoloa Antista.

Welcome to the Island of Vorn, where mythical creatures roam free and only the brightest students are invited to study them. In Book 1 of this riveting new middle grade graphic novel series, a gifted young cryptozoologist-in-training must learn to tame powerful beasts—including her own inner demons.

For as long as she can remember, Sorceline has had a knack for the study of mythical creatures. Now a student at Professor Archibald Balzar’s prestigious school of cryptozoology, she’s eager to test her skills and earn a spot as one of Balzar’s apprentices.

But for all her knowledge of gorgons, vampires, and griffins, Sorceline is mystified by her fellow humans. While she excels in her studies, she quickly clashes with her classmates, revealing her fiery temper.

When one of her rivals suddenly disappears, Sorceline must set aside her anger and join the quest to find her. But the mystery only deepens, leading Sorceline on a journey far darker and more personal than she expected…

Paola Antista is an Italian illustrator and comic artist. A graduate of Disney Academy, she began her career illustrating for magazines, educational books, and advertising agencies. She now teaches comic art in middle schools and high schools and is the illustrator of the Cats! graphic novel series.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 1 pm

Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508

Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/kids-graphic-novel-book-club-sorceline

Gunpowder Press: 10 Years and Counting of Dynamite Poetry at Beyond Baroque – In-Person Event

Gunpowder Press celebrates its 10th anniversary at Beyond Baroque! Published poets by Gunpowder Press read from new and selected work. Featuring Catherine Hodges, Nan Cohen, Nicholas Reiner, Crystal AC Salas, Amelia Rodriguez, and Susan Kelly-DeWitt. Co-editors David Starkey and Chryss Yost are interviewed by George Yatchisin about the press’s origins, its mission, and accomplishments in the literary community it has fostered in its first decade. Home of various publishing initiatives and an avid community supporter, Gunpowder Press serves as a host of the Barry Stacks Poetry Prize; Shoreline Voices Project anthologies which publishes poets in Central California; Alta California Chapbook Prize highlighting Latinx poets; and Anacapa Review, an online journal which presents a curated selection of poems each month.

Book signings and reception to follow after the readings.

Catherine Abbey Hodges is the 2015 winner of the Barry Spacks Poetry Prize from Gunpowder Press for her book Instead of Sadness and the author of three other full-length collections: Empty Me Full (Gunpowder Press, 2024), In a Rind of Light (Stephen F. Austin State University Press, 2020) and Raft of Days (Gunpowder Press, 2017). Individual poems appear in venues including Narrative, Plume, CALYX, Plant-Human Quarterly, SALT, Tar River Poetry, Atticus Review, Gyroscope Review, Verse Daily and The Writer’s Almanac. English Professor Emeritus at Porterville College, Catherine writes, edits, teaches privately and collaborates with musician Rob Hodges on ancestral Yokuts land.

Amelia Rodriguez is a journalist and poet from the Coachella Valley, California. The recipient of the San Diego Press Club’s 2023 Rising Star award and 2024 Best of Show award, she is currently the associate editor at San Diego Magazine, where she covers art, culture, and obscure women’s sports. Her articles and poetry have been published in Rolling Stone, Spectrum Literary Journal, and other national and regional publications. The First Amelia (2023 Gunpowder Press) is her first book. She lives in San Diego with her partner Michaela and their two cats, Clementine and Persimmon.

Nan Cohen is the author of two poetry collections, Rope Bridge and Unfinished City, winner of the Michael Dryden Award from Gunpowder Press and finalist for the Koret Award for an Emerging Writer on Jewish Themes, and a chapbook, Thousand-Year-Old Words. Awards for her poetry include a Wallace Stegner Fellowship, a Rona Jaffe Writer’s Award, and a Literature Fellowship in Poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts. She is the longtime co-director of poetry programs for the Napa Valley Writers’ Conference.

Nicholas Tino Reiner is an American poet of Mexican heritage. His debut poetry chapbook Levitations was co-winner of the inaugural Alta California Chapbook Prize, available in a bilingual edition from Gunpowder Press. His poems appear in Spillway, Aquifer: The Florida Review Online, Western Humanities Review, Zocalo Public Square, and elsewhere. Nicholas is Senior Press Strategist at the ACLU of Southern California, where he works to protect the liberty of all people. He holds degrees in English from Stanford University and University of California, Irvine, where he completed an M.F.A. He lives in Southern California with his wife and two daughters.

David Starkey is publisher and co-editor of Gunpowder Press. He served as Santa Barbara’s 2009-2011 Poet Laureate and is Emeritus Professor at Santa Barbara City College. His most recent books of poetry are You, Caravaggio and The Moon Shall Not Give Her Light. (davidstarkey.net).

Crystal AC Salas is a Xicanx poet, essayist, educator, and community organizer. Her poetry chapbook Grief Logic is co-winner of the inaugural Alta California Prize, from Gunpowder Press. She has work in Omnium Gatherum Quarterly, Alta Journal, Northwest Review, [PANK] Magazine, World Literature Today, Chaparral Poetry, Acentos Review, and others. A founding member of the BreakBread Literacy Project, which elevates the voices of young creatives under 25, she serves as poetry editor for BreakBread Magazine. She holds an M.F.A. from University of California, Riverside and is the recipient of a 2021-2022 California Arts Council Established Individual Artist Fellowship.

George Yatchisin is the author of Feast Days (Flutter Press 2016) and The First Night We Thought the World Would End (Brandenburg Press 2019). He is co-editor of the anthology Rare Feathers: Poems on Birds & Art (Gunpowder Press 2015), and his poetry appears in anthologies including Reel Verse: Poems About the Movies (Everyman’s Library 2019).

Sacramento resident Susan Kelly-DeWitt is a former Wallace Stegner Fellow. Her previous collection, Gatherer’s Alphabet, was published by Gunpowder Press in 2022 as the inaugural book in the California Poets Series. She is also the author of Gravitational Tug (Main Street Rag Publishing, 2020), Spider Season (Cold River Press, 2016), The Fortunate Islands (Marick Press, 2008), and a number of previous small press and online collections. Her work has also appeared in many anthologies, and in print and online journals at home and abroad, recently as the featured American Poet in the UK journal The High Window. Her past professional and writing life includes having been a reviewer for Library Journal, the editor-in-chief of the online journal Perihelion, the Program Director of the Sacramento Poetry Center and the Women’s Wisdom Arts Program, a Poet in the Schools and a Poet in the Prisons, a blogger for Coal Hill Review, and a longtime instructor for the UC Davis Division of Continuing Education. She is currently a member of the National Book Critics Circle, the Northern California Book Reviewers Association and a contributing editor for Poetry Flash. She is also an exhibiting visual artist. Please visit her website at www.susankelly-dewitt.com

Chryss Yost is the co-editor of Gunpowder Press. She is a Santa Barbara Poet Laureate who served from 2013-2015. She was awarded the 2013 Patricia Dobler Poetry Prize from Carlow University and has multiple Pushcart Prize nominations. Her first collection, Mouth & Fruit, was one of the titles that launched Gunpowder Press in 2014. Her poems have been included in the most popular poetry textbooks in the United States and are widely anthologized.

NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information. 

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 2 pm – 4 pm

Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/gunpowder-press-10-years-and-counting-of-dynamite-poetry-tickets-1144815547119?aff=oddtdtcreator

Drag Queen Storytime Celebrates Valentine’s Day at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event

Cellar Door is welcoming our Drag Queens back for a Valentine’s Day themed Drag Queen Storytime on Saturday, February 1st at 3:00 pm! Join us if you love love and love to laugh!

Tickets are required to attend our Drag Queen Storytime. All ticket sales are donations. By purchasing tickets, you agree to comply with our code of conduct.

Proceeds will be split evenly between our Drag Queens for the joy, laughter, and love they bring to our Cellar Door community!

One (1) $9.39 minimum ticket admits one (1) adult, and attending children will be admitted free. There is also a DONATION option for those of you who would prefer to donate but won’t be able to make it to the event.

By purchasing a ticket, you agree that:

No unapproved video or audio recording of any kind will be permitted

No unapproved photography of any kind will be permitted

No hate speech or disruptive behavior will be permitted

No refunds will be given; all ticket sales are considered a donation

CELLAR DOOR BOOKS RESERVES THE RIGHT TO REFUSE SERVICE OR ADMITTANCE TO ANYONE, INCLUDING PERSONS WHO HAVE PURCHASED A TICKET. PERSONS ENGAGING IN DISRUPTIVE BEHAVIOR WILL BE ASKED TO LEAVE THE PREMISES.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Saturday the 25^th

Time: 3 pm – 4 pm

Join us in-person or via Zoom for Expressions L.A. Poetry Reading Series, featuring poetry readings and open poetry mic.

RSVP:

Please email studio@lapl.org for participation details.

Where: Studio City Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 3 pm – 5 pm

Address: 12511 Moorpark St., Studio City, CA 91604

Upcoming Meetings:

1/4/25

1/18/25 – No meeting

2/1/25

2/15/25

3/1/25

3/15/25

3/29/15

4/12/25

4/26/25

Where: Central Library, LAPL, Meeting Room B

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 3 pm – 5pm

Address: 630 W. 5^th St., Los Angeles, CA 90071

In the Everything Book Club we read a variety of genres; we wish to expand our horizons and try to include many perspectives.

The only non-privileged outsider in an elite creative writing program, prickly Samantha prefers to forge her own path. She’s been ostracized by the Bunnies, a bizarre clique of wealthy young women that she and her girlfriend secretly make fun of. But when the Bunnies decide to invite her in, she finds out that their twee outfits and cutesy behavior is only the surface of something much stranger.

Attendance is limited, and advance registration is required. Please register every individual in your party, including kids. This will be used to save your spots in the program. We cannot guarantee availability for any unregistered attendees.

Where: Lancaster Library, LACL

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 3 pm – 4 pm

Address: 601 W. Lancaster Blvd., Lancaster, CA 93534

Don Kingfisher Campbell hosts and curates these events.

Where: Saturday Afternoon Poetry

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 3 pm – 5 pm

Address: Online Zoom Event

Website: https://saturdayafternoonpoetry.blogspot.com/

Ansel Krut: 26 Random Words Arranges Alphabetically with 26 Unrelated Images at Beyond Baroque – In-Person Event 

Join us for the opening of Ansel Krut’s 26 Random Words Arranged Alphabetically with 26 Unrelated Images in The Mike Kelley Gallery at Beyond Baroque. The exhibition displays the progress of the artist’s book of the same name, from the book’s initial conception through the various trial runs at the designers and printers till the final printing. Krut takes 26 randomly chosen words and matches them to his own drawings without assigning any obvious correlation between the word and the image. The exhibition includes the first texts, wet proofs, front and back cover options, original drawings and other leftovers as the book made its way towards publication.

Ansel Krut was born in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1959. He studied medicine for 2 years before switching to Fine Art and he graduated with a BA from the University of the Witwatersrand in 1982. After a scholarship to the Cite des Arts in Paris he completed an MA in painting at the Royal College of Art in London. He was the Abbey Major Scholar in Painting at the British School at Rome in 1986/87 and then stayed on in Italy for a subsequent 3 years, returning to London in 1990. He now lives and works in London. Krut was a visiting lecturer at the RCA from 2006 to 2014 and he has taught at many other art colleges throughout the UK. He was an artist-lecturer at the National Gallery in London from 2004 to 2012. His work remains informed by the years he spent growing up in South Africa, his art retaining what Ed Krčma in a catalogue essay called “an unapologetic will to insubordination” with imagery that has “arisen from a ferment of intermingled sources: from the enchanted collective narratives of folklore, to the differently dark ruins of history”.

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center, Mike Kelly Gallery

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 4 pm – 7 pm

Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/26-random-words-arranged-alphabetically-with-26-unrelated-images-tickets-1143229302619

Celebrating Unassimilable with Bianca Mabute-Louie and Anthony Ocampo at Bel Canto KUBO LB – In-Person Event

Bel Canto Books is delighted to host a conversation with Bianca Mabute-Louie, author of Unassimilable: An Asian Diasporic Manifesto For The Twenty-First Century, and Anthony Ocampo, author of Brown and Gay in LA: The Lives of Immigrant Sons.

Bianca Mabute-Louie is an award-winning sociologist, speaker, and activist completing her PhD at Rice University, where she researches the intersections of race, religion, and politics. She is published in top academic journals, including Social Forces and Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, as well as in public outlets like Elle Magazine. Bianca has been featured in CNN, TIME, ABC, LA Times, among other outlets. Over the last decade, Bianca has served Asian American community organizations and taught Asian American Studies. Through her work in academia and the community, Bianca is committed to the praxis of solidarity and collective liberation.

Anthony Christian Ocampo, Ph.D. is Professor of Sociology at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. He is the author of Brown and Gay in LA: The Lives of Immigrant Sons and The Latinos of Asia: How Filipino Americans Break the Rules of Race. His writing has appeared in GQ, Catapult, BuzzFeed, Los Angeles Review of Books, Colorlines, Gravy, Life & Thyme, the Chronicle of Higher Education, among others. He earned a BA and MA degree from Stanford University and his MA and PhD from UCLA.

Where: Bal Canto KUBO LB

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 4 pm – 6 pm

Address: 3976 Atlantic Ave., Long Beach, CA 90807

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/celebrating-unassimilable-with-bianca-mabute-louie-and-anthony-ocampo-tickets-1144555569519?aff=oddtdtcreator

Kim Dower & What She Wants: Poems on Obsession, Desire, Despair, Euphoria at Vroman’s – In-Person Event

Kim Dower will present and discuss What She Wants: Poems on Obsession, Desire, Despair, Euphoria.

Obsessive love has never been so much fun! What She Wants: Poems on Obsession, Desire, Despair, Euphoria is a powerful tribute to the intensity of obsessive love, told through the trademark humor and heartbreak of bestselling poet Kim Dower.

Following the commercial and literary success of her bestselling poetry collection, I Wore This Dress Today for You, Mom: Poems on Motherhood, Kim Dower delivers What She Wants: Poems on Obsession, Desire, Despair, Euphoria—turning her keen eye, vibrant imagination, trademark insight, and humor to the intensity of obsessive love. These steamy and provocative poems, combining humor and heartache, run through the four phases of Limerence, the state of being infatuated or obsessed with another person: Infatuation, Crystallization, Deterioration, and Ecstatic Release. From the opening poem, “She’ll do anything for food,” to the sexy title poem, “What She Wants,” the painfully funny, “His Other Girlfriend,” to the longing in “Visiting Baudelaire,” and the sad, sweet final poem, “Fish’s Lament,” Kim Dower captures the essence of what it means to be stuck on someone—even on a squirrel! Her eclectic, growing readership will savor these poems that can be read in one sitting, like a story with an arc, or separately, each one recalling the moment of falling in or out of love, the moment our hearts skipped a beat.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 4 pm

Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-01-25/vromans-ed-fiction-writing-class-diana-wagman-8-weeks

Book Launch: Tracey Gee & The Magic of Knowing What You Want at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event

Celebrate the Launch of The Magic of Knowing What You Want!

You’re invited to an evening of connection, inspiration, and storytelling as we celebrate the debut of The Magic of Knowing What You Want. Join author Tracey Gee at the wonderful and community-focused Village Well Bookstore for an engaging reading, lively discussion, and a celebration of the journey behind the book. Editor and writer Grace P Cho will moderate the event.

Tracey Gee is a certified leadership coach, consultant, and author specializing in personal and professional growth. A Gallup CliftonStrengths, Enneagram, and Cultural Intelligence facilitator, she’s worked with clients like UC Berkeley, Coca-Cola, and the Miami Heat. Tracey lives in Culver City with her family, loves coffee shops and every dog she’s ever met.

In The Magic of Knowing What You Want, leadership coach Tracey Gee walks you through a proven framework of identifying, clarifying, and embodying your desires. With interactive exercises, relatable case studies, and thoughtful questions, Gee helps you discover what you really want, teaches you how to turn those desires into action, and shows you that a thriving, abundant life is closer than you think.

What do you really want? It’s an uncomplicated question until you try to answer it meaningfully. Whether prompted by transition, disruption, or curiosity about how to live more aligned with your values, we’ve all been there, feeling frozen, stuck, or lost in the fog of competing, half-baked desires, unsure how to move forward.

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 5 pm – 6 pm

Café con Libros presents Mr. Loving Words aka James Coats and the 5th annual Poetry After Dark: Grown and Sexy Open Mic. Tickets are available through Eventbrite (link in bio) We always have a blast at this show and it’s only 3 weeks away so grab your tickets now. It’s all going down February 1st, 6:30 pm at Cafe Con Libros Press in downtown Pomona. Put on your sexy outfit, polish your hottest poem and meet us there.

Poetry, Music, Drinks.

NOTE: Tickets on Eventbrite or scan qr code at site. Open Mic sign-ups at 6:30 pm. Show starts at 7 pm.

Where: Café con Libros Press, Pomona

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 6:30 pm – 9 pm

Address: 280 W. 2^nd St., Pomona CA 91766

The short films, realized with low budgets and utilizing mostly home-video equipment, span from the late 20th century to the early decades of the 21st century. Calling into question the stability of cultural iconographies and the significance of geographical location, the films reimagine history as the key to a liberatory future. Following the screenings, the artists will be in conversation, moderated by Joshua Javier Guzmán, Vice Chair in the Department of Gender Studies at University of California, Los Angeles.

Rita Gonzalez is the Terri and Michael Smooke Curator and Department Head of Contemporary Art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art where she has curated Phantom Sightings: Art after the Chicano Movement; Asco: Elite of the Obscure; Lost Line: Contemporary Art from the Collection; Agnés Varda in Californialand, In Production: Art and the Studio System, Christian Marclay: Sound Stories, among other exhibitions and programs.

Harry Gamboa Jr. is an artist, author, and educator. He is the founder and director of Troupe Non Grata (2022-Present), Ephemeral Actions/Performed Portraits, Virtual Vérité (2005-2017), international performance troupe and co-founder of Asco (1972-1985), the East Los Angeles-based performance group. He is Faculty of the Photo/Media Program at California Institute of the Arts. His work has been exhibited by museums, galleries, and art spaces internationally.

Victoria Delgadillo’s filmmaking is influenced by the Direct Cinema genre, a method of documentary filmmaking in which filmmakers capture their subjects as directly as possible by using handheld cameras to make themselves unobtrusive. She is a graduate of the University of California, San Diego where she studied filmmaking. Her artwork is in the permanent collections of the LA County Museum, Laguna Beach Museum and The National Mexican American Museum Chicago. In 2002, she received awards from the Los Angeles City Council and from the governments of Sinaloa and Guanajuato (Mexico) for creating public awareness through art related to the femicides occurring on the US international border. Her written work and lectures in art as activism are part of the curriculums of the Universities of California at Berkeley/Los Angeles/Riverside/San Bernardino, Cal-State Universities Northridge/Los Angeles/Long Beach and San Diego as well as the University of Guadalajara (Guadalajara, Mexico). In 2009, Victoria received UCSD’s Gracia Molina de Pick Feminisms Grant for women active in social justice. In 2020, she received the J. Paul Getty Trust and the California Community Foundation Grant for individual artists that serve Los Angeles’ culturally diverse communities. Delgadillo’s visual artwork is part of various public and private art collections.

Raul Baltazar, a Los Angeles-based artist, delves into the visceral intersections of mythology, history, and urban culture. With a provocative blend of installations, performances, and multimedia works, Baltazar’s art confronts and disrupts established narratives. His practice, steeped in his Mexican heritage, explores themes of identity, spirituality, and resistance, creating a raw, immersive experience that challenges viewers to reconsider their perceptions and engage with the socio-political undercurrents of contemporary life. Baltazar’s work is a defiant exploration of the sacred and the profane, an unflinching examination of power dynamics, and an invitation to revolutionary thought.

Berta Jottar, an interdisciplinary scholar and media creator, holds a PhD from the Department of Performance Studies at TISCH School of the Arts (NYU). For the past two decades, Jottar has dedicated her expertise to researching and recording the music and dance traditions of the AfroLatinx Diaspora across the East Coast, San Juan, Puerto Rico and La Habana. Her media work blends elements of cinema verité with experimental ethnography, aiming to explore alternative forms of knowledge through embodied practices such as gesture and sound. Before relocating to the East Coast, Jottar interest on border and diaspora cultures drove her to engage actively with art collectives on the West Coast, including The Border Art Workshop/Taller de arte fronterizo, Las Comadres and other artist collectives in the Tijuana/San Diego border region. Most recently, Jottar has spearheaded multiple projects in Havana, Cuba encompassing music, performance and film. Her latest productions are La Cura, News From Nowhere and The Batista Syndrome, all directed by Steve Fagin. Currently, she is immersed in developing a multimedia archive and manuscript about rumba music and dance in New York City and Havana.

Joshua Javier Guzmán is an Associate Professor in the Department of Gender Studies at UCLA, where he serves as Vice Chair of the Department and the Director of the LGBTQ Studies program. He is the author of Dissatisfactions: Queer Latinidad and the Politics of Style. He is currently working on a second monograph entitled Brown Exposures: Queer Photography and the Literary Aperture, which is supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation’s Arts Writers Grant.

NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information. 

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center

Date: Saturday, the 1^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/phantom-histories-transborder-poetics-in-video-art-tickets-1138898388739?aff=oddtdtcreator

Griot Café Open Mic and Poetry at Shades of Afrika, Long Beach – In-Person Event

Join Griot Café Open Mic and Poetry hosted by Sistah Shy and Samuel Rain.

All ages.

$5 cover & bring a friend save $2.

Where: Shades of Afrika, Long Beach

Date: Saturday the 1^st

Time: 8 pm – 10 pm

Address: 1001 E. 4^th St., Long Beach, CA 90802

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.

JOIN us in space R18 each Sunday, from 11 am – 5 pm.

NOTE: Check every Sunday for story time and reading events

Where: Melrose Trading Post, Greenway Main Stage at Fairfax HS

Date: Sunday, the 2^nd (Every Sunday)

Time: 10 am – 5 pm

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.

– Connect with like-minded individuals in a warm and supportive environment.

– Reflect on your thoughts and emotions through guided journaling.

– Grow as you discover new insights and perspectives that can help you navigate your journey.

Bring your favorite journal and a pen and be ready to dive into an enriching experience that nurtures your mind, body, and soul.

Tickets at Eventbrite

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Sunday, the 2^nd

Time: 10 am

Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. 1B, Culver City, CA 90232

Website: https://shop.villagewell.com/events/1800920250202

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.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: West Los Angeles Branch Regional Library, LAPL

Date: Sunday, the 2^nd

Time: 2 pm – 4 pm

Address: 11360 Santa Moncia Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90025

Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-1 

NEW DATE: Kate Fagan, with Amanda Montell, & The Three Lives of Cate Kay at Book Soup – In-Person Event

Kate Fagan, in conversation with Amanda Montell, will discuss & sign The Three Lives of Cate Kay.

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo meets First Lie Wins in this electric, voice-driven debut novel about an elusive bestselling author who decides to finally confess her true identity after years of hiding from her past.

Cate Kay knows how to craft a story. As the creator of a bestselling book trilogy that struck box office gold as a film series, she’s one of the most successful authors of her generation. The thing is, Cate Kay doesn’t really exist. She’s never attended author events or granted any interviews. Her real identity had been a closely guarded secret, until now.

As a young adult, she and her best friend Amanda dreamed of escaping their difficult homes and moving to California to become movie stars. But the day before their grand adventure, a tragedy shattered their dreams and Cate has been on the run ever since, taking on different names and charting a new future. But after a shocking revelation, Cate understands that returning home is the only way she’ll be a whole person again.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Sunday the 2^nd

Time: 3 pm – 4 pm

Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069

Website: https://www.booksoup.com/event/kate-fagan-amanda-montell

Writing As Healing with Ravina, Featuring: Derek D. Brown, Andy Sanchez, Mr. Chai Tea – In-Person Event

Writing As Healing, hosted by Ravina, presents For the Love of Poetry, Workshop & Mic, featuring:

Derek D. Brown is an author, poet, and playwright born and raised in Los Angeles. His premiere collection of poems entitled Articulate Scars: Comfortable Silences and Reluctant Tears, was met with wide acclaim from poetry virgins and seasoned wordsmiths alike. Besides his own release, his work has been widely published in multiple anthologies and literary journals, including These Pages Speak: A YouTube Creative Writing Course Reader (World Stage Press, 2016) used by teachers to assist their students in the completion of college-level creative writing assignments.

Andy Sanchez (they/he), is an Alumni of CLI cohort season 6 and is currently a Teacher for the CLI Tuesday night class. Andres’ book, This Body, was published by World Stage Press in December 2020.

Mr. Chai Tea is an autistic 3rd-generation Thai-American born and raised in Los Angeles. With a background in Mechanical Engineering, he combines his love for storytelling, comedy, and poetry to promote empathy and share his unique experiences as a nerd and adventurer.

He is an artist who fearlessly embraces his awkward side and thirst for poetic expression, reminding us to find joy in our passions and always seek connection and understanding. From open mics to various stages, Chai captivates audiences with his wordsmith skills bringing laughter and inspiration to all who listen.

Ravina (Author of YELLOW, World Stage Press // Long Beach Best Poetry Collection Prize)

Where: Deanar House of Content

Date: Sunday the 2^nd

Time: 3 pm – 5 pm (Doors at 2:45 pm)

Address: 740 Centinela Ave., Suite 204, Inglewood, CA 90302

Website: https://www.instagram.com/p/DEdSWqDyGOR/?img_index=1

Special Author Event: Jacqueline Faber & The Department at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event

Join {pages} to welcome Jacqueline Faber to an evening event celebrating the publication of her new novel, The Department.

Philosophy professor Neil Weber can’t think of one good reason to get up in the morning. His wife has left him, his academic research has sputtered, and the prospect of tenure is more remote than ever.

Until Lucia Vanotti disappears.

A college student at Neil’s Southern university, Lucia has a secret of her own—one that haunts her relationships and leads to reckless, destructive behavior. When Neil is drawn into the mystery of her disappearance, he finds new energy, purpose, and relevance. But at what cost? Each clue pulls him deeper into Lucia’ s dark past, but also into the hidden lives of his closest friends and colleagues.

What has driven Lucia to risk everything? And why does Neil, a professor who hardly knew her, care so deeply about finding her? From campus classrooms to sex dens to backwoods hideaways, The Department reveals the world through the dual perspectives of Lucia and Neil as they descend into obsession, delusion, and the dangerous terrain of memory—uncovering the traumas that drive them to behave in ways they never could have predicted or imagined.

Jacqueline Faber is an author and freelance writer. She holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from Emory University, where she was the recipient of a Woodruff Scholarship, and taught in the Expository Writing Program at New York University, where she received an award for excellence in teaching. She studied philosophy in Bologna, Italy, and received a dissertation grant from Freie University in Berlin, Germany. Jacqueline writes across genres, including thrillers, rom-coms, and essays. Her writing is slated for publication in CrimeReads, Writer’s Digest, Electric Literature, Largehearted Boy and other outlets where she explores questions about memory, loss, and desire. Steeped in philosophical, psychological, and literary themes, her writing is grounded in studies of character. Jacqueline lives with her family in Los Angeles. PATMis her debut novel.

The event is free, but we would appreciate you supporting the author and the store by purchasing her book through {pages}.

RSVP

Where: pages: a bookstore

Date: Sunday the 2^nd

Time: 4:30 pm – 6:30 pm

Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266

Website: https://pagesabookstore.com/event/2025-02-02/special-author-event-jacqueline-faber

Healing for the Heart…and Beyond: Making Valentine’s Day Gay at Page Against the Machine – In-Person Event

Join us as we present a queer twist on Valentine’s Day with a multifaceted group of lesbian writers offering casual yet intimate counsel on 𝗛𝗲𝗮𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗛𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘁…𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗕𝗲𝘆𝗼𝗻𝗱. The panel discussion will touch on all manner of healing—the heart, mind, soul, and body – in the eternal human quest to discover our true selves, connect with others, and utilize our creative gifts to build healthy relationships with ourselves and each other. The discussion will be facilitated by the distinguished panel of: Dr. Jennifer Abod, Nancy Beverly, Dr. Carol Bliss, Kimberly Esslingler, Mary Giuliani, and Bri Stokes.

Dr. Jennifer Abod is a feminist lesbian award-winning director of four documentary films. She is a former public and commercial radio broadcaster, talk-show host and assistant professor of Communication at Hofstra University. Her poems appear in 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘈𝘳𝘵, 𝘚𝘪𝘭𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘉𝘪𝘳𝘤𝘩 𝘗𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴, 𝘚𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘞𝘪𝘴𝘥𝘰𝘮, 𝘞𝘪𝘭𝘥 𝘊𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘞𝘪𝘴𝘥𝘰𝘮, 𝘈𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘮𝘪𝘴, 𝘗𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘪𝘮𝘮𝘰𝘯 𝘛𝘳𝘦𝘦, 𝘚𝘱𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘸𝘢𝘺 and forthcoming in The 𝘓𝘈 𝘗𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴. She was a rock singer with the New Haven Connecticut Women’s Liberation Rock Band, 1970-1976, and sings Jazz in Long Beach, CA.

Nancy Beverly is a creator in all manner of ways—from her one-person show Sister from Another Planet (she performed it at the 2023 Hollywood Fringe Festival), to the web series 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘊𝘢𝘭𝘢𝘮𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘑𝘢𝘯𝘦, to TV jobs on 𝘎𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘞𝘩𝘪𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘳, 𝘋𝘦𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘏𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘸𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘴, 𝘙𝘰𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘯𝘯𝘦 and 𝘉𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘴𝘰𝘮. A few years ago she wrote and produced the 40-minute lesbian romance film 𝘚𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘣𝘺’𝘴 𝘝𝘢𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯…and now the novel version is out—where she gets to tell the full journey.

Dr. Carol Bliss is an artist, author, inspirational speaker and Emeritus professor of communication at Cal Poly University. She taught communication at Claremont Graduate University, Chino Men’s Prison, and Universities in Thailand, and China. She teaches and leads workshops in creativity, communication, and spirituality. She is the author of six published books and lives in Naples, California. Her poetry has recently been published in 𝘚𝘪𝘭𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘉𝘪𝘳𝘤𝘩 𝘗𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴 and in 𝘛𝘏𝘌 𝘗𝘖𝘞𝘌𝘙 𝘖𝘍 𝘛𝘏𝘌 𝘍𝘌𝘔𝘐𝘕𝘐𝘕𝘌 𝘐 poetry anthology.

Kimberly Essingler is a poet and creative producer whose work explores themes of identity, connection, and witness. She is working on her first poetry collection and editing a collaborative book of poetry with four lesbian poets over sixty. Her work has appeared in 𝘚𝘱𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘸𝘢𝘺, 𝘕𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘦 𝘊𝘰𝘸𝘣𝘰𝘺, and 𝘚𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘞𝘪𝘴𝘥𝘰𝘮. She produces the 𝘋𝘺𝘬𝘦 𝘋𝘪𝘷𝘦 podcast with Dr. Marie Cartier and is in post-production on the documentary 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘏𝘰𝘮𝘰𝘍𝘪𝘭𝘦𝘴 𝘗𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘦𝘯𝘵: 𝘉𝘢𝘣𝘺, 𝘠𝘰𝘶 𝘈𝘳𝘦 𝘔𝘺 𝘙𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘪𝘰𝘯.

Mary Giuliani is the author of It’s Not About Healing Complex PTSD. She has been a Master Certified Coach for over 20 years and is a keynote speaker and seminar leader specializing in supporting survivors in healing from Complex PTSD, achieving long-term recovery with food, weight, drugs, alcohol, and close relationships – resulting in them reconnecting with themselves and others and turning their pain into power and purpose.

Bri Stokes hails from Los Angeles, on unceded Tongva land. Her writing has appeared in Epiphany, 45th Parallel, Buzzfeed, the Northridge Review, and elsewhere. Her debut chapbook, A Throat Full of Forest-Dirt, was released in 2023 through Bottlecap Press. She is the former Managing Editor of SKEW Magazine, an editorial assistant at Hinchas Press, and completed a residency and fellowship with The Seventh Wave Magazine and Voodoonauts in 2024.

The event is free and open to the public, no tickets or reservations required!

Where: Page Against the Machine

Date: Sunday the 2^nd

Time: 5 pm – 7 pm

Writing workshop series on first Sundays in the Wrigley district at the Wicked Wolf 5 – 7 pm PST.

It’s $15 with a $5 drink ticket. Led by Beach City Poetress https://www.instagram.com/beachcitypoetress/

Where: The Wicked Wolf, Long Beach

Date: Sunday, the 2^nd

Time: 5 pm – 7 pm

Address: 2332 Pacific Ave., Long Beach, CA 90806

Bookseller Grace will lead this discussion on reading widely across the romance genre.

Everyone is welcome. RSVP required.

NOTE: See site for RSVP, guidelines, and details.

Where: The Ripped Bodice

Date: Sunday the 2^nd

Time: 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm

Address: 3806 Main Street, Culver City, CA 90323

Producer Fernando A. Funes has brought together some of his favorite poets for a special one-night celebration of lines, rhymes, verse, and poetry!

1st Sunday of every month.

NOTE: See site for RSVP, cost, and details.

Where: The Glendale Room

Date: Sunday the 2^nd

Time: 8:30 pm – 10 pm (Doors at 8:20 pm)

Address: 127 Artsakh Avenue, Glendale, CA 91206

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/dazed-and-confused-poetry-club-2025-tickets-815625045467