Seniors Writing Group at Studio City Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Danny Stone, a Saved by a Story member, 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 22nd
Time: 1 pm
Address: 12511 Moorpark St., Studio City, CA 91604
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/robertson-writers-group-2
Fiction Book Club: The Price of Salt: AKA Carol at Chevalier’s Books – In-Person Event
Inspired by Patricia Highsmith’s own life, The Price of Salt AKA Carol is a captivating story of obsession and asks us; what price we would pay for love.
Therese Belivet is an artistic stage director, trapped in a soul sucking day job at a department, whose life is forever changed by the introduction of Carol, an alluring customer who is stuck in a loveless marriage. As Therese begins to stalk Carol and love blossoms between these two women, starved for attention but will blackmail and a PI threaten their first true moment of happiness?
Join us on Monday, 9/22 at 5 pm to discuss this long unrecognized masterpiece.
Please sign up for our newsletter to stay in touch: http://eepurl.com/bjpZZD
Where: Chevalier’s Books
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 5 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://chevaliersbooks.com/event/2025-09-22/fiction-book-club-september
Queer Book Club: Big Swiss at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss Big Swiss: A Novel by Jen Beagin.
Greta lives with her friend Sabine in an ancient Dutch farmhouse in Hudson, New York. The house is unrenovated, uninsulated, and full of bees. Greta spends her days transcribing therapy sessions for a sex coach who calls himself Om. She becomes infatuated with his newest client, a repressed married woman she affectionately refers to as Big Swiss.
One day, Greta recognizes Big Swiss’s voice in town and they quickly become enmeshed. While Big Swiss is unaware Greta has eavesdropped on her most intimate exchanges, Greta has never been more herself with anyone. Her attraction to Big Swiss overrides her guilt, and she’ll do anything to sustain the relationship…
“A fantastic, weird-as-hell, super funny novel” (Bustle), Big Swiss is both a love story and a deft examination of infidelity, mental health, sexual stereotypes, and more—from an amazingly talented, singular voice in contemporary fiction.
Jen Beagin holds an MFA in creative writing from the University of California, Irvine, and is a recipient of a Whiting Award in fiction. Her first novel Pretend I’m Dead was shortlisted for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize and Vacuum in the Dark was shortlisted for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for comic fiction. She is also the author of Big Swiss. She lives in Hudson, New York.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 6 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/queer-book-club-big-swiss
Writing for Children with José Chávez via Inlandia Institute – Online Event
(BEG-INT) Alternating Mondays, 9/8, 9/22, 10/6, 10/20, and 11/3, 6:00-8:00 pm PT, on ZOOM.
$50. Registration required. https://tinyurl.com/Fall2025CWW
This workshop is designed to meet the needs of those who wish to write or are writing for children. We’ll define a “picture book,” and demonstrate story introductions, character development, plot and theme, appropriate vocabulary, 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 poet, educator, and consultant. He’s written two award-winning bilingual children’s poetry books that offer the rhythm and oral practice that help children learn to read. He teaches Writing for Children online and is finishing a book of poetry book for teachers.
Where: Inlandia Online via Zoom
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/fall-2025-writing-workshops/
Sherman Oaks Book Club: You Dreamed of Empires at Sherman Oaks-Martin Pollard Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss You Dreamed of Empires by Alvaro Enrique.
One morning in 1519, conquistador Hernán Cortés enters the city of Tenochtitlan—today’s Mexico City. Later that day, he will meet the emperor Moctezuma in a collision of two worlds, two empires, two languages, two possible futures.
Cortés is accompanied by his captains, his troops, his prized horses, and his two translators: Friar Aguilar, a taciturn friar, and Malinalli, an enslaved, strategic Nahua princess. After nearly bungling their entrance to the city, the Spaniards are greeted at a ceremonial welcome meal by the steely Aztec princess Atotoxtli, sister and wife of Moctezuma. As they await their meeting with the emperor—who is at a political and spiritual crossroads, and relies on hallucinogens to get by—Cortés and his entourage are ensconced in the labyrinthine palace. Soon, one of Cortés’s captains, Jazmín Caldera, overwhelmed by the grandeur of the place, begins to question the ease with which they were welcomed into the city, and wonders at the chances of getting out alive, much less conquering the empire. And what if…they don’t?
You Dreamed of Empires brings Tenochtitlan to life at its height and reimagines its destiny. The incomparably original Álvaro Enrigue sets afire the moment of conquest and turns it into a moment of revolution, a restitutive, fantastical counterattack, in a novel so electric and so unique that it feels like a dream.
Where: Sherman Oaks Martin Pollard Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/sherman-oaks-book-club-you-dreamed-empires-alvaro-enrique
Ticketed Event: Matt Dinnamin, with Felicia Day, & The Inevitable Ruin at Diesel, A Bookstore Off-site at Wilshire Ebell Theater – In-Person Event
Matt Dinnamin, in conversation with Felicia Day, will discuss The Inevitable Ruin.
Carl and Princess Donut are ready to battle it out in the epic seventh book in the New York Times bestselling Dungeon Crawler Carl series—now with bonus material exclusive to this print edition.
The ninth floor. Faction Wars. Nine armies enter, each led by rich and powerful aliens from across the galaxy. The winning team must capture and hold the castle at the very center of the battlefield. Strategy, alliances, pitched battles, betrayal…It all makes for great fun and even greater television.
But thanks to Carl, Donut, and Katia, this season is different.
For the first time ever, the crawlers have their own army. The NPCs, who are normally used as nothing but cannon fodder, have become fully self-aware and formed an unprecedented team of their own. And it’s not just the crawlers who are at risk this Faction Wars. Any combatant who dies on this battlefield stays in the ground.
For Donut and Katia, the stakes are even higher. No matter who wins the war, only one of them will be allowed to leave this level. If they all want to survive, they’re going to need a little help from a veteran or two.
This is it. This is what they’ve been fighting toward. This is war.
Matt Dinniman is a writer, artist, and musician (well, he’s a bass player) from Gig Harbor, WA. He is the author of several books, including the New York Times bestselling Dungeon Crawler Carl series.
Felicia Day is a prolific multi-hyphenate. She’s the New York Times Bestselling author of You’re Never Weird on the Internet (Almost) and the creativity book Embrace Your Weird, and she recently wrote the Audible series Third Eye that won “Best Audio Drama” at the Audie Awards in 2024. She has appeared as an actor in numerous television shows such as “Supernatural”, “Eureka” and “The Magicians” and she can be heard as a voice actor in such shows as “Adventure Time” and “Monster High.”
Where: Deisel Off-site at The Wilshire Ebell Theater
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 4401 West 8th St., Los Angeles, CA 90005
Rupo 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 from 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 22nd
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3575 University Ave. Riverside, CA 92501
Website: https://www.facebook.com/backtothegrind
Jon Kinnally, with Jim Colluci and Ryan O’Connell, & I’m Prancing as Fast as I Can at Book Soup – In-Person Event
John Kinnally, in conversation with Jim Colluci and Ryan O’Connell, will discussI’m Prancing as Fast as I Can.
I’m Prancing As Fast As I Can is a coming of Gay story that takes us from a scared, self-hating kid who spends most of his time under his desk staring at the hunky man on the Doan’s Pills box, to becoming a writer on Will & Grace, helping to make it a little easier for other scared, self-hating kids who might also be hiding and staring at their secret desire. It’s a journey through Olympic mustaches and when Che´r’s name had an accent and losing your virginity to a trucker and chasing Gay bashers in six-inch heels dressed as a drag bunny and a terrible virus and memorials and memorials and memorials and ACTing UP and using the word “lover” and having a fan who’s also a serial killer and Gay penguins and spreading your boyfriends’ ashes with your new boyfriend and Prop 8 and getting to write lines for divas on Ugly Betty and Gay marriage and more stuff like that and in the end ketamine therapy to help it all make sense.
Jim Colucci is a Los Angeles-based freelance entertainment writer whose work has appeared in such publications as TV Guide, Closer, Emmy and CBS’ Watch! magazine, where he served as a Deputy Editor. In 2025, he co-founded Pride LIVE! Hollywood, a month-long festival celebrating LGBTQ+ achievements in film, TV and pop culture. He has appeared on such shows as CNN’s History of the Sitcom, Reelz’s Behind Closed Doors and Discovery+’s Inventions That Changed History, and for a decade delivered a weekly on-air entertainment report on his husband Frank DeCaro’s self-titled show on Sirius XM radio. His books include the November 2021 release All in the Family: The Show That Changed Television, co-authored with Norman Lear, as well as Will & Grace: Fabulously Uncensored, The Q Guide to The Golden Girls and the New York Times best-seller Golden Girls Forever. He recently completed his next book, Love Boat Forever, while being constantly interrupted by the couple’s cookie-demanding pug mix, Penny.
Jon Kinnally was born in Syracuse, New York, and went to college at Oswego State, before moving to a then-affordable Manhattan, where he pursued acting and performed with his writing partner, Tracy Poust, in their comedy group Loud Blouse. After relocating to Los Angeles, they got a job on a new show called Will & Grace and stayed with it for its entire eight seasons, eventually running it and returning for the reboot. Over the years, there were many Emmy nominations as well as a Writers Guild Award for Outstanding Writing in Episodic Comedy in 2018. He has also worked on several other shows with Tracy, including Ugly Betty—Emmy and NAACP award nominations—and The Crazy Ones which they ran, and had the privilege to write for the great Robin Williams. He currently lives in Spain with his husband, Chris, and their cats, Howard Bannister and Elliott.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2025-09-22/jon-kinnally-ryan-oconnell
At Skylight: Rachel Harrison, with Liz Kerin and CJ Leede, & Play Nice at Skylight – In-Person Event
Rachel Harrison, in conversation with Liz Kerin and CJ Leede, will discuss Play Nice: A Novel.
A woman must confront the demons of her past when she attempts to fix up her childhood home in this devilishly clever take on the haunted house novel from the USA Today bestselling author of Black Sheep and So Thirsty.
Clio Louise Barnes leads a picture-perfect life as a stylist and influencer, but beneath the glossy veneer she harbors a not-so glamorous secret: she grew up in a haunted house. Well, not haunted. Possessed. After Clio’s parents’ messy divorce, her mother, Alex, moved Clio and her sisters into a house occupied by a demon. Or so Alex claimed. That’s not what Clio’s sisters remember or what the courts determined when they stripped her of custody after she went off the deep end. But Alex was insistent; she even wrote a book about her experience in the house.
After Alex’s sudden death, the supposedly possessed house passes to Clio and her sisters. Where her sisters see childhood trauma, Clio sees an opportunity for house flipping content. Only, as the home makeover process begins, Clio discovers there might be some truth to her mother’s claims. As memories resurface and Clio finally reads her mother’s book, a sinister presence in the house manifests, revealing ugly truths that threaten to shake Clio’s beautiful life to its very foundation.
Rachel Harrison is the USA Today bestselling author of Play Nice, So Thirsty, Black Sheep, Such Sharp Teeth, Cackle, and The Return, which was nominated for a Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a First Novel. Her short fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies and in her debut collection Bad Dolls. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and their cat/overlord.
Liz Kerin is an award-winning playwright, screenwriter, and spec-fic/horror author. She is the author of the critically acclaimed Night’s Edge duology, dark fantasy adventure The Phantom Forest, and two forthcoming horror titles to be announced. Her short fiction and personal essays have appeared on Reactor (FKA Tor.com), in the Brink Literary Journal, and in the Punk Goes Horror anthology from TruBorn Press. As a screenwriter, she has a number of film/tv projects in development, including adaptations of her novels. She is a graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and lives in LA with her family.
CJ Leede is a horror writer, hiker, and Trekkie. She is the author of Maeve Fly and American Rapture. Her debut novel Maeve Fly won the Golden Poppy Octavia E. Butler Award and Splatterpunk Award, and earned a Bram Stoker Award nomination. When she is not driving around the country, CJ can be found in LA with her boyfriend and rescue dogs.
Where: Skylight
Date: Monday, the 22nd
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-rachel-harrison-presents-play-nice-w-liz-kerin-cj-leede
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 is passionate about discussing everything related to the craft and social significance of literature!
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – Online event
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: Zoom Online Event (see site)
Website: https://beyondbaroque.org/free_workshops.html
Midnight Release Party: SenLin Yu’s Alchemised at Chevalier’s Books – In-Person Event
There’ll be games, prizes, food & drinks—it’s a party! Your ticket includes a copy of the book (deluxe jacket! gold foil! endpapers & illustrations!)
More details to come 👀 Stay tuned on our Instagram
✰ Space is limited, so get your ticket before it’s too late ✰
Where: Chevalier’s Books
Date: Monday the 22nd
Time: 10 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://chevaliersbooks.com/event/2025-09-22/alchemised-midnight-release-party
Tuesday Tales: A Travelin’ Storytime, Session 1 at Main Library, SMPL – In-Person Kids Event
This fun and engaging weekly series, featuring stories, songs, and rhymes, travels to a different library location each week. Limited space; free tickets available. For ages 3 – 5.
Where: Main Library, SMPL
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 10:30 am – 11 am
Address: 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90401
Website: https://www.santamonica.gov/events
Virtual Book Club: Isola via La Crescenta Library, LACL – Online Event
Join us weekly on Zoom on Tuesday mornings at 11 am for the Virtual Book Club. In September we will be discussing Isola by Allegra Goodman. For adults.
Please contact Marta Wiggins at mwiggins@library.lacounty.gov for your invite to join the Zoom discussion and other details about the Virtual Book Club. You can pick up your copy of Isola at the La Crescenta Library Customer Service Desk. Below is the breakdown for the weekly discussion.
Tuesday, September 23: Pages 261 – end of the book, Part VI, Chapter 34 to end of the book
Tuesday, September 30: Final discussion of Isola and free flow discussion for book, movie, video recommendations
France, 1531. Orphaned by the age of five, Marguerite de la Rocque was heir to a chateau with its own village and lands. But her guardian, Jean Francois de la Rocque de Roberval, sells Marguerite’s property to embark on an expedition to New France, bringing Marguerite and her maidservant with him. Aboard the ship, the women are limited to the company of the captain, the navigator, Roberval, and his secretary—a man whose musical talent, literary knowledge, and dark eyes intrigue Marguerite. It isn’t long before the two of them are meeting secretly to declare their love for one another. When Roberval discovers this transgression, he is furious, seeing their affection as betrayal. As punishment, he maroons them on a small island off the coast, condemning them to certain death
Where: La Crescenta Library, LACL
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14499062
Tuesday Tales: A Travelin’ Storytime, Session 2 at Main Library, SMPL – In-Person Kids Event
This fun and engaging weekly series, featuring stories, songs, and rhymes, travels to a different library location each week. Limited space; free tickets available. For ages 3 – 5.
Where: Main Library, SMPL
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 11:30 am – 12 pm
Address: 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90401
Website: https://www.santamonica.gov/events
Phy-Sci Book Club: The Parot and the Igloo (Second half of the book) at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Parrot and the Igloo: Climate and the Science of Denial by David Lipsky.
In 1956, the New York Times prophesied that once global warming really kicked in, we could see parrots in the Antarctic. In 2010, when science deniers had control of the climate story, Senator James Inhofe and his family built an igloo on the Washington Mall and plunked a sign on top: AL GORE’S NEW HOME: HONK IF YOU LOVE CLIMATE CHANGE. In The Parrot and the Igloo, best-selling author David Lipsky tells the astonishing story of how we moved from one extreme (the correct one) to the other.
With narrative sweep and a superb eye for character, Lipsky unfolds the dramatic narrative of the long, strange march of climate science. The story begins with a tale of three inventors—Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, and Nikola Tesla—who made our technological world, not knowing what they had set into motion. Then there are the scientists who sounded the alarm once they identified carbon dioxide as the culprit of our warming planet. And we meet the hucksters, zealots, and crackpots who lied about that science and misled the public in ever more outrageous ways. Lipsky masterfully traces the evolution of climate denial, exposing how it grew out of early efforts to build a network of untruth about products like aspirin and cigarettes.
David Lipsky is a recipient of the National Magazine Award and the GLAAD Media Award. His books Absolutely American and Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself were New York Times bestsellers. He teaches at New York University and lives in New York City.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 6 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/phy-sci-book-club-parrot-and-igloo-second-half-book
Canyon Readers Collective Book Club: The Cemetery of Untold Stories at Topanga Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Julia Alvarez’s The Cemetery of Unknown Stories to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month. For adults.
This book is a blend of magical realism with a deep reflection on creativity, legacy, and the stories we leave behind.
Where: Topanga Library, LACL
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 29901 Ladyface Ct., Agoura Hills, CA 91301
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14206404
Hooked on Books Book Club: The City and Its Uncertain Walls at Quartz Hill Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Haruki Murakami’s The City and Its Uncertain Walls. Copies are available at the Customer Service desk and newcomers are always welcome! For adults
We begin with a young couple, teenagers in love. One day, she disappears … and her absence haunts him for the rest of his life. A search for this lost love takes the man into middle age and on a journey between the real world and an other world. As the seasons pass and the man grows more uncertain about the porous boundaries between these two worlds, he meets a strange young boy who helps him to see what he’s been missing all along.
Where: Quartz Hill Library, LACL
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 5040 W. Ave. M 2., Quartz Hill, CA 93536
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14271346
Classic Detectives Book Club: The Spiral Staircase at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Spiral Staircase by Ethel Lina White.
A chilling classic thriller from the 1930s in which a young woman is stalked about an isolated country house by a murderer.
The Summit—a mansion buried deep in the countryside, on the Welsh Borders. Somewhere outside, a murderer lurks in the darkness. Four young women have already been killed, and each murder has been closer to the house than the last…
Now a storm is coming. Professor Warren decides to batten down the hatches for the night. No one may come in or go out until morning. But what if the killer is already inside?
This atmospheric classic brought Ethel Lina White to the attention of the world and went on to be adapted for the screen three times (1946, 1961, 1975).
A creepy, gothic thriller, this is another sensational rediscovery of the classic crime genre. The author, Ethel Lina White, was one of the best-known crime writers of the 1930s and 40s, ranking alongside greats of the Golden Age such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. Many of her thrillers were adapted for film, most famously The Lady Vanishes (originally titled The Wheel Spins) which became one of Alfred Hitchcock’s greatest triumphs as a director.
About the Author
Born in Abergavenny in 1876, Ethel Lina White was one of the best-known crime writers of the 1930s and 40s, ranking alongside greats of the Golden Age such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. Many of her thrillers were adapted for film, most famously The Lady Vanishes originally titled The Wheel Spins) which became one of Alfred Hitchcock’s greatest triumphs as a director. Originally published as Some Must Watch in 1933, The Spiral Staircase has since been adapted for the screen three times.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 23RD
Time: 6 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/classic-detectives-book-club-spiral-staircase
Queer Visitors Book Club: The Spiral Staircase at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Underdog Bookstore is excited to share that we are a local event host for Drag Story Hour’s new book club for adults – Queer Visitors!
The first club meeting is Tuesday, September 23rd from 6-8 pm. We’re starting our journey along the yellow brick road with the first instalment The Wonderful Wizard of Oz!
We are food, drink, and pet friendly, and will have sweet treats available for purchase from our local vendor, Nettie Creations.
Join us in community to discuss queer books, radical joy, and the timeless magic of Oz. All are welcome here!.
RSVP
Where: Underdog Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 23R
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 312 S. Myrtle Ave., Monrovia, CA 91016
Website: https://www.underdogbookstore.org/events/queer-visitors-book-club
La Crescenta Library Book Club: A Short Walk Through a Wide World at La Crescenta Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss A Short Walk Through a Wide World by Douglas Westerbeke. Find your copy and discussion questions at the Book Club Corner located across from the Customer Service Desk. For adults.
A genre defying novel that is in part historical fiction, travelogue and philosophical treatise heavily laced with fantasy and magical realism. It is an entertaining and thought-provoking romp through history, time and space. Cursed with immortality at the age of 9, but with a requirement that she stays in perpetual motion, Aubry flees Paris and embarks on a century-spanning, globe-trotting odyssey, seeking a cure and discovering a world beyond the boundaries of time and space.
Where: La Crescenta Library, LACL
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 6:30 pm – 7:45 pm
Address: 2809 Foothill Blvd., La Crescenta-Montrose, CA 91214
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14271362
The Mystery Book Club at Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Contact the branch for this month’s title. Feel free to email pvista@lapl.org or call 310-437-6680.
Where: Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 6400 Playa Vista Dr., Los Angeles, CA 90094
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-4
Sci-Fi Fantasy Book Club: Katabasis at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
The Village Well Book Club offshoot, the Sci-fi Fantasy Book Club! 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 (or sometimes both!). To join our emailing list, reach out to events@villagewell.com. Hope to see ya there!
This month’s pick is Katabasis by RF Kuang.
Alice Law has only ever had one goal: to become one of the brightest minds in the field of Magick. She has sacrificed everything to make that a reality: her pride, her health, her love life, and most definitely her sanity. All to work with Professor Jacob Grimes at Cambridge, the greatest magician in the world.
That is, until he dies in a magical accident that could possibly be her fault.
Grimes is now in Hell, and she’s going in after him. Because his recommendation could hold her very future in his now incorporeal hands and even death is not going to stop the pursuit of her dreams….
Nor will the fact that her rival, Peter Murdoch, has come to the very same conclusion.
With nothing but the tales of Orpheus and Dante to guide them, enough chalk to draw the Pentagrams necessary for their spells, and the burning desire to make all the academic trauma mean anything, they set off across Hell to save a man they don’t even like.
But Hell is not like the storybooks say, Magick isn’t always the answer, and there’s something in Alice and Peter’s past that could forge them into the perfect allies…or lead to their doom.:
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd.,1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
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 23rd
Time: 7 pm – 10 pm
Address: 14537 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks, CA 91403
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Jonathan Lethem & A Different Kind of Tension: New and Selected Stories at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Jonathan Lethem will discuss and sign A Different Kind of Tension: New and Selected Stories.
This dazzling, genre-defying collection from Jonathan Lethem features seven major stories published since his last collection, along with his best work spanning more than three decades. A major new story, “The Red Sun School of Thoughts,” never published elsewhere, follows a teenaged boy coming to terms with figures of authority and power—those both in his own biological family and in the family he creates for himself.
Elsewhere we meet “Super Goat Man,” a down-at-heels bohemian superhero; “The Porn Critic,” whose accidental expertise wrecks his own romantic aspirations; and “Sleepy People,” who pose interpersonal conundrums without ever rousing from their slumber. Fluidly moving between realism and the surreal, the absurd and the mundane, A Different Kind of Tension is a container bursting with life and death, couples in trouble, talking animals, technologies on the fritz. Through it all are people longing to be seen and to connect; to thrive, love, and be forgiven. “This is the joy of reading Jonathan Lethem: you never know what you’re going to get” (Financial Times).
Where: Book Soup
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2025-09-23/jonathan-lethem
Nonfiction Book Club: At Every Depth: Our Growing Knowledge of the Changing Oceans at pages, a bookstore Off-site at St. Cross Church, Hermosa Beach – In-Person Event
Book Club participants will read and discuss At Every Depth: Our Growing Knowledge of the Changing Oceans by Jessie Hill & Eric Simmons.
In At Every Depth, the oceanographer Tessa Hill and the science journalist Eric Simons profile these and other efforts to understand and protect marine environments, taking readers to habitats from shallow tidepools to the deep sea. They delve into the many human connections to the ocean—how people live with and make their living from the waters—journeying to places as far-flung as coral reefs, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and the Arctic and Antarctic poles. At Every Depth shares the stories of people from all walks of life, including scientists, coastal community members, Indigenous people, shellfish farmers, and fisheries workers. It brings together varied viewpoints, showing how scientists’ research and local and Indigenous knowledge can complement each other to inform a more sustainable future. Poignantly written and grounded in science, this book offers a narrative perspective on the changing oceans, letting us see how our relationships to the oceans are changing too.
Tessa Hill is a professor in the Earth and Planetary Sciences Department at the University of California, Davis, who teaches and researches oceanography and climate change. She is a recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and she was awarded the Rachel Carson Lecture by the American Geophysical Union.
Eric Simons is a science writer who was a longtime editor at Bay Nature magazine. He is the author of Darwin Slept Here (2009) and The Secret Lives of Sports Fans (2013). In addition to writing about science, nature, and the ocean, he teaches high school math.
Where: pages Off-site at St. Cross Church
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1818 Monterey Blvd., Hermosa Beach, CA 90254
Website: https://pagesabookstore.com/event/2025-09-23/nonfiction-book-club
Book Event: Sonora Reyes, with Aaron H. Aceves, & The Golden Boy’s Guide to Bipolar at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
Sonora Reyes, in conversation with Aaron H. Aceves, will discuss The Golden Boy’s Guide to Bipolar.
A book signing will follow the discussion.
RSVP: Ticketed event
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Tuesday the 23rd
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodice.com/events-and-tickets
The Virtual Cobalt Series & Open Mic: Rick Lupert hosts Kim Dower – Online Zoom Event
Cobalt Poets Reading & Open Mic and host Rick Lupert welcomes featured guests: Kim Dower.
Kim Dower has been the City Poet Laureate of West Hollywood. Born and raised in New York City she received a BFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College where she also taught creative writing. She has published three collections of poetry, all with Red Hen Press: Air Kissing on Mars, (2010) was on the Poetry Foundation’s Contemporary Best Sellers list, and was described by the Los Angeles Times as, “sensual and evocative…seamlessly combining humor and heartache.” Slice of Moon, (2013), was nominated for a Pushcart, Last Train to the Missing Planet (2016) was called “unexpected and sublime,” by “O” magazine. Most recently she published I Wore This Dress for You Today Mom and What She Wants: Poems on Obsession, Desire, Despair, Euphoria.
Kim’s work has been featured in Garrison Keillor’s, “The Writer’s Almanac,” Academy of American Poets, “Poem-a-Day,” and Ted Kooser’s, “American Life in Poetry,” as well as in Ploughshares, Barrow Street, Rattle and Eclipse. Her poems are included in the anthologies, Wide Awake: Poets of Los Angeles and Beyond, published by The Pacific Coast Poetry Series, an imprint of Beyond Baroque Books, and Coiled Serpent: Poets arising from the cultural quakes and shifts of Los Angeles. Kim teaches the workshops Poetry and Dreaming and Poetry and Memory in the B.A. Program of Antioch University. She’s also known as Kim-from-L.A., the name of her literary publicity company. She lives in West Hollywood, California.
For more information about Kim and her work, check out her interview with The Writer’s Almanac.
Where: Cobalt Poets – Online Zoom Event
Date: Tuesday, the 23rd
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: Online event (see site)
Website: https://www.poetrysuperhighway.com
Da Poetry Lounge Open Mic Night at Ora Café in Leimert Park – In-Person Event
The nation’s largest weekly spoken word Open Mic event is 26 years strong. DPL is a community space for every poet to be heard. They provide a platform to celebrate poetry while using it as the foundation for creativity, innovation, and expression across an array of media outlets.
$10 donation. Do NOT line up prior to 7:30 pm Free parking adjacent to the theater.
Masks are encouraged.
Where: Ora Café
Date: Tuesday, the 23rd
Time: 9 pm – 11 pm
Address: 4331 Degnan Blvd., Leimert Park, CA 90008
Website: https://www.instagram.com/ or https://www.dapoetrylounge.com/
Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Come write with us!
Many people believe that morning writing practice is key to finding your voice, your story and, in this case, your community! At the Village Well!
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning at 8:30 AM come join acclaimed author and writing instructor Francesca Lia Block for a brief intro and 40 minutes of free writing on any topic without judgement. Afterwards, you will be able to share a bit about your process and ask Francesca questions about your writing.
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/
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 8:30 am – 9:30 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Adult Mystery Book Group: I Need You to Read This at Once Upon a Time, Monrose – In-Person Event
Start your morning with this month’s pick: I Need You to Read This: A Novel by Jessa Maxwell.
This “super creepy” (The Washington Post) and “perfectly plotted whodunnit” (Katy Hays, New York Times bestselling author) follows an advice columnist searching for answers about her predecessor’s murder—from the bestselling author of The Golden Spoon.
We will be meeting to discuss the book outside of the shop in the circle in front of Star Cafe.
Where: Once Upon a Time, Montrose
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 9 am
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/mystery-book-group-i-need-you-read-jessa-maxwell
Wednesday Book Club: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn at Westchester – Loyola Village Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for a discussion of the book The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain.
All are welcome!
Where: Westchester – Loyola Village Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 12 pm
Address: 2114 W. Manchester Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90045
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/wednesday-book-club-26
Poets Café via KPFK 90.7 FM – Live On-Air Event
Poets Café celebrates Poetry. This program is a weekly half-hour literary arts discussion and reading program featuring guest authors and their works.
Poetry From Around the World is a segment of this series offered monthly on the 2nd Monday of the month on KPFK Los Angeles 90.7 FM.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: KPFK 90.7 FM
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 2 pm – 2:30 pm
Address: On-air Event (live)
Website: https://www.kpfk.org/on-air/poets-cafe/
Iacobani Book Club: The Women’s March at Angleo M. Iacobani Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us for a book discussion of The Women’s March by Jennifer Chiaverini. For Adults.
Where: Iacobani Library, LACL
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 3 pm – 4 pm
Address: 500 S. Del Mar Ave., San Gabriel, CA 91776
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14033963
Sci-Fi Book Club: Children of the Dune at Van Nuys Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Children of Dune by Frank Herbert.
Where: Van Nuys Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 5 pm – 6 pm
Address: 6250 Sylmar Ave,, Van Nuys, CA 91401
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/sci-fi-book-club-children-dune-frank-herbert
Book Club for Adults: Remarkably Bright Creatures at Valley Plaza Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt.
Where: Valley Plaza Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 6 pm – 7:15 pm
Address: 12311 Vanowen St., North Hollywood, CA 91605
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-club-adults-6
Let’s Read Los Angeles: Inventing Paradise at North Hollywood Amelia Earhart Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Inventing Paradise by Paul Haddad.
Inventing Paradise: The Power Brokers Who Created the Dream of Los Angeles traces the improbable rise of Los Angeles through the prism of six visionaries who had outsize influence on the city’s growth: Phineas Banning, Harrison Gray Otis, Henry Huntington, Harry Chandler, William Mulholland, and Moses Sherman.
Where: North Hollywood Amelia Earhart Regional Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 5211 Tujunga Ave., North Hollywood, CA 91601
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/lets-read-los-angeles-inventing-paradise
Poetry from the Caribbean Diasporaat Exposition Park – Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Regional Branch Library – In-Person Event
Please join us for an evening of poetry and spoken word performances that celebrate the Caribbean Diaspora. The event will be hosted by Amanda Choo Quan, a Trinidadian Jamaican writer and PhD candidate in Creative Writing and Literature at the University of Southern California.
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 3900 S. Western Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90062
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/poetry-caribbean-diaspora
All-Genres Workshop with Renee Gurley via Inlandia Institute – Online Event
(INT-ADV)
Alternating Wednesdays, 9/10, 9/24, 10/15, 10/29, and 11/12, 6:00-9:00 pm PT, on ZOOM.
$50. Registration required. https://tinyurl.com/Fall2025CWW
In this multi-genre workshop, participants submit poetry and prose for biweekly critiques and receive feedback from other group members. Discussions include the craft of writing and the challenges writers face. The workshop leader provides biweekly articles and links related to participants’ work, particularly to problems that were discussed in the previous session.
Renee (RJ) Gurley (she/her) is a writer and English teacher with an MA and MFA, and over 20 years of experience. Her work appears in Coping Magazine, Lehigh Valley Woman’s Journal, and Midwifery Monthly. Cállate!, the first chapter of her memoir, Lehigh Valley Woman’s Journal, and Midwifery Monthly. Cállate!, the first chapter of her memoir, was shortlisted in the First Pages Contest.
Where: Inlandia Online via Zoom
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 6 pm – 9 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/fall-2025-writing-workshops/
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 24th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: On-air Event (live at 101.5 FM)
Website: https://www.lapoetsociety.org/events
Author Event: Annette Chavez Martinez, with Jayci Lee, & Everything She Ever Knew at Octavia’s Bookshelf – In-Person Event
Local author, Annette Chavez Macias and conversation partner Jayci Lee join us for an incredible night to discuss and sign Macias’ latest novel, Everything She Never Knew! This story about life after betrayal is an emotional, heartwarming novel about a woman whose marriage and friendship collapse all at once.
As next-door neighbors and best friends, Claudia and Rachel share everything. But in Claudia’s mind, that means recipes and clothes—not husbands. So it’s a huge shock when Rachel runs off with hers.
If that weren’t enough, her mom shows up at her door with heavy suitcases in tow. She intends to stay until Claudia has pulled through this. But behaving like a typical mother or grandmother isn’t Gloria’s style, and Claudia wonders why she’s really there. She also wonders why she can’t stop thinking about Nick, the husband Rachel jilted for her own, who still lives in the next house over.
It’s all a bit much for Claudia, who, unlike her impulsive mother, has always prized the familiar comforts of stability and routine. Now that those have been snatched away, she’ll have to face her fears and take some risks—for herself and for her daughter.
Annette Chavez Macias writes stories about love, family, and following your dreams. She is proud of her Mexican American heritage, culture, and traditions, all of which can be found within the pages of her books. For readers wanting even more love stories and guaranteed happily ever-afters, Annette also writes romance novels under the pen name Sabrina Sol. A Southern California native, Annette lives just outside Los Angeles with her husband, three children, and their bulldog named Reina.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Octavia’s Bookshelf
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 1353 North Hill Ave., Pasadena, CA 91104
Website: https://www.octaviasbookshelf.com/events/everything-she-never-knew-author-event
Mystery & Thriller Book Club: The Talented Mr. Ripley at Studio City Branch Library – In-Person Event
Join us on the last Wednesday of every month for our Mystery & Thriller book club!
September (9/24): The Talented Mr. Ripleyby Patricia Highsmith
Where: Studio City Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 12511 Moorpark St., Studio City, CA 91604
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-thriller-book-club-0
Romantasy Book Club: What the River Knows at Agoura Hills Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss What the River Knows by Isabel Ibañez. Copies available at Customer Service. For adults.
The Mummy meets Death on the Nile in this lush, immersive historical fantasy set in Egypt filled with adventure, a rivals-to-lovers romance, and a dangerous race.
Where: Agoura Hills Library, LACL
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 29901 Ladyface Ct., Agoura Hills, CA 91301
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14296723
Carla Ondrasik & Stop Trying!: The Life-Transforming Power of Trying Less and Doing More at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event
Carla Ondrasik will discuss her book Stop Trying!: The Life-Transforming Power of Trying Less and Doing More.
If you’re struggling to get things done or meet your goals, the problem isn’t that you’re not trying hard enough, it’s that you’re trying in the first place.
When it comes to getting stuff done, we fall short more often than we like to admit. This can leave us feeling frustrated and ashamed, because despite trying our very best we can’t seem to meet our goals. Why? The surprising answer is ingeniously outlined in Stop Trying!: The Life-Transforming Power of Trying Less and Doing More—an evolutionary guide that evokes the revelatory force of The Five-Second Rule and the sublime practicality of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. Put simply, it turns out that trying is just an illusion for doing.
Stop Trying! illuminates the deception in a mindset built on trying, which can lead to anxiety, procrastination, perceived loss of control, fatigue, fear of failure, lack of follow-through, and overall life dissatisfaction. Importantly, this book offers a way out of the rut and into practical, progressive action. Stop Trying! reveals the compelling science behind our brain, behaviors, and beliefs when it comes to the notion of trying. Pulling from positive psychology, the science of habit formation, clinical studies, and more, motivational speaker Carla Ondrasik guides us to proven-effective strategies for better doing—and ultimately to goal achievement and a more fulfilling life.
Where: Diesel, A Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 24th
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Suite 33, Santa Monica, CA 90402
Book Event: Alexandra Vasti, with Emma R. Alban, & Ladies in Hating at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
Alexandra Vasti, in conversation with Emma R. Alban, will discuss Ladies in Hating.
A book signing will follow the discussion.
RSVP: Ticketed event
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodice.com/events-and-tickets
RECESS Open Mic is at SIPA HQ, Palms Up Academy – In-Person Event
RECESS Open Mic is at SIPA HQ on Wednesdays.
This dynamic open mic is the most accessible public program in the Palms Up Academy curriculum and manifests their mission statement in a physical (and digital) space.
Join them at the intersection of Historic Filipino town & The World: Search to Involve Pilipino Americans.
NOTE: See site for RSVP, cost, guidelines, and details.
Where: SIPA HQ
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 7 pm – 9:30 pm (Doors at 6:30 pm; Open Mic at 8 pm)
Address: 3200 W. Temple St., Ste. 100, Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: https://www.palmsupacademy.com
At Skylight: Ilana Masad, with Gabrielle Korn, & Beings: A Novel at Skylight – In-Person Event
Join is to hear Ilana Masad, in conversation with Gabrielle Korn, discuss Beings: A Novel.
In 1961, an interracial couple drove through the dark mountains of New Hampshire when a mysterious light began to follow them. Years later, through hypnosis, they recalled an unbelievable brush with extraterrestrial life. Unintentionally, a genre was born: the alien abduction narrative.
In Ilana Masad’s Beings, the couple’s experience serves as one part of a trio of intertwined threads: Known only by their roles as husband and wife, Masad explores the pair’s trauma and its aftermath and questions what it means to accept the impossible. In the second thread, letters penned by a budding science-fiction writer, Phyllis, to her beloved, Rosa, expose the raw ache of queer yearning, loneliness, and alienation in the repressive 1960s-as well as the joy of finding community. In the present day, a reclusive and chronically ill Archivist attempts to understand a strange forgotten childhood encounter while descending into obsession over both Phyllis’s letters and the testimony of the first alien abductees.
Over the course of a decade, Phyllis wrestles with her desires and ambitions as a lesbian writer, while the abducted couple grapple with how to maintain control of their narrative. All the while, the archive shatters and reforms, redefining fact and fiction via the stories left behind by the abductees, Phyllis, and the Archivist themself. Masad makes human what is alien and makes tangible what is hidden—sometimes by chance and sometimes intentionally—in the archive.
Ilana Masad is a writer of fiction, nonfiction, and criticism whose work has been widely published. Masad is the author of the novel All My Mother’s Lovers and is co-editing the forthcoming anthology Here For All the Reasons: #BachelorNation on Why We Watch.
Gabrielle Korn is the author of three books and the former editor in chief of Nylon Media. Her debut novel, Yours For The Taking, was an Indie Next pick, a New York Times best book of the month, and a Goodreads Choice Award nominee for Readers’ Favorite Science Fiction. Its sequel, The Shutouts, was hailed “another winner” by Publishers Weekly and “a perfect blend of sadness and hope” by Kirkus. Her writing has appeared across the internet for fifteen years, with bylines in Elle, McSweeney’s, The Millions, Literary Hub, InStyle, Refinery29, Oprah Magazine, Autostraddle, and more, as well as several anthologies. She lives in LA with her wife, where together they run the Pink Door Artist & Writer residency.
Where: Skylight
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-ilana-masad-presents-beings-w-gabrielle-korn
Vroman’s Fiction Reading Group: Paradise at Vroman‘s – In-Person Event
The Vroman’s Fiction Reading Group meets the 4th Wednesday of every month at 7 pm.
This event is free and open to the public.
September’s pick is Paradise by Toni Morrison.
Fiction Reading Group meetings are held inside Vroman’s Bookstore on the second floor in the event space.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-09-24/vromans-fiction-reading-group
Anansi Writers Workshop at The World Stage – In-Person Event
The Anansi Writers Workshop was founded in 1990 by Kamau Daáood, Akilah Oliver, Nafis Nabawi and Anthony Lyons. In 1993, Michael Datcher initiated the development of a three-part format for the workshop. Our tradition of a community workshop began in the late 1960s at the Watts Writers’ Workshop, where World Stage co-founder Kamau Daáood started his writing career. Hosted by Jessica Gallion aka “Yellawoman.”
- 7:30 pm – 8:30 pm — Formal workshop;
- 8:30 pm – 9:00 pm — TBA;
- 9:05 pm – 10:00 pm — Open mic.
Suggested: $10.00 Donation via PayPal: The World Stage Gallery.
NOTE: See site for further details and any change in the schedule. Contact on Instagram @ _yellawoman
Where: The World Stage (use left rear entrance)
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: 4321 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Story Salon: Theme: Everything Was Great Except for That One Thing at Art Parlor in Valley Village – In-Person & Virtual Hybrid Event
Los Angeles’s longest running storytelling venue now virtual!
An alternative to stand-up clubs + self-conscious performance spaces
Story Salon challenges you all to tell stories in 90 seconds! Can you do it? If you can, join us Wednesday 9/17!
Tickets can be purchased early with the link in bio or at storysalon.com
Theme: You All Are Perfect. Except For That One Thing.
Where: Art Parlor
Date: Wednesday the 24th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm (Doors at 7 pm)
Address: 5302 Laurel Canyon Blvd., Valley Village, CA 91607
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Wednesday Night Poetry Workshop with Jose Hernandez Diaz via Beyond Baroque – Online Event
The West Coast’s longest-running free poetry workshop is offered by Beyond Baroque on Zoom and welcomes new and seasoned poets to share their work and provide feedback. Please be prepared to share one poem. This workshop will be hosted via the Zoom video-conferencing platform. Please be prepared to share one poem.
Please spend some time before the workshop learning how to share documents via Zoom. It will keep the session moving if you’re able to make your poem viewable quickly and easily. An instructive video is available on the site.
The workshop can sometimes reach high levels of attendance, which means not everyone will get a chance to read every session.
Jose Hernandaz Diaz is a 2017 NEA Fellow. He is the author of The Fire Eater (Texas Review Press, 2020) Bad Mexican, Bad American (Acre Books, 2024) The Parachutist (Sundress Publications, 2025) and Portrait of the Artist as a Brown Man (Red Hen Press, 2025). He has been published in Bennington Review, The Yale Review, The London Magazine, The Southern Review, Poetry Ireland Review, The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2011, and in The Best American Poetry 2025. He has taught creative writing at the University of California at Riverside. Currently, he is the Visiting Writer in Residence at the University of Tennessee.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: Online event (see site)
Website: https://www.beyondbaroque.org
Poetry Reading & Open Mic by Two Idiots Peddling Poetry with Ben Trigg and guests Juantia Mantz and Gina Duran at The Ugly Mug – In-Person Event
Host Ben Trigg and Two Idiots Peddling Poetry welcomes featured guests Juanita Mantz and Gina Duran.
Juanita Mantz (“JEM”) is a USC Law educated lawyer, writer, performer, and podcaster. She has 2 books, a memoir titled “Tales of an Inland Empire Girl” (Los Nietos Press, 2022) which won bronze at the Latino Books Into Movies Awards and a hybrid chapbook titled “Portrait of a Deputy Public Defender, or how I became a punk rock lawyer” (Bamboo Dart Press, Aug 2021) which won gold at the International Latino Book Awards.
Her stories have been published in journals, newspapers & anthologies and she is an alumni of the VONA and Macondo workshops.
Juanita has presented at the Colony Theater, UCR Writers’ Week, the UCR Punk Conference, Pasadena LitFest, AWP & Beyond Baroque and she received a 2023/2024 California Arts Council Grant at the Established Artist level.
Juanita is in the low residency MFA creative writing program at University of New Orleans. On her video podcast, “Life of JEM”, she does live interviews with writers. She is currently working on a one woman show. Find everything on her author website: https://juanitaemantz.com.
Gina Rae Duran is an Interdisciplinary artist, and trauma informed educator. She is Editor of The White Picket Fence anthology, forthcoming FlowerSong Press, author of, …and so, the Wind was Born, FlowerSong Press, radio personality of The Collective, and founder of IE Hope Collective; an outreach for disadvantaged youth.
$5 cover fee, cash only
$5 cover fee, cash only.
Where: The Ugly Mug, Orange
Date: Wednesday, the 24th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: 261 N. Glassell St., Orange, CA
Website: https://www.facebook.com/events
Lit Angels: Heal Through Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Let Francesca help you with all aspects of your writing!
Do you want to write professionally or for personal satisfaction and healing but aren’t sure where to start and need some inspiring tips and support? Do you have a project that needs revision? Are you feeling stuck creatively? Join acclaimed author and writing instructor Francesca Lia Block for a discussion of her 12 Questions followed by free writing and Q&A. Come be a part of the supportive Lit Angels writing community and consider writing a story to share at our Valentine’s event on 2/7 for possible submission in Lit Angels Journal.
About the instructor:
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/
Tuesdays & Thursdays @10AM | $15
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 10 am – 11 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Afternoon Book Club: Digging to America at Culver City Julain Dixon Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us for a discussion of Digging to America by Anne Tyler. For Adults.
Summary provided by the publisher:
“Two families meet at the Baltimore airport while waiting for their baby girls to arrive from Korea. The Iranian American Sami and Ziba Yazdan, with Ziba’s elegant and reserved mother, Maryam, in tow, wait quietly while brash and all-American Bitsy and Brad Donaldson, plus extended family, are armed with camcorders and a fleet of balloons proclaiming “It’s a girl!” After they decide together to throw an impromptu “arrival party,” a tradition is born, and so begins a lifelong friendship between the two families. As they raise their daughters, the Yazdan and Donaldson families grapple with questions of assimilation and identity. When Bitsy’s recently widowed father sets his sights on Maryam, she must confront her own idea of what it means to be other, and of who she is and what she values.”
Where: Culver City Julian Dixon Library, LACL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 12 pm – 1 pm
Address: 4975 Overland Ave., Culver City, CA 90230
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14410361
“Saved by a Story” Seniors Writing Gr at Westwood Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Come enjoy creativity and community in a nonjudgmental environment. Discover the bounty of stories that lie within!
Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 1 pm – 2:30 pm
Address: 1246 Glendon Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90024
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/saved-story-senior-writing-workshop-1
Book Discussion: Remarkably Bright Creatures at Sunland – Tujunga Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for this community-led book discussion of Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt.
Where: Sunland – Tujunga Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 1 pm
Address: 7771 Foothill Blvd., Tujunga, CA 91042
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-discussion-12
Marina Del Rey Book Club: First Lie Wins at Marina Del Rey Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us for a discussion of First Lie Wins by Ashley Elston. For Adults.
This month, we’ll explore First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston.
This thriller-&fiction focuses on Evie Porter who appears to have the ideal Southern life—a devoted boyfriend, a charming home with a white picket fence, and a perfect circle of friends. But here’s the twist: Evie Porter doesn’t exist. The name, the town, even the life—it’s all a fabrication. She’s part of an elaborate scheme orchestrated by a shadowy figure known only as Mr. Smith. Evie’s mission: embed herself into the life of Ryan Sumner, a seemingly handsome, upstanding businessman—but perhaps more.
Where: Lloyd Taber-Marina del Rey Library, LACL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 2 pm – 3 pm and 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 4533 Admiralty Way., Marina Del Rey, CA 90292
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14437470
Eagle Rock Book Club: Violeta at Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
The Eagle Rock Book Club explores both acclaimed newer books and rediscovered classics of the past.
The selection for September is Violeta by Isabel Allende. This sweeping novel tells the epic story of Violeta Del Valle, a woman whose life spans one hundred years and bears witness to the greatest upheavals of the twentieth century.
The library will have copies to check out or check our e-media page for electronic access on Libby and hoopla.
Please bring book suggestions for future meetings.
Where: Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 3 pm
Address: 5027 Caspar Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90041
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/eagle-rock-book-club-2
LA Made Presents: Diego Rivera: Coloring the Stories of the Maya Peoples at Sun Valley Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join Dr. Gloria Arjona as she presents – Diego Rivera: Coloring the Stories of the Maya Peoples. In this easy-to-understand approach to the complex Mayan world Dr. Arjona will regale the audience with a wide repertoire of songs from Mexico and Central America, in Spanish, Mayan and Nahuatl.
As an educator and performer, Dr. Gloria Arjona believes in the power of oral literature to convey the rich cultures of Latin America; therefore, in her lectures, she includes live music, media, poetry, and traditional attire.
Where: Sun Valley Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 7935 Vineland Avenue, Sun Valley, CA 91352
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/la-made-presents-diego-rivera-coloring-stories-maya-peoples
Cover to Cover Book Club: Here One Moment at Mid Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Joinus for a discussion of the monthly book selection.
September 25: Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty
Where: Mid-Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 16244 Nordhoff Street, North Hills, CA 91343
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/cover-cover-book-club-1
Between the Lines Book Club: The Great Divide at Castaic Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us as we celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month and dig into The Great Divide by Cristina Henríquez. A powerful novel about the construction of the Panama Canal, casting light on the unsung people who lived, loved, and labored there. For adults.
Searing and empathetic, The Great Divide explores the intersecting lives of activists, fishmongers, laborers, journalists, neighbors, doctors, and soothsayers—those rarely acknowledged by history even as they carved out its course.
Where: Castaic Library, LACL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 27971 Sloan Canyon Rd., Castaic, CA 91384
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14296732
Writing the Personal Essay with JD Mathes via Inlandia Institute – Online Event
(All Levels)
Alternating Thursdays, 9/11, 9/25, 10/9, 10/23, and 11/6, 6:00-8:00 pm PT, on ZOOM.
$50. Registration required. https://tinyurl.com/Fall2025CWW
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. He is the award winning author of five books: Ahead of the Flaming Front: A Life on Fire, winner of the North American Book Prize; Shipwrecks and Other Stories, an essay collection Fever and Guts: A Symphony; The Journal West: Poems; and the forthcoming Of Time and Punishment: A Memoir—the result of his PEN America Writing for Justice Fellowship. He has published essays in journals such as The Sun, The Southern Review, War, Literature & the Arts, The Fourth Genre, and The Baltimore Review. Among things he’s done to support his writing, and two daughters have been a wildland firefighter on a helicopter-rappel crew and logistics at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, Antarctica where he led the Southernmost Writers Workshop in the World. www.jdmathes.com
Where: Inlandia Online via Zoom
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6 pm – 9 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/fall-2025-writing-workshops/
The Art and Craft of Writing Poetry with Romaine Washington via Inlandia Institute – Online Event
(All Levels)
Alternating Thursdays, 9/11, 9/25, 10/9, 10/23, and 11/6, 6:00-8:00 pm PT, on ZOOM.
$50. Registration required. https://tinyurl.com/Fall2025CWW
Discover the art and craft of writing poetry with generative prompts and other forms of poetic inspiration. Brief group feedback will help you uncover images and language that resonate for you and for your audience.
Romaine Washington, M. Ed., is a twice Pushcart-nominated poet. She is the editor of These Black Bodies Are…A Blacklandia Anthology and returning guest editor for Cholla Needles. She has authored two books Purgatory Has an Address and Sirens in Her Belly. Ms. Washington is a graduate fellow of The Watering Hole, South Carolina, and the Inland Area Writing Project at the University of California, Riverside. For over twenty years, she taught language arts and now enjoys facilitating workshops. The proud mother of two sons, Romaine Washington, is a native Californian residing in the Inland Empire.
Where: Inlandia Online via Zoom
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://inlandiainstitute.org/fall-2025-writing-workshops/
Writer’s Block: Creative Writing and Meaningful Connection at Octavia’s Bookshelf – In-Person Event
If you would like to connect with other writers and have dedicated time for creative writing (poetry, short stories, novels, songs, screenplays, etc.), this is for you! We are holding space for writers to free-write, share and receive positive feedback, and make meaningful connections. All levels are welcome. This space is offered freely!
ABOUT THE FACILITATOR, ZAHIDA:
Zahida Sherman is a proud Seattle native and poet who made her way to Southern California by way of everywhere. Her previous writing has centered on culture, belonging, and wellness for Bustle, Healthline, Well and Good, Afropunk, and Blavity, among others.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Octavia’s Bookshelf
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 1353 North Hill Ave., Pasadena, CA 91104
Dual Poetry Book Launch with Youna Kwak and Prageeta Sharma at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Join us for the launch of two exciting new poetry books, For This and Other Cruelties by Youna Kwak and Onement Won by Prageeta Sharma!
Youna and Prageeta will read from and discuss their probing, intimate, and provocative work.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
About the authors:
Youna Kwak is the author of a poetry collection, sur vie (Fathom Books), and two books of French-to-English translation, Gardeners and Daewoo (Diálogos Press). Other writing can be found in the Los Angeles Review, The Hopkins Review, Chicago Review, Oversound, and American Poets. She lives and works in Los Angeles.
Prageeta Sharma is the author of six collections of poetry; her most recent collection is Onement Won, out from Wave Books (September, 2025). She is the founder of the conference Thinking Its Presence: An Interdisciplinary Conference on Race, Creative Writing, and Artistic and Aesthetic Practices, a recent recipient of the 2025 NEA Creative Writing Fellowship and is currently the Henry G. Lee ’37 professor of English at Pomona College.
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Cookies & Comics Graphic Novel Book Club: Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen: Who Killed Jimmy Olsen? at Westwood Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Do you love graphic novels? Does your family tire of talking 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 Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen: Who Killed Jimmy Olsen? by Matt Fraction. Jimmy Olsen must die! Wait, we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Jimmy Olsen lives! Superman’s best friend and Daily Planet photographer Jimmy Olsen tours the bizarre underbelly of the DC Universe in this new series featuring death, destruction, giant turtles, and more, combining Silver Age energy with a distinctly modern sensibility! You can grab this title on hoopla with your library card.
The recommended audience for this monthly Zoom event is teens aged 16+ and adults.
Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/cookies-comics-graphic-novel-book-club-14
Bel Canto Book Club: Solito with Bel Canto Books at Alder & Sage, Long Beach – In-Person Event
Join us for the Bel Canto Book Club hosted by Alder & Sage (366 Cherry Ave, Long Beach, CA 90814). We’ll meet every third Thursday of the month at 6:30 pm to discuss a book of contemporary fiction or non-fiction handpicked by bookstore owner Jhoanna Belfer of Bel Canto Books.
September – SOLITO by Javier Zamora
NOTE: See site for guidelines.
Where: Alder & Sage
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: 366 Cherry Ave., Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/bel-canto-book-club-2025-tickets-1106488349439?aff=oddtdtcreator
Sean Malin, with Jesse Thorn, James Kim, Naomi Ekperigin, Andy Beckerman & Kevin T. Porter & The Podcasts Pantheon at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event
Sean Malin, in conversation with Jesse Thorn, James Kim, Naomi Ekperigin, Andy Beckerman and Kevin T. Porter, will discuss The Podcast Pantheon: 101 Podcasts That Changed How We Listen—From WTF to Serial.
Spanning the most popular podcast genres—true crime, comedy, sports, relationships, and more—culture critic and Vulture‘s Start Here columnist Sean Malin introduces the first comprehensive canon in podcast history. Featuring a foreword by award-winning actor and producer Jon Hamm.
The Golden Age of podcasts is upon us. With over fifty official podcast networks, more than three million programs of every imaginable category available for download, and tens of millions of unique listens and views every week in the US alone—plus, our favorites being adapted into dozens of beloved films, TV series, and books—podcasts are now part of the fabric that makes up our everyday global media. Finally, here is an exclusive insider’s perspective told through 101 different shows across dozens of genres.
The Podcast Pantheon is the first book of its kind: A resource for discovering podcasts and learning more about how this multibillion-dollar industry came into being from the geniuses who created it.
Sean Malin is a culture critic whose writing and speaking on film, comedy, and food, among other topics, have been published by the New York Times, Eater, Austin Chronicle, and the Los Angeles Times. A participant in the inaugural critics class of Current TV’s The Rotten Tomatoes Show, he has since 2019 been Vulture‘s Start Here columnist, where he conducts deep dives into the defining episodes of the world’s funniest podcasts. Sean lives between California and Texas.
Jesse Thorn, creator/host of Bullseye and the MaxFun podcast network.
James Kim, creator of Moonface and producer of Netflix’s Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney
Naomi Ekperigin & Andy Beckerman, creators/hosts of Couples Therapy
Kevin T. Porter, co-creator of Gilmore Guys
Where: Diesel, A Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Suite 33, Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2025-09-25/sean-malin-podcast-pantheon-101
Yiming Ma & These Memories Do Not Belong to Us: A Constellation Novel at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Yiming Li will discussThese Memories Do Not Belong to Us: A Constellation Novel.
A hauntingly beautiful and prescient debut set in a future where a renamed China is the sole global superpower.
When I was a boy, my mother used to tell me stories of a world before memories could be shared between strangers.
In a far-off future ruled by the Qin Empire, every citizen is fitted with a Mindbank, an intracranial device capable of recording and transmitting memories between minds. This technology gives birth to Memory Capitalism, where anyone with means can relive the life experiences of others. It also unleashes opportunities for manipulation: memories can be edited, marketed, and even corrupted for personal gain.
After the sudden passing of his mother, an unnamed narrator inherits a collection of banned memories from her Mindbank so dangerous that even possessing them places his freedom in jeopardy. Traversing genres, empires, and millennia, they are tales of sumo wrestlers and social activists and armless swimmers and watchmakers, struggling amid the backdrop of Qin’s ascent toward global dominance. Determined to release his mother’s memories to the world before they are destroyed forever, the narrator will risk everything—even if the cost is his own life.
Powerful and provocative, These Memories Do Not Belong to Us masterfully explores how governments and media manipulate history to control the collective imagination. It forces us to see beyond the sheen of convenient truths and to unearth real stories of sacrifice and love that refuse to be eradicated.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2025-09-25/yiming-ma
Book Event: Lizzy Ives, with R.K. Ashwick, & Thick Witch Travels at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
Lizzy Ives, in conversation with R.K. Ashwick, will discuss Thick Witch Travels.
A book signing will follow the discussion.
RSVP: Ticketed event
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://www.therippedbodice.com/events-and-tickets
At Skylight: Leni Zumas, with Meg Howrey, & Wolf Bells at Skylight – In-Person Event
Leni Zumas, in conversation with Meg Howrey, will discuss Wolf Bells: A Novel.
On a bluff above a river rises The House, where elderly and disabled residents live alongside young people who help out in exchange for free rent. The community is led by a former punk singer who never wanted to be responsible for anyone yet now finds herself the caretaker of this precarious collection of lives. It’s not a family, exactly, but it’s got the complicated, sometimes painful, sometimes hilarious, dynamics of kinship.
When two kids—Nola and her little cousin James—show up on The House’s back porch in need of refuge, the whole experiment is thrown into question. All are welcome here, or that was the idea. But the authorities are looking for these children, and The House’s finances are teetering on the edge.
Zumas’s long-anticipated third novel wrestles with America’s crisis of care in a taut, aching, polyphonic tale that moves as fast as the crackling comebacks that fly between The House’s residents over breakfast. As the rules of the outside world start to press in on this safe haven, readers will find themselves asking, what would the world look like if everyone had a place to belong?
Leni Zumas was a finalist for the 2021 John Dos Passos Prize for Literature. Her bestselling novel Red Clocks won the Oregon Book Award for Fiction and was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and the Neukom Award for Speculative Fiction. The novel was a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice and was named a Best Book of 2018 by The Atlantic, the Washington Post, the Huffington Post, and the New York Public Library. Vulture called it one of the “100 Most Important Books of the 21st Century So Far.” Zumas’s fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The New York Times, The Times Literary Supplement, Granta, Guernica, The Cut, Tin House, and elsewhere. She lives in Oregon and teaches in the creative writing program at Portland State University.
Meg Howrey is the author of the novels Blind Sight, The Cranes Dance, The Wanderers, and most recently, They’re Going to Love You. Her writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, The New York Times, Granta, Vogue, and Harvard Review.
Where: Skylight
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-leni-zumas-presents-wolf-bells-w-meg-howrey
Writing Workshop: Storycraft Unlocked at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Discover the art of storytelling with the seven-point structure! In this interactive class, you’ll learn how to craft compelling narratives by breaking your story into seven essential beats—from the opening hook to the final resolution.
Whether you’re outlining a new idea or refining a draft, this framework will help you create stories that captivate and make readers turn the page.
RSVP
Where: Underdog Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 25th
Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 312 S. Myrtle Ave., Monrovia, CA 91016
Website: https://www.underdogbookstore.org/events/writing-workshop-storycraft-unlocked
Vroman’s On Screen: Tim Greiving, with Matt Gourley, & Later Days at Vroman‘s – In-Person Event
Tim Greiving, in conversation with Matt Gourley, will discuss John Williams: A Composer’s Life.
John Williams is one of the most important film composers of all time, having almost singlehandedly revived the Hollywood symphonic scoring tradition and helped restore the livelihood of American orchestras through the popularity of film music programming. His film music, in the words of director Oliver Stone, “came to stand for the American culture.”
In John Williams: A Composer’s Life, the first biography of the composer, author Tim Greiving offers an engaging account of a man whose body of work is well-known but whose personal life has consistently remained very private. Williams wrote the memorable scores and hummable themes for a staggering number of popular touchstones across multiple generations—among them Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Jaws, E.T., Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List, and the Harry Potter series—and earned more Oscar nominations than any individual artist in the history of the motion picture Academy. He also composed dozens of concerti, fanfares, and other concert works and was a national presence as music director of the Boston Pops for more than a decade. He inspired countless children to pursue a career in the orchestra and won the respect of the classical community worldwide. Seeking to understand what drove Williams’s musical productivity and its effects on the lives of those close to him, Greiving delves deeply into the composer’s decades-long career, uncovering countless new stories and revelations. Throughout, he analyzes and describes Williams’ film scores, recalling them primarily in narrative and emotional terms rather than purely musicological ones, and in doing so emphasizes one of Williams’s principle strengths: his musical storytelling
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Thursday, the 25th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-09-25/tim-greiving
Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Many people believe that morning writing practice is key to finding your voice, your story and, in this case, your community! At the Village Well!
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning at 8:30 am come join acclaimed author and writing instructor Francesca Lia Block for a brief intro and 40 minutes of free writing on any topic without judgement. Afterwards, you will be able to share a bit about your process and ask Francesca questions about your writing.
About the instructor:
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/
Come make some magic at the Village Well! All genres and levels are welcome!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 8:30 am – 9:30 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Weekly Pajama Storytime at Once Upon a Time, Montrose – In-Person Kids & Family Event
Our most popular story time is ready to delight and dazzle! This is also the prime time to see Pippi Longstocking, our bookstore cat in action.
There is a large FREE parking lot off Florencita Dr. as well as metered parking along Honolulu Ave. and Montrose Ave.
Free to attend.
NOTE: Free to attend.
Where: Once Upon a Time, Montrose
Date: Friday, the 26th
Time: 9:30 am
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/2025-09-26/weekly-pj-story-time
Book Club: The Nightingale at La Mirada Library, LACL– In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah.
The Nightingale captures World War II and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the women’s war. It tells the stories of two sisters, each embarking on her own path toward survival, love, and freedom in war-torn France. For adults.
Where: La Mirada Library, LACL
Date: Friday, the 26th
Time: 10:30 am – 11:30 am
Address: 13800 La Mirada Blvd, La Mirada, CA 90638
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14470758
Bilingual Storytime at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Bilingual Storytime! Exposing your children to multiple languages is highly beneficial for their learning and development, and what better way to do it than through this fun activity where we will read a wonderful story in both English and Spanish.
¡Hora de cuentos bilingüe! Exponer a tus hjijos a varios idiomas es de gran beneficio para su aprendizaje y desarrollo, y qué mejor que hacerlo en esta divertida actividad en donde leeremos un maravilloso cuento en inglés y en español.
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 11 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Writing Gets Lonely: Open Writing Studio at Heavy Manners Library – In-Person Event
Join host Katja Bartholmess for an open writing studio at Heavy Manners Library from 1-3! No frills, no prompts, just write!
Manuscripts, Screenplays, Articles: whatever you’re working on, let’s do it in each other’s company!
Where: Heavy Manners Library
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 1 pm – 3 pm
Address: 1200 N. Alvarado St. Unit D, Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: https://heavymannerslibrary.com/events/writing-gets-lonely-open-writing-studio-9-26
Horror Novel Book Club: Tiny Threads at Compton Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Tiny Threads by Lilliam Rivera. To borrow a print copy of the books, please contact the Compton Library directly. 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.
Fashion-obsessed Samara finally has the life she’s always dreamed of: A high-powered job with legendary designer Antonio Mota. A new home in sunny California, far away from those drab Jersey winters. And an intriguing love interest, Brandon, a wealthy investor in Mota’s fashion line.
But it’s not long before Samara’s dream life begins to turn into a living nightmare as Mota’s big fashion show approaches and the pressure on her turns crushing. Perhaps that’s why she begins hearing voices in her room at night—and seeing strange things that can’t be explained away by stress or anxiety or the number of drinks she’s been consuming.
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. To sign up, see library staff, or register online at Visit.LACountyLibrary.org/Events and filter by location or event date.
Where: Compton Library, LACL
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 29901 Ladyface Ct., Agoura Hills, CA 91301
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14345645
Black Lit Book Club: Night Flyer: Harriet Tubman and the Faith Dreams of a Free People at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss Night Flyer: Harriet Tubman and the Faith Dreams of a Free People by Tiya Miles, Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
Harriet Tubman is among the most famous Americans ever born and soon to be the face of the twenty-dollar bill. Yet often she’s a figure more out of myth than history, almost a comic-book superhero. Despite being barely five feet tall, unable to read, and suffering from a brain injury, she managed to escape from her own enslavement, return again and again to lead others north to freedom without loss of life, speak out powerfully against slavery, and then become the first American woman in history to lead a military raid, freeing some seven hundred people. You could almost say she’s America’s Robin Hood, a miraculous vision, often rightly celebrated but seldom understood.
Tiya Miles’s extraordinary Night Flyer changes all that. With her characteristic tenderness and imaginative genius, Miles explores beyond the stock historical grid to weave Tubman’s life into the fabric of her world. She probes the ecological reality of Tubman’s surroundings and examines her kinship with other enslaved women who similarly passed through a spiritual wilderness and recorded those travels in profound and moving memoirs. What emerges, uncannily, is a human being whose mysticism becomes more palpable the more we understand it—a story that offers us powerful inspiration for our own time of troubles. Harriet Tubman traversed many boundaries, inner and outer. Now, thanks to Tiya Miles, she becomes an even clearer and sharper signal from the past, one that can help us to echolocate a more just and sustainable path.
Tiya Miles is the Michael Garvey Professor of History at Harvard University, the author of five prizewinning works on the history of slavery and early American race relations, and a 2011 MacArthur Fellowship recipient. She was the founder and director of the Michigan-based ECO Girls program, and she is the author of the National Book Award–winning, New York Times bestselling All That She Carried. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Open Mic Night Every Friday Night at The Den Café, Santa Ana – In-Person Event
See you NEXT WEEK for a night of local talent, food, coffee and cocktails at The Den Cafe. A stage that’s been a home for OC’s artist since 1999.
Sign-ups start at 5:30 with @rodharrison66
Music starts at 6 pm
Spoken word and poetry are welcome!
Where: The Den Café
Date: Friday the 26h
Time: 6 pm (Doors at 5:30 pm)
Address: 125 N. Broadway, Santa Ana, CA 9270
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Triptych: a reading hosted by Shy Watson at Stories Books & Café – In-Person Event
Shy Watson is an incoming PhD candidate in Creative Writing & Literature at the University of Southern California. She has authored two full-length poetry collections: Horror Vacui (House of Vlad) and Cheap Yellow (Civil Coping Mechanisms).
Featuring:
Gabby Bess is the author of Alone with OtherPeople, Undercover Amish, and several children’s books.
Violetta Balkoff is a poet and writer whose work has appeared in XO Magazine. Her writing explores themes of love, heartbreak, and relationships, often in an intimate and reflective style.
Erin Taylor is an editor, poet, journalist, critic, and artist. Taylor is the author of the full-length poetry collection Bimboland (Archway, 2021) and has written for publications such as Allure, Observer, Bitch, and more. Often Taylor writes about the sex workers’ rights movement, complex trauma, and the internet.
Where: Stories Books & Café
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1716 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: https://storiesla.com/events
Guest Authors: S.A. Gibson, Shakyra Dunn, A.J. Runyon at Underdog Bookstore – In-Person Event
Underdog Bookstore presents an evening with authors S.A. Gibson, Shakyra Dunn, and E.J. Runyon.
Shakyra Dunn is a voice actor, singer, and author of The Final Lesson and The Sage’s Reign.
S.A. Gibson has been the lead editor for the SFN Anthology for 5 years.
E.J. Runyon is the author of a dozen books and a coach to over 40 authors as well as a professional editor.
Join us for community, conversation, book signings and more!
RSVP
Where: Underdog Bookstore
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 312 S. Myrtle Ave., Monrovia, CA 91016
Website: https://www.underdogbookstore.org/events/guest-authors-sa-gibson-shakyra-dunn-aj-runyon
Speakeasy Open Mic & Featured Guests with L.A. Poet Society at Bodevi Wine & Espresso Bar, San Fernando – In-Person Event
We love supporting our creative community. Come through and join our open mic and showcase your talents.
FEATURED GUESTS:
Poet, IDEAS AUBREY is a contemporary youth educator, poet, and spoken word artist who uses his personal life experiences to create powerful and positive poetry.
Musician, MARA GEORGE
Musician/Songwriter, ALEX INFINITY
Hosted by DIOSY, a San Fernando Valley native, is a co-founder of Voces Unidas en Pacoima!
Music set from DJ MOM
Support our fundraiser for KIND: Kids in Need of Defense, by donating towards our show, and participating in our raffles.
Help us reach our goal of raising $2500 for immigrant and refugee children. So far, we’ve raised nearly $1500! (THANK YOU!)
All genres are supported at our mic.
5 mins per person.
We can’t wait to see you shine.
All abilities and all folks welcome.
Hate speech is not tolerated.
Where: Bodevi Wine & Espresso Bar
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 7 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 909 San Fernando Rd., San Fernando, CA 91340
Website: https://www.instagram.com/losangelespoetsociety
Romance Book Club: The Irresistible Urge to Fall for Your Enemy at Chevalier’s – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Irresistible Urge to Fall for Your Enemy by Brigitte Knightley.
Meet Aurienne, a brilliant and dedicated healer, and Osric, a charismatic but morally questionable assassin. Their respective magical Orders are mortal enemies, and they despise each other on principle.
However, when Osric falls victim to a magical illness that’s slowly killing him, he realizes that Aurienne is the only one who can save him. He bribes her with the funding she desperately needs to help the sick in her own community, forcing them into a reluctant and highly volatile partnership. As they work together to find a cure and investigate a mysterious plague, their constant verbal sparring and undeniable tension slowly gives way to a grudging respect, and then something much, much more complicated. This is a slow-burn romance that doesn’t shy away from the “enemies” part, making the eventual swoon-worthy moments feel completely earned.
Where: Chevaliers’ Bookstore
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://chevaliersbooks.com/event/2025-09-26/romance-book-club-september
Book Event: Sasha Bonet, with X Mayo & The Waterbearers at Reparations Club – In-Person Event
Join Rep Club for a discussion on The Waterbearers: A Memoir of Mothers and Daughters, with author Sasha Bonét & moderator X Mayo
Betty Jean, the author’s grandmother, had a house along a bayou in Texas, a home paid for and run without a man by her side. This home served as the center of Bonét’s family’s universe, the one place that was a constant through all of life’s changes.
Mama Connie, one of Betty Jean’s eleven children, vowed that her life would be different. And in many ways it was: she got married, lived in suburbia, and built a life resembling the American dream. But when it came to raising children of her own, she was more like Betty Jean than she cared to admit. But, like her mother before her, Connie’s sweat was the founding salt of her own universe.
Today, Sasha Bonét navigates all aspects of being a mother—escape, promise, burden, assent, and rebellion—not just for the women in her family who came before her, but for Black women with whom society is acquainted, too: figures like Nina Simone, Betty Davis, and Darnella Frazier, who filmed the murder of George Floyd.
Generations of Black women have borne children, borne the burdens of events untold, and borne witness to unspeakable trials. The Waterbearers carries this history, its fierce eloquence capturing a masterpiece of life written by a author who is intimately acquainted with how Black women have passed down knowledge and culture. The author doesn’t just present genealogical lineages but illuminates the cultural and societal connections of strong Black women who have built legacies and changed the world, sometimes in the most mundane of moments. The fierce eloquence of this story confirms Sasha Bonét as a voice we all now need to hear.
SASHA BONÉT is a writer and cultural critic based in New York City. Her criticism and essays have appeared in The Paris Review, Aperture, New York Magazine, Vogue, and BOMB, among other publications. Bonét is a professor of creative writing for Columbia University and Barnard College.
X MAYO, Born and raised in South Central/Inglewood, X Mayo is an actor, writer, producer, comedian, and taco expert. She’s an Emmy Nominated writer who’s credits include; The Daily Show With Trevor Noah, The 2025 BET Awards, and the reboot of Hollywood Squares premiering on CBS this fall. X Mayo is a creative who has an emphasis on community building. Her brand Who Made The Potato Salad has done multiple entertainment workshops that have not only fostered community, but have gotten minorities hired within the industry. Their alumni have gone on to win NAACP Awards and gain employment at; The Daily Show, Showtime, Netflix, and Comedy Central. When X is not building her own table you can catch her on your screen starring in The Blackening, Freakier Friday, Season 3 of LOOT, and the new Marvel Series Wonderman, premiering on Disney Plus in December 2025. X is obsessed with 90’s black sitcoms and in her mind, she is Khadijah James. You can follow her and Who Made The Potato Salad? on IG @80dollarsandasuitcase @whomadethepotatosaladshow
Where: Reparations Club
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 3054 S. Victoria Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90016
At Skylight: Michelle Gurule, with Chris Belcher, & Thank You, John at Skylight – In-Person Event
Michelle Gurule, in conversation with Chris Belcher, will discuss Thank You, John.
Thank You, John is Best American Essays Notable Michelle Gurule’s debut memoir: a heartfelt, laugh-out-loud tragi-comedy of errors based on her time spent as an inexperienced sugarbaby in 2010s Denver.
Michelle, a queer, wanna-be writer exasperated by student loans, bad teeth, and the poor decisions of her loveable sitcom-worthy family, believes a sugar daddy is written in her density as firmly as she believes her idol, Alanis Morissette, holds the musical blueprint to the life she desires most.
With a salt-of-the-earth Chicano father who’s convinced aliens will eventually rule the world, a white mother who maxes out her credit cards on fast food, and a sugar-hyped 7-year-old nephew, Michelle diagnoses herself as self-parentified with a core mistrust in the world’s unreliability. Left to her own devices and barely making ends meet, she turns to the world of stripping until her chance for financial freedom arrives in the form of John, a lonely older man who offers her a weekly pile of cash for lively conversation and sex. She will keep her family, and only her family, availed of all the gritty details.
Grateful and convinced by the immediate improvement money makes in her life, sugaring takes the role of any other exploitative job in America- the physical wear and tear, competition between colleagues, the crossed personal boundaries, dangerous power imbalances, and the reliance on hierarchy to keep only the rich and powerful rich and powerful–it’s just a lot more intimate. A worthy sacrifice, right?
Michelle Gurule is a writer and educator based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Michelle earned her M.F.A. in Creative Nonfiction from the University of New Mexico in 2021. Her creative work explores the complexities of sex work, class, power and Michelle’s intersectional identity as a queer, white / Chicana woman. Her essays have appeared in Electric Literature, Slate, HuffPost Personals, The Offing, Joyland, StoryQuarterly, and elsewhere. In 2021, the excerpt, “Exit Route,” won StoryQuarterly’s Nonfiction Prize, judged by T Kira Maealani Madden and was later listed in Best American Essays Notables in 2022. Thank You, John is her debut memoir.
Chris Belcher is a writer and jointly appointed Associate Professor in the Writing Program and the Department of Gender & Sexuality Studies at the University of Southern California. Under her working name, Natalie West, she edited the acclaimed anthology We Too: Essays on Sex Work and Survival for the Feminist Press. Her debut memoir, Pretty Baby, was published by Simon & Schuster’s Avid Reader Press in 2022, and she is now in development with Cinetic Media on the TV adaptation. Her writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, Autostraddle, Catapult and elsewhere. Born and raised in West Virginia, she now lives in Los Angeles.
Where: Skylight
Date: Friday the 26th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-michelle-gurule-presents-thank-you-john-w-chris-belcher
Robert Oventile and Contributors & The Canyon at Vroman‘s – In-Person Event
Through poems and photos, The Canyon meditates on Eaton Canyon, a unique ecosystem nestled adjacent Pasadena and Altadena, California.
In January 2025, the Eaton Fire devastated the canyon, along with parts of Altadena and Pasadena. The Canyon reflects on the resilience of this environment, recalling how its wildlife, plants, and terrain rebounded after the 1993 Kinneloa Fire. Shaped by fire and now increasingly by human-driven climate change, Eaton Canyon is part of a larger story-one that climate scientists place within the evolving Earth System.
A celebration of Eaton Canyon’s beauty and endurance, The Canyon invites readers on a journey through an ever-changing landscape.
About the Author and the Photographers
Susan Hopkins has been an Eaton Canyon Docent Naturalist since 2018 and a UC California Naturalist since 2019. Susan’s passion is taking long in duration, very short on distance hikes in Eaton Canyon. The slower you go, the more you see. She is also a nature gossip.
Edgar McGregor is a meteorologist and environmentalist living in Southern California. He takes daily walks at Eaton Canyon to pick up litter, speak about environmental issues, and monitor changes to the park. He specializes in forecasting Santa Ana windstorms and aided in warning the Altadena community in the days before the 2025 Eaton Fire.
Tom Mills is an amateur nature and wildlife photographer who is one of many volunteer docents at the Eaton Canyon Natural Area. Born and raised on the North Shore of Long Island, N.Y., Tom relocated to California in 1988 and has lived in Pasadena, California with his wife, Simone, for over thirty years. Tom is also a member of the Pasadena Audubon Society, with whom he also volunteers his time and photographs for use in the Society’s publications.
Robert Savino Oventile hikes Eaton Canyon regularly. He is coauthor with Sandy Florian of Sophia Lethe Talks Doxodox Down (Atmosphere, 2021).
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Friday, the 26th
Time: 7 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-09-26/robert-oventile-and-contributors-read-discuss-sign-canyon
The Golden Mean: A USC & Beyond Baroque Reading Series at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person Event
A quarterly reading series at Beyond Baroque that brings together poets from the University of Southern California’s PhD in Creative Writing & Literature program with other notable poets from Los Angeles and beyond.
Featuring readings by T Bambrick, Douglas Manuel, Katheleen Maris Paltrineri, Eduardo Martínez-Leyva, and Nathan Xavier Osorio. This installment was curated by Liz Johnson and we are welcoming a new host for the series! Matthew Gellman, author of Beforelight, and a PhD candidate in literature and creative writing at USC, will be presenting the poets in The Wanda Coleman Theater.
Following the readings, be sure to join us for a reception & book signings.
About the Authors:
T Bambrick is the author of Intimacies, Received (Copper Canyon Press 2022), and Vantage (American Poetry Review/Honickman First Book Award 2019). Their work can be found in the New Yorker, The Nation, American Poetry Review, and elsewhere. A 2020 Wallace Stegner Fellow, they have received fellowships from the Sewanee Writer’s Conference, Community of Writers, Vermont Studio Center, and the Key West Literary Seminar, as well as scholarships from the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference and the Bread Loaf Environmental Writer’s Conference. She lives in Los Angeles and is a Dornsife Fellow in the creative writing PhD program at the University of Southern California.
Douglas Manuel was born in Anderson, Indiana and now resides in Long Beach, California. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Arizona State University, an MFA in poetry from Butler University, and a PhD in English Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Southern California. He is the author of two collections of poetry, Testify (2017) and Trouble Funk (2023). His poems and essays can be found in numerous literary journals, magazines, and websites, most recently Ploughshares and the Los Angeles Review of Books. He has traveled to Egypt and Eritrea with The University of Iowa’s International Writing Program to teach poetry. A recipient of the Dana Gioia Poetry Award and a fellowship from the Borchard Foundation Center on Literary Arts, he is an assistant professor of English at Whittier College and teaches at Spalding University’s low-res MFA program.
Kathleen Maris Paltrineri is a poet-translator from Iowa and the recipient of a Fulbright fellowship to Norway. Her translation of Norwegian poet Kristin Berget’s and when the light comes it will be so fantastic (Northwestern University Press, 2025) is supported by a Stanley Award for International Research and by NORLA, Norwegian Literature Abroad. For her own poetry, Paltrineri has received support from the Arctic Circle Residency, Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and Jentel Artist Residency. Her poems have recently appeared in Spoon River Poetry Review, Bone Bouquet, and Bennington Review.
Eduardo Martínez-Leyva, born in El Paso, TX, to Mexican immigrants, is the author of Cowboy Park, winner of the 2024 Felix Pollak Prize in Poetry from the University of Wisconsin Press. His work appears in Poetry Magazine, The Adroit Journal, Narrative Magazine, The Slowdown, The Hopkins Review, Best New Poets, and elsewhere. He has received fellowships from CantoMundo, The Frost Place, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Lambda Literary, and Columbia University, where he earned his MFA. He was a 2024 Get the Word Out publicity incubator participant with Poets & Writers and has served as writer-in-residence at St. Albans School for Boys in Washington, D.C.
Nathan Xavier Osorio’s debut collection of poetry, Querida (University of Pittsburgh Press), won the 2024 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize selected by Shara McCallum. He is the author of The Last Town Before the Mojave, selected by Oliver De la Paz as a recipient for the Poetry Society of America’s 2021 Chapbook Fellowship. He received his PhD in Literature from the University of California, Santa Cruz in Literature and holds an MFA in Poetry and Literary Translation from Columbia University’s School of the Arts. He was selected as a Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Irvine and his work has appeared in BOMB, Gulf Coast, The Rumpus, Boston Review, The Notre Dame Review, U.S. LatinX Art Forum, The Slowdown, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, and elsewhere. He is the 2025 Dartmouth Poet-in-Residence and an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Texas Tech University.
Matthew Gellman’s first book, Beforelight, was selected by Tina Chang as the winner of BOA Editions, Ltd.’s A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize. His second book, The Understudy, is forthcoming from Four Way Books in 2027. Matthew has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Brooklyn Poets, Adroit’s Djanikian Scholars Program, the Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Bread Loaf Writers Conference, and elsewhere. His poems have appeared in Bennington Review, Gulf Coast, Prairie Schooner, Poetry Northwest, Indiana Review, The Common, Lambda Literary’s Poetry Spotlight, and other publications. He is currently a PhD candidate in literature and creative writing at the University of Southern California.
L. A. Johnson is the author of the chapbook Little Climates (Bull City Press, 2017). She holds an MFA from Columbia University and a PhD from University of Southern California, where she is currently a Mellon Humanities and University of the Future postdoctoral fellow. The winner of the 2022 Mississippi Review Poetry Prize, the 2022 Greensboro Review Poetry Prize, the 2021 Arts & Letters Rumi Poetry Prize, her poems appear in The Atlantic, Poetry Magazine, and The Slowdown. She’s received support for her writing from Vermont Studio Center, Community of Writers, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and elsewhere. Find more about her at http://www.la-johnson.com.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Friday, the 26th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice Beach Los Angeles, CA 90291
Book Club for Middle Grade Readers: Mexikid by Pedro Martin via Fairfax Branch Library, LAPL– Online Kids/MG Event
Middle-grade readers are invited to participate in our fun monthly book discussions. This month, we will be reading Mexikid: A Graphic Memoir by Pedro Martín.
RSVP:
For more information email gkim@lapl.org for the Zoom link.
Where: Fairfax Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 10 am
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-club-middle-grade-readers-mexikid
Get Lit Free Poetry Club: Every Saturday, July through September 27th – In-Person Teen Event
Get Lit Poetry Club is offered every Saturday through September 27th, for teens ages 13 – 19.
Link in bio! Every Saturday starting July 19 from 10 am – 1 pm, teens are invited to a free poetry club at the Get Lit office in Los Angeles. This weekly space offers hands-on training in the craft of poetry, performance, and editing.
Writers will receive one-on-one support to help polish their work, connect with a diverse and passionate community, and explore real-world opportunities to share their voice.
No experience needed, just a willingness to show up and
truth.
Where: Get Lit Office
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 10 am – 1 pm
Address: 672 S. La Fayette Park Pl. #10, Los Angeles, CA 90057
Website: https://www.instagram.com
DA Poetry Lounge Workshops: Remember Why You Wrote It at Art Share L.A. – In-Person Event
Pages Matam will present the workshop Remember Why You Wrote It at Art Share L.A.
Check out Da Poetry Lounge’s September workshops for the month!
Where: Art Share L.A.
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 11 am – 1 pm
Address: 801 E. 4th Pl,. Los Angeles, CA 90013
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Ghost School: A Generative Workshop for “Haunted” Writers with Brendon Constantine at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person Event
In 1876, Emily Dickinson wrote “Nature is a Haunted House–but Art–a House that tries to be haunted.” Brendan Constantine presents ‘Ghost School,’ a generative workshop for ‘haunted’ writers! Join us for an afternoon of writing, discussion, games, and a few surprises as we confront the poem ‘that stays with you.’ All are welcome. Sufferers of ‘Writer’s Block’ strongly encouraged.
Brendan Constantine is a poet based in Los Angeles. His work has appeared in many standards, including Poetry, The Nation, Best American Poetry, and Poem a Day. His fifth collection, The Opposites Game, is forthcoming from Red Hen Press in 2026. He teaches at the Windward School and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Ticket purchase is required. Tickets will be available at the Beyond Baroque bookstore on the day of the workshop, but we recommend registering in advance through Eventbrite. Masks are encouraged while inside our center. Please arrive early.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Saturday, the 27th
Time: 11 am – 2 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice Beach Los Angeles, CA 90291
Dr. Haleh Massey & Say Something, Poupeh Babaee! at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
Dr. Haleh Massey will present her children’s book Say Something, Poupeh Babaee!
Uplifting and engaging, this story depicts the healing power of therapy, friendship, and familial bonds. This is a message of hope to all the awkward, overwhelmed immigrant children struggling to find acceptance.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-09-27/dr-haleh-massey
Mystery Book Club: Better the Blood at Westwood Branch Library, LAPL– In-Person Event
Read the book and join our lively discussion.
Participants will discuss Better the Blood by Michael Bennett,
Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 11:30 am
Address: 1246 Glendon Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90024
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-14
Book Club Discussion: The Grief Keeper at Felipe de Neve Branch Library, LAPL– In-Person Event
Join us for a book club discussion of The Grief Keeper by Alexandra Villasante.
Sign up in person at the library and receive a free book while supplies last. Any questions? Please email felipe@lapl.org.
Coffee, tea and snacks will be served.
Where: Felipe de Neve Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 11:30 am – 12:30 pm
Address: 2820 W. 8th St., Los Angeles, CA 90057
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-club-discussion-grief-keeper-alexandra-villasante
Open Mic Poetry & Guest Martin Jago at Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL– In-Person Event
Share your original poems, lyrics, spoken word, or just enjoy listening. Each poet will have five minutes to read an original work. If you wish to read, sign up when you arrive.
Our featured speaker will be Martin Jago. Martin is a British-American poet based in Los Angeles, author of Photofit (Pindrop Press, 2023) and the forthcoming chapbook Black Plastic Blues (Finishing Line, 2026). His writing has appeared widely in literary magazines like Agenda, Acumen, The Moth, LIT Magazine, Presence, The Penn Review, The High Window, The Indianapolis Review, Tupelo Quarterly, and Sierra Nevada Review, among others. He holds a Master’s in Creative Writing from the University of Oxford where he was an F.H. Pasby Prize finalist and H.E.F.C.E. scholar.
Where: Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 1 pm
Address: 5027 Caspar Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90041
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/open-mic-poetry-13
Saturday Afternoon Book Club: The Ugly Side of Me at Vermont Square Branch Library, LAPL– In-Person Event
This month, we’re diving into The Ugly Side of Me by Nikita Lynnette Nichols. Don’t miss this chance to share your insights and connect with fellow book lovers in a welcoming, thoughtful environment.
Where: Vermont Square Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 1 pm
Address: 1201 W. 48th St., Los Angeles, CA 90037
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/saturday-afternoon-book-club-2
Weekend Book Club: Whan Javi Dumped Mari: A Novel at Carson Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join a facilitated discussion of fiction and nonfiction titles. A limited number of titles are available for attendees to pick up at the library.
September’s Book: When Javi Dumped Mari: A Novel by Mia Sosa. For adults.
Where: Carson Library, LACL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 2 pm – 3 pm
Address: 151 E. Carson St., Carson, CA 90745
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14496315
Meet & Greet: Terry McMillan & It Was the Way She Said It at Octavia’s Bookshelf – In-Person Event
Terry McMillan, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Waiting To Exhale and How Stella Got Her Groove Back will be with us for a meet and greet! This is NOT an event to be missed, so RSVP at the link at website! RSVP includes a copy of her September 9th release, It Was The Way She Said It, as well as an opportunity to meet Terry and get your book signed.
Whether she’s revealing life lessons, pontificating about aging, recalling her sources of inspiration, or laying bare the beginnings of her life as a writer, McMillan approaches every piece with enduring candor, wit, and fearlessness.
Devoted fans and new readers alike will be delighted to discover these treasures spanning McMillan’s long, groundbreaking career. Indeed, it wasn’t only what Terry McMillan has said that made her so beloved…it was the way she said it.
RSVP
Where: Octavia’s Bookshelf
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 2 pm – 4 pm
Address: 1353 North Hill Ave., Pasadena, CA 91104
Website: https://www.octaviasbookshelf.com/events/meet-greet-with-terry-mcmillan
Miriam’s Garden Poetry Series at Hyde Park Miriam Matthews Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join host librarian Yago Cura for the Miriam’s Garden Poetry Reading Series.
Featured Guests include:
Laura Sermeño was born in Montebello, CA, raised and educated in Sur El Monte, (UCLA matriculated), educated by her people—from the classrooms to the streets. In 2012, she began auditioning for spoken word performances. In 2015, she was accepted into the Voices of our Nation’s (VONA) Southern California Regional Workshop, focusing on “Poetry as Documentary.” Last year she published her first full-length poetry collection, born to cry. She teaches and resides in Pasadena, CA.
Pam Concepcion is an interdisciplinary artist, experimenting with different mediums like poetry, screenwriting, graphic design, digital collage art, and video editing. She loves writing about how complex social phenomena intimately affect our relationships with ourselves, friends, loves, family, and everyone else around us. She is currently working on her first book, Unbecoming, a collection of poetry, photos and collages about a young girl’s coming of age.
Plus: Special Guests.
Where: Carson Library, LACL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 2:30 pm – 4 pm
Address: 2205 W. Florence Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90043
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Arroyo Book Club at Arroyo Seco Regional Branch Library, LAPL– In-Person Event
Join us for a lively book discussion.
RSVP:
Email ayosco@lapl.org with questions or for participation details.
Where: Arroyo Seco Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 3 pm
Address: 61r45 N. Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90042
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/arroyo-book-club
Creative Writing Group at Central Library, LAPL– In-Person Event
Calling all writers of fiction, screenplays, poetry, etc. Get feedback on your writing in a fun, supportive environment! The Central Library Creative Writing Group meets every other Saturday for fellowship, feedback, and snacks. Meetings start out with a short writing prompt exercise, then writers are invited to share up to five pages of their work for feedback from the group. Whether you are just starting out or well on your way to glory, join us and banish (at least temporarily) those Lonely Writer Blues!
RSVP:
Please RSVP by emailing fiction@lapl.org.
Where: Central Library, LAPL, Meeting Room B
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 3 pm – 5 pm
Address: 630 W. 5th St., Los Angeles, CA 90071
Website: https://lapl.org/whats-on/events/creative-writing-group
Saturday Afternoon Poetry Features: Andy Palasciano & Michelle Smith via Zoom Event – Online Event
Andy Palasciano & Michelle Smith will read and discuss their work + poets published in Four Feathers Press online edition:Drink Down.
Don Kingfisher Campbell hosts and curates these events.
Where: Saturday Afternoon Poetry
Date: Saturday, the 27th
Time: 3 pm – 5 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://saturdayafternoonpoetry.blogspot.com
BCB Presents Booked By Berkeley at Bel Canto Books – In-Person Event
More information coming soon!
Where: Bel Canto Books, KUBO Long Beach
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 3976 Atlantic Ave, Long Beach, CA 90807
Website: https://belcantobooks.net/events
Nonfiction Book Club: The Devil in the White City at West Hollywood Library, LACL – In-Person Event
We will read and discuss The Devil in the White City by Eric Larson. For adults.
Where: West Hollywood Library, LACL
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 625 N, San Vicente Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14271544
Lanzamiento de Libro: Demonios de Huáscar Robles at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center – In-Person & Online Livestream Event
Lectura y Conversación con el autor Huáscar Robles junto a Margarita Pintado Burgos y Sidharta Ochoa.
Join us for the book launch of the second edition of Demonios (Abismos Editorial), the latest novel by Huáscar Robles. A sharp and humorous exploration of adolescence, religion, identity, and social tensions in the contemporary Caribbean. Robles will be joined in conversation by poet and literary critic Margarita Pintado Burgos and writer, editor, and translator Sidharta Ochoa. After the readings, join us for a reception in the Poets’ Garden and book signings by the authors.
Margarita Pintado Burgos writes poetry, creative nonfiction, and literary criticism. She is the author of four poetry collections, including Una muchacha que se parece a mí/A Girl Who Looks Like Me, which received the 2015 Institute of Puerto Rican Culture Poetry Prize, and Ojo en celo/Eye in Heat, winner of the 2023 Ambroggio Prize from the Academy of American Poets and the University of Arizona Press. A 2022 Letras Boricuas Fellow from the Mellon and Flamboyán Foundations, Pintado Burgos earned her PhD in Spanish from Emory University and is currently a professor of literature and creative writing in San Diego, California. Since 2021, she has directed the poetry website Distropika.
Huáscar Robles is a writer and journalist from Caguas, Puerto Rico, and a 2024 Letras Boricuas Fellow from the Mellon and Flamboyán Foundations. He is the author of the novel Demonios (Secta de los Perros, 2022) and the nonfiction book Puerto Príncipe: Temblemos Todos (La Cifra, 2017). His fiction and essays have been published in NYU’s Temporales, Chicago Tribune, and Evento Horizonte. Robles’s work explores identity, repression, bilingualism, and the historical memory of the Caribbean.
Sidharta Ochoa, writer, editor, and translator, published in México, Perú and Argentina. She was a recipient of a scholarship in the Young Creators Category FONCA- México. Sidharta received the Brazilian Publishers scholarship in 2019, the translation support grant from the Portuguese Ministry of Culture and DGLAB (2019), and the Latvian Literature for Publishers grant in 2019 and 2020. She was awarded the Magdalena Mondragón National Literature Prize- México in the Essay Category (2019), the Camões, I.P. Editing and Translation Support Grant in Portugal (2021), and the KPIPA (Korea) grant in 2023. Her latest short story collection is La ilusión de la ligereza (Typotaller, 2025).
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Saturday, the 27th
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice Beach Los Angeles, CA 90291
Philosophy Book Club: The Coin at Chevaliers Books – In-Person Event
The Coin by Yasmin Zaher follows a wealthy, unnamed Palestinian woman as she navigates life as a teacher and an outsider in New York City. It offers a fascinating and complex case study by both engaging with and subverting the traditional Western gaze on the “Orient.”
The book challenges the audience to confront their own preconceived notions about what a “Palestinian story” should look like. It resists easy moralizing and instead presents a character who is defined by her contradictions—her wealth and her displacement, her desire for both connection and complete isolation, her trauma and her agency. The Coin forces a re-examination of Orientalism, not just as a historical or political concept, but as a deeply personal and psychological experience that shapes one’s identity and existence.
Where: Chevalier’s
Date: Saturday, the 27th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://chevaliersbooks.com/event/2025-09-27/philosophy-book-club-september
Vroman’s On Screen: Stephen Rebello, with Alonso Duralde, & Signs Criss-Cross: The Making of Hitchcock’s Dazzling, Subversive Masterpiece Strangers on a Train at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
For the very first time the tense and drama-filled story of the making Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train is revealed as author Stephen Rebello takes readers deep into the shadows and light of one of the most subversive, corrosively funny, and beloved suspense thriller masterworks.
Richly documented, meticulously researched, and stylishly written, Criss-Cross is more than an authoritative film book. It is a portrait of an especially politically paranoid, misogynistic, and homophobic era in America, a time of dramatic transition in the entertainment industry, and a day of reckoning for Alfred Hitchcock and a few other talents with whom he made a dark, resonant, and prescient work of art.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2025-09-27/stephen-rebello
Historical Fiction Book Club: We Are Green and Trembling at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Participants will read and discuss We Are Green and Trembling by Gabriela Cabezón Cámara.
Based on the life of Antonio de Erauso, a real figure of the Spanish conquest, We Are Green and Trembling is a queer baroque satire and a historical novel that blends elements of the picaresque with surreal storytelling. Its rich and wildly imaginative language forms a searing criticism of conquest and colonialism, religious tyranny, and the treatment of women and indigenous people. It is a masterful subversion of Latin American history with a trans character at its center, finding in the rainforest a magical, surreal space where transformation is not only possible but necessary.
The Argentine writer Gabriela Cabezón Cámara (b. 1968) has worked at varied jobs, from selling car insurance in the street to cultural journalism. She is the author of the novels Slum Virgin, Romance of the Blonde Brunette, and The Adventures of China Iron, which was shortlisted for the International Booker and Médicis prizes. She is an environmental activist and a co-founder of the feminist movement Ni una menos.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 5 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/historical-fiction-book-club-we-are-green-and-trembling
Noir at the Bar Event: Mystery Writers at The Book Jewel – In-Person Event
Don’t miss our mystery event of the fall! Noir at the Bar — Saturday, September 27 at 6 pm. #noiratthebar #thebookjewel #mysterywriters #murdermystery #independentbookstore.
Featuring:
John Lansing is the author of six thrillers featuring Jack Bertolino—The Devil’s Necktie, Blond Cargo, Dead Is Dead, The Fourth Gunman, 25 To Life, and Mia, the prequel—as well as the true-crime non-fiction book Good Cop Bad Money, written with former NYPD Inspector Glen Morisano. Embedded is John’s first thriller in the Dakota Judd series. He’s been a writer and supervising producer on network television, and the co-executive producer of the ABC series Scoundrels and co-wrote two MOWs for CBS.
Patricia Smiley is the author of the Tucker Sinclair mysteries and the Pacific Homicide series. Her short fiction has been featured in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and Two of the Deadliest, an anthology edited by Elizabeth George. A Dark September Night is the first book in her new Justice Bay series, which is set in a small coastal town in Northern California.
Carl Vonderau is an award-winning author of crime fiction. Even as a child in Cleveland, he loved to write. But it took a long time to become a full-time author. His debut thriller, Murderabilia, won Left Coast Crime and San Diego Book awards. Saving Myles, his second novel, won the American BookFest, Pencraft, and National Indie Excellence awards for Best Mystery/Suspense.
Michelle Gagnon is a former modern dancer, bartender, dog walker, model, personal trainer, freelance journalist, and Russian supper club performer. Critics agree that her performance at most of these professions was middling at best. Her bestselling thrillers have been published in dozens of languages worldwide and were nominated for a Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense and a Thriller Award. Shei is the author of Slaying You, Book 1 and Book 2.
Nolan Knight is the author of Gallows Dome, The Neon Lights Are Veins, and Beneath the Black Palms. He is a fourth generation Angeleno and former staff writer for Los Angeles’ Biggest Music Publication, the L.A. Record. His short fiction has been featured in various publications including Akashic Books, Thuglit, Shotgun Honey, Starlite Pulp, and Action, Spectacle. His work has been met with praise by luminaries such as Barry Gifford, James Sallis, Allison Anders, and Lydia Lunch. His latest novel, The Gorgon of Los Feliz, is out now from Down & Out Books.
Lauren Ling Brown is the author of Reese’s Book Club Pick and USA Today Bestseller, Society of Lies. Before starting her career, Brown received a BA in English literature from Princeton University and an MFA in film production with a focus in screenwriting from the USC School of Cinematic Arts.
Holly Overton is a TV writer and producer with over a decade of experience. Her fourth novel, The Mothers’ Guide to the Apocalypse will be published August 2025. Her debut thriller, Baby Doll was an international bestseller and was published in eleven countries. Her 2nd novel, The Walls was released Aug. 2017. Her 3rd novel The Runaway will be published Spring 2019. An identical twin, Hollie grew up in Kingsville, Texas but now resides in LA with her husband, David, and her triplets. Yes, she is tired and no she doesn’t know how she does it.
Hosted by Eric Beetner, a writer/filmmaker from Los Angeles with over 25 books and more than 100 short stories published. He also hosts the podcast Writer Types and the Noir at the Bar reading series in L.A.
Where: The Book Jewel
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 6259 W. 87th St., Westchester, CA 90045
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Heartbeats Circle & Open Mic: Palabra del Pueblo at The Libros, Lincoln Heights – In-Person Event
Happy LAtinx Heritage Month! From L A Poetry Society!
Guest Host Mariana Franco welcomes features: Bri Stokes, Jennifer Baptiste & Hope Cerna.
We are honored to feature these versatile and talented Afro/LAtinx Poets:
BRI STOKES is a writer, editor, curator, cultural worker, producer and poet born, raised and living in Los Angeles, on unceded Tongva land. Her writing has appeared in BuzzFeed, 45th Parallel, Epiphany, the Northridge Review, and elsewhere. Bri is a former poetry editor at the now-disbanded Hecate Magazine, and served as the Managing Editor of Issue 04 of SKEW Magazine. Her debut chapbook, A Throat Full of Forest-Dirt, was published in late-2023 by Bottlecap Press. Earlier in 2023, she was longlisted for Thin Air Magazine’s “The Bird In Your Hands” prize for poetry. In 2018, she was awarded “Best Short Story” by the El Camino College Myriad for her speculative fiction piece, “Pr(e)y.” Bri is a 2024 Voodoonauts Fellow and an editorial assistant at HINCHAS Press.
JENNIFER BAPTISTE aka Miss B is a poetry writer, academic librarian and voice actress based in Los Angeles. She loves creating relatable stories for children and also shares her adult poetry in various literary publications and personal zines. Follow her daily creative life through social media on @WheresMsB!
HOPE CERNA is the author of the debut collection A Sentimental Garden.
~~~~ Join our mic, open to ALL ARTISTS ~~~
We curate a safe space to all good humans.
No hate speech is tolerated.
FREE SHOW. Sign up at the event. Each person gets 5 mins!
Bring a donation to help us fundraise for KIND: Kids in Need of Defense.
We are only $1000 away from our goal!
https://fundraise.supportkind.org/fundraise/la-poet-society
Where: The Libros, Lincoln Heights
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 6 pm
Address: 3422S.Broadway, Lincoln Heights, CA 90042
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Poetry Book Launch: Barbara Fant & Joy in the Belly of a Riot at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Join us for the launch of Barbara Fant’s newest poetry collection, Joy in the Belly of a Riot!
Barbara will be joined by an all-star group of poets and authors to read from this life-affirming collection about survival and the divine.
Get your tickets on EVENTBRITE!
About the book:
The acclaimed poetic force celebrates the practice of poetry as healing and prayer in this vital, life-affirming collection about surviving the void and touching the divine—the second book in a creative collaboration between Amistad and Moore Black Press.
At age fifteen, Barbara Fant tragically lost her mother, and her world was suddenly upended. “I became an angry teenager. I was mad at the world.,” she recalls. “I even stopped praying, but I began to write. Poetry became my way of communication, my way of processing…it became my way to pray.”
Rebirth, renewal, and healing are the heart of Joy in the Belly of a Riot. Fant’s monumental collection is a continuation of her lifelong project of using poetry as prayer; this is healing-informed poetry to restore herself, her community, and the world. Exquisitely lyrical and boldly resonant, Fant’s poems excavate the nightmares of a childhood marked by poverty, violence, racism, and the loss of countless loved ones. Suffering seemed endemic to neighborhoods like hers, and yet, in Fant’s own words, “I keep trying to write about the trauma, but the joy won’t let me.”
Steeped in a rich Black Christian tradition and drawing on Scripture for artistic inspiration, Fant’s verse offers solace and guidance for all, from the devout to the skeptical. In these poems Fant demands that we see her, and her community, through more than our grief. As she closes this profound collection, Fant gently preaches that we choose life and reminds us that “wholeness is our birthright.”
Joy in the Belly of a Riot is a healing balm in times of sustained uncertainty and a rock upon which we can build and sustain a foundation of joy. Fant’s essential message demands to be heard, now more than ever.
About the participants:
Barbara Fant is an acclaimed poet who has been writing and performing for over fifteen years. She has competed in nine National Poetry Slam competitions and placed 8th out of 96 poets in the 2017 Women of the World Poetry Slam. She is the author of two poetry collections: Paint, Inside Out (2010) from Penmanship Books and Mouths of Garden (2022) from Sundress Publications. Her work has been featured in the Academy of American Poets, Electric Literature, McNeese Review, The Ohio State University Press, Button Poetry, and Def Poetry Jam, amongst others. Additionally, she has received residencies in Havana, Cuba and Senegal, West Africa.
Natashia Deón is a two-time NAACP Image Award Nominee for Outstanding Literature, practicing criminal attorney and author of the critically acclaimed novels, GRACE and The Perishing. GRACE was named a Best Book of the Year by the New York Times and awarded Best Debut Novel by the American Library Association’s Black Caucus. A Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award Nominee for Outstanding Fiction and a PEN America Fellow, Deón has also been awarded fellowships and residencies at Yale, Prague’s Creative Writing Program, and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. She is a professor of creative writing at UCLA and Antioch University. Her personal essays have been featured in The New York Times, Harper’s, The Los Angeles Times, Harper’s Bazaar, American Short Fiction, Buzzfeed, and other places.
bridgette bianca is a poet and professor from South Central Los Angeles. She received her Bachelor of Arts in English from Howard University and her Master of Fine Arts in Writing from Otis College of Art & Design. bridgette bianca has performed her poetry all around Southern California. bridgette bianca’s work as a writer and an educator seeks to serve the people and moments most forget or ignore. Her first book of poetry, be/trouble, was released by Writ Large Press in 2020. She also guest-hosts literary events across Los Angeles and is one-half of the literary curating teams Making Room for Black Women with Sanura Williams and South Central Spits Fire with GusTavo Guerra Vasquez. When she is not sharing her poetry, she hosts two Instagram series, Young, Black, and Tenure-Track, where she documents her experiences in higher education and We Be Readin! Wednesdays, where she discusses her romance reading obsession!
Yazmin Monet Watkins is a poet, comedian, screenwriter, actress, educator, organizer, avid roller skater, and adventurer. She can be seen on season two of Grand Crew and has co-developed and written pilots with Netflix and Comedy Central alongside Paul Downs, Lucia Aniello and the all-Black female comedy group, Obama’s Other Daughters. She has empowered audiences at countless universities, festivals, and institutions and has had commissioned work with prestigious institutions including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the California African American Museum, Center Theatre Group and The Lincoln Center. Her full-length book of poems, A Vessel Born to Float with Andrews McMeel Publishing is available now. Watkins’ serves as the co-chair of the Arts & Culture committee for Black Lives Matter Los Angeles and her body of work weaves art and activism, exploring the intersection of race, gender, sexuality, self-love, and all things Black Girl Magic. Once Beyoncé said she liked her hair.
Alyesha Wise is an award-winning, published poet, educator and speaker from Camden, N.J. Currently residing in LA, she is the Director of Programming for Street Poets, Inc., an organization mostly serving juvenile injustice-impacted youth with mentorship and arts programming. Alyesha has been featured on platforms and in publications such as OWN TV, BET, LA Times, Bustle, Afropunk, PBS, Buzzfeed and more. Other collabs include the ACLU, The Shabazz Center, The Nantucket Project, Brave New Films and the Google Interstellar Project. Ron Howard once wrote about Alyesha’s work, “Very Powerful.” Her collection of poetry, My Older Brother, A Famous Rapper, will be released in summer of 2025 by El Martillo Press.
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd.,1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Queer Novel Book Club: The Song of Achilles at Bel Canto Books with @LogansLovelyLibrary – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller.
Space is limited. RSVP
Where: Bel Canto Books at Logans Lovely Library
Date: Saturday the 27th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 2106 E. 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Melrose Trading Post: L.A. Poet Society at Greenway Arts Alliance at Melrose Trading Post at Fairfax H.S. – In-Person Event
The Melrose Trading Post is a pioneering arts-based marketplace held every Sunday at Fairfax High School in Los Angeles, CA with 275 local creative small business vendors, delicious food booths and local live music.
MTP was founded in 1997 with a mission to champion small businesses, art, and community. The market funds Greenway Arts Alliance’s arts education programming and provides employment and leadership development opportunities for students at Fairfax High School.
JOIN us in space R18 each Sunday, from 11 am – 5 pm.
All poems are donation-based, so you name your price.
NOTE: Check every Sunday for story time and reading events
Where: Melrose Trading Post, Greenway Main Stage at Fairfax HS
Date: Sunday, the 28th
Time: 10 am – 5 pm (market); 11 am – 5 pm (poets on demand)
Address: 7850 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90046
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Sunday Storytime at Chevaliers Books – In-Person Event
Join us for Storytime at Chevalier’s Books; bring your little one to enjoy some reading from your local booksellers, special guests, or local volunteers!
Contact us if you would like to be a volunteer reader, and we will see you at the bookstore.
As always, our storytime events are always free to attend, but we strongly recommend you RSVP so that we can accommodate all who wish to attend.
Where: Chevalier’s
Date: Sunday, the 28th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://chevaliersbooks.com/event/2025-09-28/sunday-storytime-chevaliers
Brunch Bites & Books: Women in a Golden State Anthology at LibroMobile, Santa Ana – In-Person Event
Join us for a local contributors celebration & LMAC’s Black Wall Series featuring Stacy Russo!
Join us for a Local Contributors Celebration with: Lisa Alvarez, Debby Arrin, Lisa Black, Mary Camarillo, Kathleen Gunton, Jan Hanson, Elizabeth Iannaci, Ruthie Marlenée, Penelope Moffet, & Robbi Nester.
Where: LibroMobile
Date: Sunday, the 28th
Time: 11 am – 2 pm
Address: 1150 S. Bristol St., A3, Santa Ana, CA 92704
Kids Graphic Novel Reading: Dr. Haleh Massey & Say Something, Poupeh Babaee! at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Kids Event
Join us for a special reading presented by Dr. Haleh Massey of Say Something, Poupeh Babaee!
Dr Massey’s work explores immigration and empathy through the lens of an Iranian-born girl. Join us for a thoughtful and funny reading.
Poupeh Babaee is an Iranian girl sent to live with her relatives in the United States. Although Poupeh understands and speaks English, the stress of entering a new school in a foreign land renders her mute, and she is diagnosed with selective mutism. Worse yet, a travel ban–which labels Iran a “dangerous country”–has barred her parents from entering the US! Poupeh must now overcome her selective mutism to advocate for her parents during an interview with an embassy consular officer if she ever wants to see them again.
Dr. Haleh Massey is a clinical psychologist and LMFT. In addition to Say Something, Poupeh Babaee! illustrated by Ghazal Qadri (Little Bee Books), her middle grade novel, Hairy Man Suit (Lee & Low), comes out Spring ’26, and its sequel, Seventh Grade Blues (Lee & Low) in Spring ’27
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Barney Saltzberg Storytime at Children’s Book World – In-Person Event
Sunday storytime fun with drawing & music and beloved picture book creator, Barney Saltzberg!
Join beloved author & illustrator Barney Saltzberg in person at Children’s Book World to celebrate his newest magical picture book, Rabbit’s Feat.
In a vast, open desert, Boulder is convinced that today is the day he’ll see his shy friend Cactus’s flowers bloom. “I’ve dreamt of seeing them up close,” he tells her. But Boulder is too far away, and he can’t move anyway! Nonetheless, Boulder is certain today will be different. Cactus isn’t so sure, but Boulder believes. Unbeknownst to the two friends, enterprising Rabbit observes their plight and decides to help out. As Boulder and Cactus talk more about their dreams, Rabbit works harder and harder to make their wish a reality. The task is sisyphean, but with courage, determination, and a little bit of kismet, Rabbit might just move mountains.
Barney Saltzberg is the bestselling author of over 40 books for children, including One of These is Not Like the Others, Hug This Book, Beautiful Oops! and the Animal Kisses series, with over 800,000 copies in print. He has also recorded four albums of songs for children. He lives in Los Angeles.
Where: Children’s Book World
Date: Sunday, the 28th
Time: 11:30 am
Address: 10580 ½ W. Pico Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90064
Website: https://childrensbookworld.com/event/2025-09-28/barney-saltzberg-storytime
La Palabra Reading Series & Open Mic: Soledad Con Carne & Tauri at Avenue 50 Studio, Highland Park – In-Person Event
La Palabra host Pam Concepcion hosts features Soledad Con Carne and Tauri, plus an Open Mic.
Soledad Con Carne is a casually queer, intergalactic Oakland/Ohlone-based Chicanx punk poet, working/poor multiple high school drop-out, bookstore lackey, San Fernando Valley poet laureate, and blatant smoker sharing-trauma-with-their-mother.
Tauri (she/her/he/him/they/ella) graduated from Cal State San Bernardino with an MFA in creative writing. They were born and grew up in East LA where the tacos are abundant and the music and art are found on almost every esquina, from corridos to punk. Tauri is a part of the Los Angeles Poet Society and is the Chief Editor of Acid Verse Literary Journal. They are also a part of California Poets in The Schools and teach poetry.
Where do we find resistance in nature? How do plants or animals fight and protect themselves in their current habitats? Like a cactus growing spines and storing water, or a snake, waiting to strike its prey, camouflaging amongst rocks, or beavers building dams to reshape ecosystems— there is an instinctive subversiveness in the need to adapt or survive. Those of us who live in highly urbanized areas tend to forget how we too are part of nature so how do we re-awaken these spirits within our modernized minds?
Touch (figurative) grass with our features Soledad @soledadconcarne and Tauri on the 4th Sunday of the month 🦗 There will be poetry, art and an open mic set afterwards!
We highly encourage our open mic volunteers to come early, write ekphrastic poetry on our current exhibit Re-emerging Spirits by Will Loya @loyawill, and hopefully share it on the mic! Our open mic has no strict themes (rough drafts are loved!). You are welcome to read another poet’s work too.
Where: Avenue 50 Studio
Date: Sunday, the 28th
Time: 2 pm – 4 pm
Address: 3714 N. Figueroa St., Highland Park, CA 90065
Website: https://www.instagram.com
La Palabra Reading Series & Open Mic: Soledad Con Carne & Tauri at Avenue 50 Studio, Highland Park – In-Person Event
La Palabra host Pam Concepcion hosts features Soledad Con Carne and Tauri, plus an Open Mic.
Soledad Con Carne is a casually queer, intergalactic Oakland/Ohlone-based Chicanx punk poet, working/poor multiple high school drop-out, bookstore lackey, San Fernando Valley poet laureate, and blatant smoker sharing-trauma-with-their-mother.
Tauri (she/her/he/him/they/Ella) graduated from Cal State San Bernardino with an MFA in creative writing. They were born and grew up in East LA where the tacos are abundant and the music and art are found on almost every esquina, from corridos to punk. Tauri is a part of the Los Angeles Poet Society and is the Chief Editor of Acid Verse LIterary Journal. They are also a part of California Poets in The Schools and teach poetry.
Where do we find resistance in nature? How do plants or animals fight and protect themselves in their current habitats? Like a cactus growing spines and storing water, or a snake, waiting to strike its prey, camouflaging amongst rocks, or beavers building dams to reshape ecosystems— there is an instinctive subversiveness in the need to adapt or survive. Those of us who live in highly urbanized areas tend to forget how we too are part of nature so how do we re-awaken these spirits within our modernized minds?
Touch (figurative) grass with our features Soledad @soledadconcarne and Tauri on the 4th Sunday of the month 🦗 There will be poetry, art and an open mic set afterwards!
We highly encourage our open mic volunteers to come early, write ekphrastic poetry on our current exhibit Re-emerging Spirits by Will Loya @loyawill, and hopefully share it on the mic! Our open mic has no strict themes (rough drafts are loved!). You are welcome to read another poet’s work too.
Where: Avenue 50 Studio
Date: Sunday, the 28th
Time: 2 pm – 4 pm
Address: 3714 N. Figueroa St., Highland Park, CA 90065
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Author Event: Daniel Olivas & Chicano Frankenstein at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Cellar Door welcomes Chicano Frankenstein author, Daniel A. Olivas, to join our Latinx Book Club on Sunday, September 28th at 2:00 pm. We’re inviting everyone to come and listen as Daniel talks about his all too timely novel, Chicano Frankenstein.
An unnamed paralegal, brought back to life through a controversial process, maneuvers through a near-future world that both needs and resents him. As the United States president spouts anti-reanimation rhetoric and giant pharmaceutical companies rake in profits, the man falls in love with lawyer Faustina Godínez. His world expands as he meets her network of family and friends, setting him on a course to discover his first-life history, which the reanimation process erased. With elements of science fiction, horror, political satire and romance, Chicano Frankenstein confronts our nation’s bigotries and the question of what it truly means to be human.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 2 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com
Palabras Literary Salon: Jose Enrique Medina & Haunt Me at Latinx With Plants – In-Person Event
Celebrate stories with BIPOC poets + writer among plants with host Jen Cheng. Light reception.
Featured guest Jose Enrique Medina will read and discuss his book Haunt Me, winner of the Rattle Chapbook Prize.
José Enrique Medina earned his BA in English from Cornell University. He is the author of Haunt Me, winner of the 2025 Rattle Chapbook Prize, forthcoming in September. His poetry and fiction have appeared in Best Microfiction 2019, The Los Angeles Review, The Tahoma Review, Burnside Review, and many other publications. A VONA fellow and frequent poetry slam judge, he writes with heart, heat, and just the right amount of haunt. He is the founder of the Chickens and Poetry Residency for Writers. When he’s not wrangling words, he’s usually on his ranch in Whittier, chasing after bunnies and baby chicks. Connect with Medina on Instagram @MedinaWrites or http://www.MedinaWrites.com
As Medina describes the theme:
Haunting isn’t just about ghosts—it’s what lingers when someone dies and leaves behind a secret, a wound, or a question. Our ancestors don’t always leave quietly; sometimes they leave messes, mysteries, or stories still unfolding through us.
Our guest readers circle includes: Anisa Abeytia, Chen Gu, Gia Civerolo, Jean Trinh, Caleb Luna, Steve Valenzuela, Peter Lechuga, Pallavi Dhawan, Ramón García, Ceasar Avelar, Yash Bhutada, Nancy Lynée Woo, Amy Shimshon-Santo, James Fujinami-Moore, and Jen Cheng.
RSVP & donation: bit.ly/sep2025palabras or www.jencvoice.com/palabras
Where: Latinx with Plants
Date: Sunday, the 28th
Time: 2 pm – 3:30 pm
Address: 2208 Cesar Chavez, Los Angeles, CA 90033
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/palabras-literary-salon-september-2025-edition-tickets-1653546795979
Soft Power Matters: A Poetry Event: 7 Poets in Cholla Needles Journal at Matter Studio Gallery – In-Person Event
Soft Power Matters, our next POETRY EVENT with 7 poets published in the Cholla Needles Journal.
Romaine Washington (she/her) is the editor of These Black Bodies Are…A Blacklandia Anthology, and Cholla Needles Issue 88; she is also the author of two poetry books, Purgatory Has an Address and Sirens in Her Belly.
Angela M. Franklin is a poet, essayist, visual artist, activist, and documentarian. She holds an MFA from Antioch University Los Angeles and is a fellow of Cave Canem, VONA fellow, and Hurston Wright. Her work is published in anthologies such as Korean Anthology Flowers Blooming from Scars: 30 Year Anniversary of LA Riots, The Gathering, Peregrine: Black Voices Speak, The Best of Poetry Salon, Voices of Leimert Park Redux, and online publications Cultural Weekly, Portside and Spectrum.
Franklin has two books underway. Leather Sundays is a memoir examining violence’s impact on a Black family and its neighboring community. The second book is a collection of poetry, Cutting Through Keloids. @angelamurielfranklin
Lisa Cheby, poet, librarian, and daughter of Hungarian immigrants, has three chapbooks with Strikethrough Press. She was writer in Residence at SAFTA’s Firefly Farms and Dorland Mountain Arts. Lisa’s poems and essays are found in journals such as Exposition Review and anthologies such as Coiled Serpent. http://lisacheby.wordpress.com
Pam Ward released her poetry collection, Between Good Men & No Man at All, World Stage Press.2024. She is also the author of two novels, Want Some Get Some and Bad Girls Burn Slow, Kensington, a UCLA graduate, California Arts Council Fellow, Pushcart Poetry Nominee and founding member of the Leimert Park Book Fair. Published in numerous publications, including Voices of Leimert Park, Renaissance Noir and the LA Times, Pam was honored by the LA Department of Cultural Affairs as a Trailblazer writer, 2025 and participated in the first literary Olympics in Paris, 2024. She’s been writer in residence, a board member of Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Foundation and The World Stage and conducted workshops for Black Women for Wellness, Art Center College of Design and runs her own community press, Short Dress Press. Her recently completed her first YA novel entitled, Stoves Don’t Cry. Currently, Pam is working on her novel, I’ll Get You My Pretty, the true account of her aunt’s dalliance in the Black Dahlia murder, an event that occurred in Pam’s neighborhood.
Tisha Reichle-Aguilera is a multi-genre writer and interdisciplinary scholar. Her doctoral dissertation titled, “Claiming Our Space,” explores the post-adolescent bildungsroman in college novels written by women of color. She is the author of Breaking Pattern (Inlandia Books 2023), a YA novel and a prose chapbook, Stories All Our Own (Bottlecap Press). Her play Blind Thrust Fault was featured in Center Theater Group Writers’ Workshop Festival and her one-act play “Temporary Arrangement” was featured in the Latinx group of Short + Sweet Festival Hollywood. Her short stories have been anthologized in Rural Writers of Color, Made in L.A. Volume 4 & 5, Ramblings & Reflections: SouthWest Writers Winning Words Anthology, and Puro Chicanx Writers of the 21st Century. A first-generation college graduate, she writes so the desert landscape of her childhood can be heard as loudly as the urban chaos of her adulthood. She is a Macondista and works for literary equity through Women Who Submit. Find her on Instagram @writertish and links to her work at tishareichle.com.
Ginger Galloway co-founded, Wild Seed Poetry and Arts Collective (wildseedpac.org). The Wild Seed PAC is inspired by the fierce work of dynamic Black women in poetry, literary, visual and performing arts Wild Seed Poetry & Arts Collective was born. Building a safe space to explore and challenge each other and the scope of our craft to create new and innovative works. This is a collective of women who support and encourage each other, cultivating wild seeds who must, as is their destiny, break free and grow. Wild Seed Poetry & Arts Collective is founded by and entirely led by Black women.
Jasmine Vallejo-Love is a disabled Afro-Puerto Rican American poet, writer, HR leader, coach, and interior design hobbyist raised in the South Bronx and living in Los Angeles. She is a 2025 Lambda Literary Emerging LGBTQ Voices Fellow and was selected for the 2025 PEN America Emerging Voices workshop. A Diana Woods Memorial Award finalist, her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Lunch Ticket, Southland Alibi, Cholla Needles, Blacklandia: Anthology on Black Mental Health, and Free Your Voice: Brandeis Women’s Publication.
September 28, from 2-4 pm suggested contribution $20 “Poets Pay Rent Too” (quoting S. Pearl Sharp)
Where: Matter Studio Gallery
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 2 pm – 4 pm
Address: 5080 West Pico Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90019
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Karen Palmer, with Samantha Dunn, & She’s Under Here at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event
Karen Palmer, in conversation with Samantha Dunn, will discuss her book She’s Under Here.
In 1989, shortly after her second marriage, Palmer and her new husband quit their jobs without notice. They pulled her two young daughters out of school and packed only the essentials into their used car. This was their DIY witness protection, a desperate escape fueled by the untenable threat of Palmer’s abusive ex-husband, Gil. With unflinching honesty, Palmer bravely exposes the choices—or lack thereof—women face when none of the options are good, and their lives are at stake.
She’s Under Here might center on Palmer’s story of escape, but it’s also a profound and heart wrenching examination of why she ended up trapped and how she handled the ongoing perils of life constructed around a false identity. She plunges readers into a world—her world—of fear and the extraordinary choices made in its wake. After years of being stalked, enduring death threats, and the kidnapping of her three-year-old daughter, Palmer knew that she and her family had to vanish. But with that there were consequences. She’s Under Here is a haunting meditation on themes of disappearance, both literal and figurative; the ambiguity between desire and fear, victim and perpetrator; and raises imperative questions about the true cost of survival and the enduring search for safety and self.
“I had this extraordinary thing happen to me, where virtually overnight I left behind family and friends, my name, my job, my home—my entire identity—and started over with falsified documents. For twenty years I lived in fear of being discovered. Writing the book took many years, its completion a kind of exorcism. One of the hopes I have for She’s Under Here is that it helps others in a similar situation who might feel alone,” explains Palmer about why she’s choosing now to publish her story.
Karen Palmer is a Pushcart Prize winner and has received grants from the NEA and Colorado Council on the Arts. She’s Under Here grew out of her award-winning essay “The Reader Is the Protagonist,” first published in Virginia Quarterly Review and selected by Leslie Jamison for inclusion in Best American Essays 2017. More recently her short story “Birds of Paradise” won the 2022 Emily Clark Balch Prize for Fiction. Her writing has appeared in The Rumpus, The Kenyon Review, Arts & Letters, and Kalliope, among others. She lives in Los Angeles.
Samantha Dunn is a senior editor at the Southern California News Group, which publishes the Orange County Register and the LA Daily News, among others. She produces the company’s magazines and the virtual program BOOKISH, about authors, thinkers, and the literary life. But Sam is also the author of several books, including the novel Failing Paris, a PEN West award finalist, and the bestselling memoirs Not By Accident: Reconstructing a Careless Life and Faith in Carlos Gomez. Her bylines have appeared in hundreds of publications, like O the Oprah Magazine, Ms., the Los Angeles Times and others. Sam’s essays and short stories are anthologized in a number of places too, including the short story anthology, Women on the Edge: Writing from Los Angeles, which she co-edited. She has written for the stage and has taken a few turns screenwriting as a member of the Writers Guild of America. Sam also teaches nonfiction writing at Chapman University, and through the literary nonprofit Writing by Writers.
Where: Diesel, A Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 3 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2025-09-28/karen-palmer-samantha-dunn
Storytime & Craft: Queer Latine Heroes with Sofie Aguilar at Underdog Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us for a storytime reading and coloring page craft with author Sofia Aguilar to celebrate the release of Queer Latine Heroes!
This debut children’s picture book features a collection of brief biographies and portraits of queer Latines from Latin America and the U.S. throughout history and modern-day.
FREE event – little listeners of all ages welcome!
RSVP
Where: Underdog Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 3 pm – 4 pm
Address: 312 S. Myrtle Ave., Monrovia, CA 91016
Website: https://www.underdogbookstore.org/events/storytime-craft-queer-latine-heroes
Book Talk: Eric C. Wat, with D. Hideo Maruyama, & Daddy Issues: Stories at Bel Canto KUBO, Long Beach – In-Person Event
Bel Canto Books is delighted to host a conversation with Eric C. Wat, author of Daddy Issues: Stories, in conversation with D Hideo Maruyama at KUBO LB.
Winner of the Barbara DiBernard Prize in Fiction, Daddy Issues is a collection of moving and complex—yet simply and directly told—stories of queer Asian American experiences in Los Angeles. In many of these stories, the protagonists are artists and writers and other creative thinkers living on the fringe of survival, attempting to align a life of the imagination with the practical considerations of career, income, and family: a gay father who hasn’t come out to his young son; a social worker, numbed by the destitution of his clients, who finds himself lost in self-destruction; a trans man who returns home to a father with dementia to help his family pack as they are pushed out by gentrification; a husband who can only stand aside as his wife heals from a miscarriage; and a broke writer who learns to love his stories again. The stories in Daddy Issues offer different contemplations on solitude—the good and the bad of it. Ultimately, this collection by Eric C. Wat is full of hope, and it shows how we can find the connections we need once we allow ourselves to become vulnerable.
Eric C. Wat is the author of four books, including his Los Angeles Times-bestselling debut novel Swim (2019). His last book, Love Your Asian Body: AIDS Activism in Los Angeles won the outstanding award in History from the Association of Asian American Studies in 2023. His second novel manuscript Drive was a finalist of the Black Lawrence Immigrant Writing contest in 2022. Eric has a long history of working with nonprofit community-based organizations, and he continues to support many progressive organizations through his consulting and volunteer practice.
D Hideo Maruyama obtained his MFA in Creative Writing from Long Beach State. For about a decade from the 90s to 2000s, he was the editor of the AAPI-focused dIS*orient Journalzine. Recently, he was included in the anthologies Voices of Leimert Park Redux (2017), Long Beach Spits Fire (2024), and In Praise of Libraries (2024). His poetry was published on Discover Nikkei (2025). His first book of poetry, Taiko Quartz Beat, was published by the World Stage Press in 2024 through the Community Literature Initiative. Follow his Instagram accounts for his documentation of the Los Angeles poetry scene on dISorient Journalzine, and his observational poetry and photography on Roninpoet.
Where: Bel Canto KUBO, Long Beach
Date: Sunday the 21st
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 3076 Atlantic Ave., Long Beach, CA 90807
Zillennial Book Club: The Will of the Many at Cellar Door Bookstore – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Will of the Many (Hierarchy #1) by James Islington.
The Catenan Republic—the Hierarchy—may rule the world now, but they do not know everything.
I tell them my name is Vis Telimus. I tell them I was orphaned after a tragic accident three years ago, and that good fortune alone has led to my acceptance into their most prestigious school. I tell them that once I graduate, I will gladly join the rest of civilized society in allowing my strength, my drive, and my focus—what they call Will—to be leeched away and added to the power of those above me, as millions already do. As all must eventually do.
I tell them that I belong, and they believe me.
But the truth is that I have been sent to the Academy to find answers. To solve a murder. To search for an ancient weapon. To uncover secrets that may tear the Republic apart.
And that I will never, ever cede my Will to the empire that executed my family.
To survive though, I will still have to rise through the Academy’s ranks. I will have to smile, and make friends, and pretend to be one of them, and win. Because if I cannot, then those who want to control me, who know my real name, will no longer have any use for me.
And if the Hierarchy finds out who I truly am, they will kill me.
James Islington is the bestselling author of The Will of the Many (the first novel in the Hierarchy series), as well as the Licanius Trilogy (beginning with The Shadow of What Was Lost). He has sold more than two million books, and his work has been translated into seventeen different languages. He lives on the Mornington Peninsula in Victoria, Australia, with his wife and two children.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://www.cellardoorbookstore.com/event/zillennial-book-club-will-many
Local Author Day: M.A. Arana and Len Leatherwood at Vroman’s Bookstore – In-Person Event
M.A. Arana presents Wing Rebel: Book Three of The Wings Series
The battle between the winged Avans and the dark Garghons intensifies in Wing Rebel, the third book in The Wings Series. Led by King Mabon Sevilla, the Avans are sworn to protect Earth, but their kingdom is on the brink of destruction. Mabon’s daughter, Sada, possesses extraordinary powers, while his twin sons, Xander and Xio, must navigate a deadly path between magic, fate, and betrayal.
As the Garghons, led by the ruthless King Waqar, seek to crush the Avans and take control of Ava, Mabon and his allies must fight to protect their world. With the return of Mabon’s former mate, the dark ghost Ibis, the stakes are higher than ever. Ibis is out for blood, and everything the Avans value is in danger of being destroyed by her evil sorcery.
Amid political intrigue, fierce battles, and heart-wrenching sacrifices, the Avans must confront their destinies and fight not just for their kingdom, but for their very survival. Wing Rebel is a thrilling tale of love, destiny, and the unbreakable bonds of family, where magic comes at a cost and no one is safe from the dangers that lie ahead.
Len Leatherwood presents Hope In A Time Of Dying
1994: A medical breakthrough is on the horizon, but for those already living with HIV, it may not come soon enough.
For Hope Winterfield, the AIDS epidemic is no longer just a distant tragedy-it’s at her doorstep. When her brother, Robert, a cosmetic surgeon, faces the devastating realities of the disease, she steps in to help him hold together his collapsing practice, his complicated relationships, and his fading hope.
But Robert’s struggles extend beyond his diagnosis. His husband, Cody, is charming yet manipulative, threatening everything Robert has built. His business partner, Anthony, is fiercely loyal but hides secrets of his own. Meanwhile, Robert’s increasingly erratic behavior adds another layer of mystery to the turmoil, pulling him further from those who love him. Hope not only fights for her brother but must also confront the unresolved wounds of her past. As she balances the needs of her husband, Ben Maxwell, and their three children, she continues to navigate her strained relationship with their mother, whose love comes with unspoken expectations. Caught between duty and old resentments, Hope must finally face her own hurt and regrets, reckoning with the love and loss that have shaped their fractured family.
Just as all seems lost, a groundbreaking treatment offers a sliver of hope. But will Robert live long enough to see it? And will love, family, and loyalty be enough to weather the storm?
A poignant, deeply human novel set against the backdrop of the AIDS epidemic, Hope in a Time of Dying explores resilience, redemption, and the power of love and family in the face of unimaginable loss.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 4 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Village Poets Series & Open Mic: Themed Rading with Cecilia Woloch, Suzanne Lummis & Timothy Steeele at Bolton Hall – In-Person Event
The Foothills Poet Laureate, Kathleen Travers, will produce a Village Poets reading based on the historical connection Bolton Hall Museum had with the Utopia Movement in the early 20th century. The reading will take place on Sunday, Sept 28th.
Travers has invited distinguished poets Cecilia Woloch, Suzanne Lummis & Timothy Steele to feature. There will be a limited open reading with readers encouraged to read a one minute poem which can be on the theme or not as they wish.
Cecilia Woloch is a U.S.-born poet, writer, teacher, and performer based in Los Angeles. Her honors include fellowships from the Fulbright Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Center for International Theatre Development; her work has also received a Pushcart Prize and been included in the Best American Poetry Series. She has published seven collections of poems and a novel, as well as essays and reviews and her work has been published in translation in French, German, Polish, Hungarian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Hebrew and Romanes. Raised in rural Kentucky, she has traveled the world as a writer and teacher, giving readings, leading workshops at universities and literary conferences,. Most recently, she’s taught creative writing at Sichuan University in China and at the University of Rzeszów in southeastern Poland.
Suzanne Lummis’ fourth poetry collection will be published this fall by the edgier end of What Books—their imprint Giant Claw—Crime Wave. She’s the editor of Beyond Baroque Books’ imprint, the Pacific Coast Poetry Series, and the editor of the just-released anthology, national in scope, Poetry Goes to the Movies. Her individual poems have appeared in New Ohio Review, Plume, The New Yorker, are in the current issue of Poetry Salzburg Review and forthcoming in Rattle. Suzanne’s honors range from Drama-Logue awards and Women in Theater’s “Red Carpet Award” to outstanding instructor awards andBeyond Baroque’s George Drury Smith Award. She was a 2018/19 City of Los Angeles fellow.
Timothy Steele holds degrees from Stanford University and Brandeis University and has taught at Stanford, UCLA and Santa Barbara, USC and California State University, Los Angeles, where he is a professor emeritus and President’s Distinguished Professor. Steele’s five collections of poetry include The Color Wheel and Toward the Winter Solstice. Among Steele’s honors are a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Peter I. B. Lavan Younger Poets Award from the Academy of American Poets, the Los Angeles PEN Center’s Award for Poetry, a Commonwealth Club of California Medal for Poetry, and the Robert Fitzgerald Award for Excellence in the Study of Prosody.
Bolton Hall is a Los Angeles Historical Landmark built in 1913. Our reading starts at 4:30 pm and goes till 6:30 pm. Refreshments will be served. Free parking is available on the street and also at Elks Lodge 10137 Commerce Ave. Park behind the building and walk a short distance to Bolton Hall Museum across the street and down the block.
Where: Bolton Hall Museum
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 4:30 pm – 6:30 pm
Address: 10110 Commerce Ave,, Tujunga, CA 91040
Website: https://villagepoets.blogspot.com/
Earthseed Symposium: Speculative Fiction Book Club: Love After The End at North Figueroa Bookshop – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss Love After The End: An Anthology of Two-Spirit and Indigiqueer Speculative Fiction edited by Joshua Whiteh.
This exciting and groundbreaking fiction collection showcases a number of new and emerging 2SQ (Two-Spirit and queer) Indigenous writers from across Turtle Island. These visionary authors show how queer Indigenous communities can bloom and thrive through utopian narratives that detail the vivacity and strength of 2SQness throughout its plight in the maw of settler colonialism’s histories.
Contributors include Nathan Adler, Darcie Little Badger, Gabriel Castilloux Calderon, Adam Garnet Jones, Mari Kurisato, Kai Minosh Pyle, David Alexander Robertson, jaye simpson, and Nazbah Tom. Edited by Joshua Whitehead.
Where: North Figueroa Bookshop
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 5 pm
Address: 6040 N. Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 9
The Prototype Poetry Show & Open Mic at The Broadwater Plunge, Hollywood – In-Person Event
Who are we? The Poesers. What are we doing? Hosting and producing an experimental poetry show & open mic, THE PROTOTYPE in Hollywood.
Poesers: Candice Margarita and Alexa Wise
Features:
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.
Consuelo was born in Fontana, CA and raised in the Seventh-day Adventist church by Mexican immigrant parents, Consuelo finds herself at the divine crossroads of creation and holiness. Being both queer and trans, Consuelo finds way to weave her upbringing into the fibers of her art through metaphor and iconography. Her primary modalities are performance and the written word, and considering that she preached at church from ages 10-17, she is no stranger to the microphone.
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Karo Ska is a gender-fluid, non-binary femme poet and writer of South Asian and Eastern European descent who writes about identity, trauma, mental health, and politics, with a focus on their experiences as a second-generation immigrant. They are the author of two chapbooks, gathering grandmothers’ bones (2020) and loving my salt-drenchedbones (2022). Karo Ska is also a teacher, workshop facilitator, and activist who currently lives on unceded Tongva land.
We are a collective of “Poesers” (poetry + posers = ironically combined into a new “poetic” word) merging communities through interdisciplinary art-making, performance and other creative mediums through artistic fusion with poetry. With our stage, we offer more opportunity for humans of Los Angeles to be seen, heard, and understood with every finger snap. We hypothesize that the microphone is for everyone and anyone regardless of level and skill. Through our shows, we test out that theory.
For our open mic; works in progress, music pieces, and storytelling welcomed, don’t worry about *effing* up, just chalk it up to #THEPROTOTYPE!
Where: The Broadwater Plunge
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 6322 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90038 =
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-prototype-poetry-show-open-mic-tickets-1693967936699 or https://www.instagram.com/p/DOxINmHEQfG/
September Historical Romance Book Club: Beautiful Things at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
Historical Romance Book Club is led by Orders Manager Katie S.
Participants will discuss Beautiful Things by Emily Rath.
Crashing a country house party in Regency England, an intrepid young woman is drawn into the orbit of three delicious gentlemen in this slow burn, very sexy romance.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Sunday the 28th
Time: 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Los Angeles Literature 