Philosophical Horror Book Club: When the wolf Comes Home at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy.
One night, Jess, a struggling actress, finds a five-year-old runaway hiding in the bushes outside her apartment. After a violent, bloody encounter with the boy’s father, she and the boy find themselves running for their lives.
As they attempt to evade the boy’s increasingly desperate father, Jess slowly comes to a horrifying understanding of the butchery that follows them—the boy can turn his every fear into reality.
And when the wolf finally comes home, no one will be spared.
Nat Cassidy writes horror for the page, stage, and screen. His acclaimed novels, including Mary: An Awakening of Terror and Nestlings, have been featured in best-of lists from Esquire, Harper’s Bazaar, NPR, the Chicago Review of Books, the NY Public Library, and more, and he was named one of the “writers shaping horror’s next golden age” by Esquire. His award-winning horror plays have been produced throughout New York City and across the United States. He won the NY Innovative Theatre Award for his one-man show about H. P. Lovecraft, another for his play about Caligula, and was commissioned by the Kennedy Center to write the libretto for a short opera (about the end of the world, of course). You’ve also likely seen Nat on your TV, playing various Bad Guys of the Week on shows such as Law & Order: SVU, Blue Bloods, Bull, Quantico, FBI, and many others … but that’s a topic for a different bio. He lives in New York City with his wife.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Monday the 16th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-16/philosophical-horror-book-club-when-wolf-comes-home
NeuroDIVE Open Mic Night at Heavy Manners Library – In-Person Event
Calling all neurodivergent poets, artists, and storytellers! Join us for this open mic hosted by @neurodive_mic.
NeuroDIVE Open Mic is an open mic specifically geared towards neurodivergent artists/poets/comedians. Neurotypical artists and allies are welcome.
Our purpose is to create visibility and a third space for neurodivergent artists and artists with disabilities where we can all relate, connect, and feel seen.
Featured guest: Lilah Juergens
Where: Heavy Manners Library
Date: Monday the 16th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1200 North Alvarado Street, Los Angeles, CA 90026
Website: https://www.instagram.com
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 16th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3575 University Ave. Riverside, CA 92501
Website: https://www.facebook.com
Vroman’s & The Altadena Historical Society Present: Michele Zack, with Michelle Huneven, & Altadena: Between Wilderness & City at Vroman’s – In-Person Event
Michele Zack, in conversation with Michelle Huneven, will discuss Altadena: Between Wilderness & City.
Special Commemorative Edition
When Michele Zack’s lavishly illustrated Altadena Between Wilderness and City appeared in 2004, State Librarian historian Kevin Starr called it “urban history at its best,” Zack won the prestigious Pfleuger Award for history writing, and the book topped Vroman’s best-seller list in history—narrowly beating Howard Zinn’s The People’s History of the United States. This 2025 hardcover edition features enhanced photographs, an updated author’s note, and post-Eaton fire images. Zack will be in conversation her old friend, Altadena born novelist Michelle Huneven, who has set three novels there. Zack and Huneven, neighbors, both lost homes in the Eaton Fire.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Monday the 16th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-02-16/michele-zack
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
Date: Monday the 16th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: Zoom Online Event (see site)
Website: https://beyondbaroque.org/free_workshops.html
Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Do you want to find creative inspiration and overcome writer’s block in a supportive and peaceful community setting? Are you interested in writing professionally or for personal growth and healing but unsure where to begin?
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: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 10 am – 11 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
NEW! Toddler Tuesdays: A Travelin’ Storytime – Session 1 at Main Library, SMPL – In-Person Kids Event
This fun and engaging weekly series of stories, songs, and rhymes travels to different library locations. Limited space; first come, first served. For ages walking – 3 years.
Where: Main Library, SMPL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 10:30 am – 11 am
Address: 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90401
Website: https://www.santamonica.gov/events
Virtual Book Club: Amity by Nathan Harris via La Crescenta Library, LACL – Online Event
Join us weekly on Zoom for the Virtual Book Club. In February we will be discussing Amity by Nathan Harris. For adults.
Please contact Marta Wiggins at mwiggins@library.lacounty.gov for your link to join.
Each week we read and discuss 1/4 of the book. Please see the weekly discussion breakdown below.
Week 3: February 17: Chapters 9 – 10 — P ages 167 – 219
Week 4: February 24: Chapters 11 – Epilogue — Pages 221 – to the end of the book
New Orleans, 1866. The Civil War might be over, but formerly enslaved Coleman and June have yet to find the freedom they’ve been promised. Two years ago, the siblings were separated when their old master, Mr. Harper, took June away to Mexico, where he hoped to escape the new reality of the post-war South. Coleman stayed behind in Louisiana to serve the Harper family, clinging to the hope that one day June would return. When an unexpected letter from Mr. Harper arrives, summoning Coleman to Mexico, Coleman thinks that finally his prayers have been answered. What Coleman cannot know is the tangled truth of June’s tribulations under Mr. Harper out on the frontier. And when disaster strikes Coleman’s journey, he is forced on the run with Mr. Harper’s daughter, Florence. Together, they venture into the Mexican desert to find June, all the while evading two crooked brothers who’ll stop at nothing to capture Coleman and Florence and collect the money they’re owed. As Coleman and June separately navigate a perilous, parched landscape, the siblings learn quickly that freedom isn’t always given—sometimes, it must be taken by force.
Where: La Crescenta Library, LACL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event (see site)
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/
NEW! Toddler Tuesdays: A Travelin’ Storytime – Session 2 at Main Library, SMPL – In-Person Kids Event
This fun and engaging weekly series of stories, songs, and rhymes travels to different library locations. Limited space; first come, first served. For ages walking – 3 years.
Where: Main Library SMPL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 11:30 am – 12 pm
Address: 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90401
Website: https://www.santamonica.gov/events
Tuesday Afternoon Book Club: The Largesse of the Sea Maiden via Silver Lake Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event
Join us to discuss The Largesse of the Sea Maiden by Denis Johnson. Copies available at the library. For adults.
This month’s book club will be held on Zoom, but in March will return to a hybrid meeting, both in person and on Zoom. For the Zoom link, please email silver@lapl.org
Where: Silver Lake Branch Library LAPL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 1 pm – 2 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/tuesday-afternoon-book-club
Before the Ban Book Club: Free Lunch at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Free Lunch by Rex Ogle.
Instead of giving him lunch money, Rex’s mom has signed him up for free meals. As a poor kid in a wealthy school district, better-off kids crowd impatiently behind him as he tries to explain to the cashier that he’s on the free meal program. The lunch lady is hard of hearing, so Rex has to shout.
Free Lunch is the story of Rex’s efforts to navigate his first semester of sixth grade—who to sit with, not being able to join the football team, Halloween in a handmade costume, classmates and a teacher who take one look at him and decide he’s trouble—all while wearing secondhand clothes and being hungry. His mom and her boyfriend are out of work, and life at home is punctuated by outbursts of violence. Halfway through the semester, his family is evicted and ends up in government-subsidized housing in view of the school. Rex lingers at the end of last period every day until the buses have left, so no one will see where he lives.
Unsparing and realistic, Free Lunch is a story of hardship threaded with hope and moments of grace. Rex’s voice is compelling and authentic, and Free Lunch is a true, timely, and essential work that illuminates the lived experience of poverty in America.
Rex Ogle is the author of Free Lunch, which won the YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults Award; Abuela Don’t Forget Me, a finalist for the YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults Award; Punching Bag; and the novel When We Ride. He lives in Los Angeles, California.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 1 pm – 3 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-17/ban-book-club-free-lunch
Author Talk: John Patrick Green, with Dan Santat, & Investigators: Agents of S.U.I.T.: Sew Much Trouble at Lawndale Library, LACL – In-Person Kids Event
Join us for a conversation with author John Patrick Green and Caldecott Medal-winning illustrator Dan Santat to celebrate the release of Investigators: Agents of S.U.I.T.: Sew Much Trouble. For ages 6+
Join us for a conversation with author John Patrick Green and Caldecott Medal-winning illustrator Dan Santat to celebrate the release of Investigators: Agents of S.U.I.T.: Sew Much Trouble.
This is the fourth volume of Agents of S.U.I.T with the weirdest mystery yet! Someone has stolen the Notorious P.I.G. food truck, and with it, Piggy Smalls’ special BBQ sauce! But before Bongo and Marsha can solve the case, they need to solve the problems they’re having with each other.
For ages 6+
Books provided by Pages: a bookstore.
Where: Lawndale Library, LACL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 3:30 pm – 4:30 pm
Address: 14615 Burin Ave., Lawndale, CA 90260
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15539099
YA Virtual Book Group: Hannah V. Swayerr & Truth Is at Village Well Books & Coffee – Online Event
Join us for a virtual conversation with Hannah V Sawyerr, author of Truth Is!
For details on how to join via Zoom, sign up for the event on EVENTBRITE!
Hannah V. Sawyerr was recognized as the Youth Poet Laureate of Baltimore in 2016. Her spoken word has been featured on the BBC’s World Have Your Say program as well as the National Education Association’s “Do You Hear Us?” campaign. Her written word has been included in gal-dem, Rookie, and xoNecole. She holds a BA in English from Morgan State University and an MFA in creative writing from the New School. Sawyerr is an English professor at Loyola Marymount University and lives in Los Angeles.
This is an empowering and defiant novel in verse in which a teen poet grapples with an unplanned pregnancy and determines what happens to her body in a world that wants to take the choice away from her.
Seventeen-year-old Truth Bangura wants nothing more than to know a life beyond her hometown. Writing and performing is her only solace in a life overwhelmed by a drifting relationship with her best friend, an emotionally turbulent home environment, and the reality that her below average grades make her true dream—escaping her mother’s grasp after graduation—uncertain.
When Truth learns she’s pregnant by her ex-boyfriend, she makes one decision she’s finally sure about: an abortion.
Determined to move forward, Truth turns to the pages in her notebook with the support of her slam poetry team—including the poet with a voice smooth as summer jazz, who’s been catching her eye during practice.
Told through searing free-verse, journal entries, and interspersed fill-in-the-blank poetry prompts, Hannah V. Sawyerr’s Truth Is reminds us there is always a choice. There is always hope. And there is always a way forward.
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Adult Book Club: Colored Television at Baldwin Park Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us for a discussion of our latest selection, Colored Television by Danzy Senna. For Adults
After a long, precarious stretch bouncing among rentals, Jane and her family are living in luxury, house-sitting in the hills above L.A. Jane needs to finish her second novel, but things don’t work out quite as hoped. Desperate for a plan B, Jane turns her gaze to Hollywood. Meeting with a hot producer with a development deal at a network, he seems excited to work with a “real writer”. Things finally seem to be going right for Jane—until they aren’t.
If you would like a copy of the book, please drop by Baldwin Park Library to pick up a copy or check the catalog for a digital copy.
RSVP
Where: Baldwin Park Library, LACL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 4181 Baldwin Park Blvd., Baldwin Park, CA 91706
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15551995
Book Launch: David A. Romero & The Enemy Sleeps at Barnes & Noble, Huntington Beach – In-Person Event
David A Romero will present and discuss his debut novel The Enemy Sleeps.
David A. Romero is a spoken word artist and filmmaker known for Diamond Bars (2011), Secret Beaches (2011), My Name Is Romero (2012), Undocumented Football (2013), and Basketball with Edgar Allan Poe (2018). As a spoken word artist, Romero has performed at over 75 colleges and universities in over 25 states in the USA.
Where: Barnes & Noble, Huntington Beach
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 7881 Edinger Ave., Suite 110, Huntington Beach, CA 92647
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Classic Detectives Book Club: Death at Breakfast at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Death at Breakfast by John Rhode.
A classic winter’s crime novel by one of the most highly regarded exponents of the genre.
Victor Harleston awoke with uncharacteristic optimism. Today he would be rich at last. Half an hour later, he gulped down his breakfast coffee and pitched to the floor, gasping and twitching. When the doctor arrived, he recognised instantly that it was a fatal case of poisoning and called in Scotland Yard.
Despite an almost complete absence of clues, the circumstances were so suspicious that Inspector Hanslet soon referred the evidence to his friend and mentor, Dr Lancelot Priestley, whose deductions revealed a diabolically ingenious murder that would require equally fiendish ingenuity to solve.
John Rhode was a pseudonym for the author Cecil John Charles Street (1884-1964), who also wrote as Miles Burton and Cecil Waye. Having served in the British Army as an artillery officer during the First World War, rising to the rank of Major, he began writing non-fiction before turning to detective fiction, and produced four novels a year for thirty-seven years. The Sunday Times said, ‘he must hold the record for the invention of ingenious forms of murder’, and the Times Literary Supplement described him as ‘standing in the front rank of those who write detective fiction’. Rhode’s first series novel, The Paddington Mystery (1925), introduced Dr Lancelot Priestley, who went on to appear in 72 novels, many for Collins Crime Club.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-17/classic-detectives-book-club-death-breakfast
3rd Tuesday Book Club: Remarkably Bright Creatures at Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL – In-PersonEvent
Join us for a lively discussion of Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt. All are welcome!
Where: Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 6400 Playa Vista Dr., Los Angeles, CA 90094
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/3rd-tuesday-book-club-0
Book Club: Everytime I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies at Pico Rivera Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss Everytime I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies by Catherine Mack. Copies available at the library. For adults.
Bestselling author Eleanor Dash is on her book tour in Italy when she gets caught up in a real life murder mystery. Contending with literary competitors, rabid fans, a stalker―and even her ex, Eleanor tries to discover who’s trying to get away with murder.
Where: Pico Rivera Library LACL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 9001 Mines Ave., Pico Rivera, CA 90660
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15440085
Naughty Novel Society eBook Club: Bride at Lawndale Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Explore the Romance genre and learn about all the digital resources the library has to offer with this unique book club. We will be utilizing the free digital resources Libby and Hoopla with limited hard copies available. For ages 18+.
February’s Pick: Bride by Ali Hazelwood. Available in Audiobook and eBook on Libby and a limited number of hard copies for attendees at the library.
Refreshments will be served. This program generously sponsored by Lawndale Friends of the Library.
Where: Lawndale Library LACL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 14615 Burin Ave., Lawndale, CA 90260
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15426360
Surviving Ragnarok Eventat Underdog Bookstore Monrovia – In-Person Event
Join us at Underdog Bookstore on the 3rd Tuesday of the month for SURVIVING RAGNAROK, a 3-part look at the Norse gods & goddesses who survive the Nordic Judgment Day. Includes a visual presentation followed by a guided meditation, hosted by Andy, The Buffalo Oracle.
RSVP
Where: Underdog Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 312 Myrtle Ave., Monrovia, CA 91016
Website: https://www.underdogbookstore.org/events/surviving-ragnarok-j7a48
3rd Tuesday Book Club: Remarkably Bright Creatures at Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for a lively discussion of Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt. All are welcome!
Where: Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 6400 Playa Vista Dr., Los Angeles, CA 90094
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/3rd-tuesday-book-club-0
Mary Kubica, with Kaira Rouda, & It’s Not Her at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us to welcome Mary Kubica to the store to discuss and sign It’s Not Her. Joining her in conversation will be Kaira Rouda.
Two families vacationing at a secluded lake resort are at the center of a chilling crime and mysterious disappearance in this twisty, unputdownable thriller.
Courtney Gray’s tranquil family vacation is shattered when she hears a blood-curdling scream from the lakeside cottage next door. There she finds the lifeless bodies of her brother and sister-in-law. Her teenage niece Reese is nowhere to be found, while her nephew Wyatt lies asleep upstairs, unharmed.
As the police descend on the quiet resort town, disturbing secrets about Courtney’s family start to emerge. When she learns that the town has secrets of its own, it makes her wonder if Reese is another victim in a brutal crime or if she’s the killer.
As Courtney begins to unravel the terrible mystery, she realizes that everyone around her has something to hide. And the closer she gets to the truth, the harder it is to see.
Mary Kubica is a New York Times bestselling author of thrillers including The Good Girl, Local Woman Missing and She’s Not Sorry. Her books have been translated into over thirty languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide. She’s been described as “a helluva storyteller” (Kirkus) and “a writer of vice-like control” (Chicago Tribune), and her novels have been praised as “hypnotic” (People) and “thrilling and illuminating” (L.A. Times). She lives outside of Chicago with her husband and children.
Kaira Rouda is the USA Today bestselling and award-winning author of contemporary fiction exploring what goes on beneath the surface of seemingly perfect lives. SheReads has named her latest novel We Were Never Friends a most anticipated mystery thriller for 2026. Her novels have been translated into more than a dozen languages, and have been selected by Library Reads, Amazon and Apple Books Editors as Best Books of the Month and Strand Magazine’s Best Book of the Year. She lives in Southern California with her family.
Where: Diesel, A Bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Suite 33., Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2026-02-17/mary-kubica-kaira-rouda-discuss-and-sign-its-not-her
Original Book Group: The True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Join us for our longest running book club! We read mostly contemporary fiction with the occasional non-fic thrown in. To join our mailing list, please email events@villagewell.com.
This February’s pick is The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) by Rabih Alameddine,
From the winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction comes a tragicomic love story set in Lebanon, a modern saga of family, memory, and the unbreakable attachment of a son and his mother.
In a tiny Beirut apartment, sixty-three-year-old Raja and his mother live side by side. A beloved high school philosophy teacher and “the neighborhood homosexual,” Raja relishes books, meditative walks, order, and solitude. Zalfa, his octogenarian mother, views her son’s desire for privacy as a personal affront. She demands to know every detail of Raja’s work life and love life, boundaries be damned.
When Raja receives an invite to an all-expenses-paid writing residency in America, the timing couldn’t be better. It arrives on the heels of a series of personal and national disasters that have left Raja longing for peace and quiet away from his mother and the heartache of Lebanon. But what at first seems a stroke of good fortune soon leads Raja to recount and relive the very disasters and past betrayals he wishes to forget.
Told in Raja’s irresistible and wickedly funny voice, the novel dances across six decades to tell the unforgettable story of a singular life and its absurdities—a tale of mistakes, self-discovery, trauma, and maybe even forgiveness. Above all, The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) is a wildly unique and sparkling celebration of love.
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Tuesday the 17th
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 17th
Time: 7 pm – 10 pm
Address: 14537 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks, CA 91403
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Brian Raftery, with Phoebe Reilly, & Hannibal Lecter at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Drawing from exclusive interviews and previously unseen archival materials, this one-of-its-kind biography of Hannibal Lecter documents the cannibal’s journey from terrifying villain to unexpectedly adored antihero.
This unique biography traces the many lives and crimes of Hannibal Lecter: his disturbing debut in Thomas Harris’s 1981 novel Red Dragon; his rise to infamy in beloved films like Michael Mann’s Manhunter and Jonathan Demme’s Academy Award-winning The Silence of the Lambs; and his unexpected comeback in the cult-hit TV series Hannibal. It also dives into the untold life and career of Harris, the secretive bestselling author whose passion for reporting, eye for grisly detail, and connections to the FBI helped birth not only Lecter, but also the modern true-crime genre. Along the way, Hannibal Lecter: A Life documents the many ways Lecter’s rise reflected America’s ever-growing obsession with real-life serial killers.
Featuring all-new interviews with crucial figures from Lecter’s past—including actor Brian Cox, director Mann, and former FBI special agent John Douglas—Hannibal Lecter: A Life is a deeply reported, wildly entertaining look at the making of one of the most beloved bad guys of all time.
Note: Please RSVP at site.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 8818 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2026-02-17/brian-raftery
Romance Book Club at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event
Our new Kiss & Tell romance book club meets monthly to discuss a romance novel and generally takes place on the third Tuesday of each month at 7:00 pm. At each meeting we discuss and vote on the next month’s book club selection
Facilitated by Lisa Becker
Participants will discuss If Not for My Baby by Kate Golden.
It’s the duet of a lifetime when a rock star and his backup singer find a new kind of harmony off stage in this sensational contemporary romance.
Clementine Clark isn’t looking for love. Growing up with a single mom who weeps over a new guy each week tends to have that effect on a girl. But Clementine doesn’t mind being the rational one—she’s even buried her musical dreams so deeply within herself that she hardly notices the hole it’s left in her life.
That is until her best friend calls her with a life-changing opportunity: to join Irish megastar Halloran on his first US tour as a backing vocalist. Clementine wants to reject the offer, but the pay is enough to change her and her mom’s life. Overnight, Clementine goes from serving enchiladas at the Happy Tortilla to belting high notes before a cheering crowd.
But the whiplash of trading small-town Texas for sold-out stadiums is nothing compared to the rush of performing with the enigmatic Thomas Patrick Halloran. Poet, introvert, and lyrical genius, Halloran quickly gets under Clementine’s skin. The two couldn’t see the world more differently. And yet, over the course of the next eight weeks on tour, the romantic rockstar might just strike an unforgettable chord in Clementine. But will it be enough for an encore?
Kate Golden is the USA Today bestselling author of The Sacred Stones trilogy. She lives in Los Angeles where she works in the film industry developing movies with screenwriters and filmmakers. When she isn’t telling stories, Kate is an avid book reader, puzzle addict, and game night enthusiast which she hosts with her husband and puppy, Milo. You can find her on Instagram at @KateGoldenAuthor and on TikTok at @Kate_Golden_Author.
Note: Please RSVP at site.
Where: pages: a bookstore
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://pagesabookstore.com/event/2026-02-17/romance-book-club
Mystery & Thriller Book Group: While Justice Sleeps via Santa Monica Library – Online Event
Participants will discuss While Justice Sleeps by Stacey Abrams.
This community-led, monthly book discussion group meets virtually at 7 p.m. on the third Tuesday of the month. This book group discusses domestic and international titles in the mystery and thriller genres. To register, email library@santamonica.gov.
The titles include:
February 2026: While Justice Sleeps by Stacey Abrams
Where: Santa Monica Library
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://www.santamonica.gov/events
Peter Alan Lesser, with Tom Zehnder, & Live at McCabe’s Guitar Shop: Santa Monica’s Legendary Music Venue at Vroman’s – In-Person Event
Peter Alan Lesser, in conversation with Tom Zehnder, will discuss Live at McCabe’s Guitar Shop: Santa Monica’s Legendary Music Venue.
Hosting icons and legends of folk, blues, bluegrass, jazz, spoken word and world music since 1969.
A decade after Gerald McCabe opened up a guitar repair shop in Santa Monica, California, legendary folk musicians Elizabeth Cotten and Mike Seeger came looking for a way to earn money to get back home. Their inaugural performance kickstarted a concert series that has featured some of the world’s finest musicians—including Doc Watson, Jackson Browne, Bill Monroe and Linda Ronstadt—in one of the most intimate performance spaces on the West Coast.
Against a backdrop of guitars in a room often packed to the rafters, music rang out to fill every corner. But audiences weren’t the only ones who left with cherished memories. Enjoy behind the scenes stories from artists like Rosanne Cash, Taj Mahal, Lucinda Williams, Arlo Guthrie and many more as they look back on their experiences at McCabe’s. From picking up a new hobby to serendipitous meetings of future bandmates, there was never a dull moment in the shop.
This is your backstage pass to the untold stories of one of California’s most celebrated music venues and those who performed live at McCabe’s Guitar Shop.
Peter will be joined by musician Tom Zehnder, who will share stories about his legendary father, longtime repairman, music school director and band leader John Zehnder, and play some tunes on the guitar his Dad bought at McCabe’s over 50 years ago!
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Tuesday the 17th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-02-17/peter-alan-lesser
The Virtual Cobalt Series & Open Mic: Rick Lupert & Rich Youmans – Online Zoom Event
Cobalt Poets Reading & Open Mic and host Rick Lupert welcomes featured poet Rich Youmans
Rich Youmans is an acclaimed American poet, editor, and writer based in North Falmouth, Massachusetts, recognized for his expertise in haibun—a form blending prose and haiku. He is the editor-in-chief of Contemporary Haibun Online and authored Haibun: A Writer’s Guide. His award-winning work has appeared in Haibun Today, KYSO Flash, and Rattlecast.
Where: Cobalt Poets – Online Zoom Event
Date: Tuesday, the 17th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: Online event (see site)
Website: https://www.poetrysuperhighway.com
Da Poetry Lounge: Open Mic Night at COC – COMMUNITY OWNED CENTER 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.
Semi-Finals Bout 1, DPL SLAM Team
Featuring: Samantha Rios: Los Angeles’ newest Youth Poet Laureate, writes with a voice that resonates deeply across generations. Her poetry, shaped by personal experience and rich with vulnerability, has moved audiences nationwide, from the Brave New Voices stage in Washington D.C. to over 5 million viewers on TikTok. In August of 2025 she also starred in the spoken word tour de force “If I Awaken In Los Angeles” at the Ford theater and is featured in the Grammy considered album of the same name.
$10 suggested donation. Pay what you can. Do NOT line up prior to 7:30 pm Free parking adjacent to the theater.
Masks are encouraged.
Where: COC – COMMUNITY OWNED CENTER, New Leimert Park Location
Date: Tuesday, the 17th
Time: 9 pm – 11 pm (Doors at 8:15 pm)
Address: 4276 Crenshaw Blvd., Leimert Park, CA 90008
PARKING:
Street parking: Crenshaw and Degnan
Parking Lot: 3416 W 43rd St Leimert Park, Los Angeles, CA 90008
Website: https://www.instagram.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 a 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 18th
Time: 9 am – 10 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Coffee Time Book Club: Buckeye at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event
Our COFFEE TIME BOOK CLUB: Meets monthly, generally on third Wednesday of each month at 10:00am
We tend to read new-release literary fiction. At each meeting we discuss and vote on what we will read and discuss for the following month.
Facilitated by Linda McLoughlin Figel
Participants will discuss Buckeye: A Novel by Patrick Ryan.
One town. Two families. A secret that changes everything.
In Bonhomie, Ohio, a stolen moment of passion, sparked in the exuberant aftermath of the Allied victory in Europe, binds Cal Jenkins, a man wounded not in war but by his inability to serve in it, to Margaret Salt, a woman trying to obscure her past. Cal’s wife, Becky, has a spiritual gift: She is a seer who can conjure the dead, helping families connect with those they’ve lost. Margaret’s husband, Felix, is serving on a Navy cargo ship, out of harm’s way—until a telegram suggests that the unthinkable might have happened.
Later, as the country reconstructs in the postwar boom, a secret grows in Bonhomie—but nothing stays buried forever in a small town. Against the backdrop of some of the most transformative decades in modern America, the consequences of that long-ago encounter ripple through the next generation of both families, compelling them to reexamine who they thought they were and what the future might hold.
Sweeping yet intimate, rich with piercing observation and the warmth that comes from profound understanding of the human spirit, Buckeye captures the universal longing for love and for goodness.
Patrick Ryan is the author of the story collections The Dream Life of Astronauts (named one of the Best Books of the Year by the St. Louis Times-Dispatch, Literary Hub, Refinery29, and Electric Literature, and longlisted for The Story Prize) and Send Me. His work has appeared in The Best American Short Stories, the anthology Tales of Two Cities, and elsewhere. The former associate editor of Granta, he is the current editor-in-chief of the literary magazine One Story. He lives in New York City.
Note: Please RSVP at site.
Where: pages: a bookstore
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 10 am – 11 am
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://pagesabookstore.com/event/2026-02-18/coffee-time-book-club
Book Club: Good Dirt at Washington Irving Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us in reading Good Dirt by Charmine Wilkerson. Copies are available for check out in the branch or on your mobile device as an e-book/e-audiobook.
Where: Washington Irving Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 12 pm
Address: 4117 W. Washington Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90018
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-club-10
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 18th
Time: 2 pm – 2:30 pm
Address: On-air Event
Website: https://www.kpfk.org/on-air/poets-cafe/
Book Club for Adults: Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow at San Gabriel Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us for book club as we discuss Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. Copies of this title are available at the Information Desk. For ages 18 and up.
On a bitter-cold day, in the December of his junior year at Harvard, Sam Masur exits a subway car and sees, amid the hordes of people waiting on the platform, Sadie Green. He calls her name. For a moment, she pretends she hasn’t heard him, but then, she turns, and a game begins: a legendary collaboration that will launch them to stardom. These friends, intimates since childhood, borrow money, beg favors, and, before even graduating college, they have created their first blockbuster, Ichigo. Overnight, the world is theirs. Not even twenty-five years old, Sam and Sadie are brilliant, successful, and rich, but these qualities won’t protect them from their own creative ambitions or the betrayals of their hearts.
Where: San Gabriel Library, LACL
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 3 pm – 4 pm
Address: 500 S. Del Mar Ave., San Gabriel, CA 91776
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/14840579
Graphic Novel Club: Kindred Dragons at Once Upon a Time, Montrose – In-Person Kids/Teen Event
These are the *coolest* kinds of books there is—do you think so too? If so, then our fabulous Graphic Novel Club is for you!! Celebrate our shared love of graphic novels and visual creativity! Iz and Apollo host our ever-popular book club.
Best for ages 8+.
This is a discussion based club. Participants should come prepared to share their thoughts about that meeting’s book choice.
Participants will discuss Kindred Dragons (Book 1) by Sarah Mensinga.
Alice has been unhappy ever since her parents sent her to Prince Edward Island to live with her strict grandmother. Alice is fanciful, prone to telling tall tales, and absolutely OBSESSED with dragons! Fairies deliver dragon eggs to a select few, known as Kindreds, but no egg has ever arrived for Alice.
While wandering the woods alone, she finds and secretly befriends a mysterious old dragon named Brim. Alice is excited to finally have a dragon friend of her own, but when Brim suddenly falls ill, Alice must set out on a desperate quest to save him.
Where: Once Upon a Time, Montrose
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/2026-02-18/graphic-novel-club
Middle Grade Book Club at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event
Meets monthly, generally on the third Wednesday of each month at 4:30 pm.
We read new releases of middle grade fiction. Book selection is done by voting at each meeting for the following month’s meeting.
Facilitated by Nedda Lewers. Please RSVP to amy@pagesabookstore.com
Where: pages: a bookstore
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 4:30 pm – 5:30 pm
Address: 904 Manhattan Ave., Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
Website: https://pagesabookstore.com/event/2026-02-18/middle-grade-book-club
Book Club for Adults: Nickle Boys at San Fernando Library, LACL – In-Person Event
In honor of African American and Black History Month, we’re reading The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead. Copies of the current title are available at the Information Desk. New members are always welcome! For adults.
The author brilliantly dramatizes a strand of American history through the story of two boys sentenced to a hellish reform school in 1960s Florida. In reality, the Nickel Academy is a chamber of horrors, where abuse is rife, where corrupt officials and tradesmen do a brisk trade in supplies intended for the school, and where any boy who resists is likely to disappear ‘out back’. Based on the history of a real reform school in Florida that operated for one hundred and eleven years and warped and destroyed the lives of thousands of children, The Nickel Boys is a devastating, driven narrative.
Where: San Fernando Library, LACL
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm
Address: 217 N. Maclay Ave., San Fernando, CA 91340
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15408289
Quiet Write Night at Lake View Terrace Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Enjoy a tranquil evening with other creative writers. This is a great way to get focused on your writing projects for 2026.
Where: Lake View Terrace Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 12002 Osborne Street, Lake View Terrace, CA 91342
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/quiet-write-night-6
Rainbow Reads Teen Book Club: Just Another Epic Love Poem at Once Upon a Time, Montrose – In-Person Teen Event
Our Rainbow Reads Book Club celebrates diversity in Young Adult books as we read books featuring various identities and stories. This is a safe space welcome to teens of all identities and allies! Join Iz and Apollo for our proud book club.
Best for ages 13 and up.
This is a discussion based club. Participants should come prepared to share their thoughts about that meeting’s book choice.
No drop-ins.
Participants will discuss Just Another Epic Love Poem by Partisa Akhbari, and celebrate all the identities and stories!
Best friendship blossoms into something more in this gorgeously written queer literary romance.
Where: Once Upon a Time, Montrose
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/2026-02-18/rainbow-reads-book-club
Fiction Book Club: Erasure at Studio City Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us on the third Wednesday of every month for our long-running book club for adults!
Upcoming meeting:
February (2/18): Erasure by Percival Everett
RSVP:
Please email studio@lapl.org for participation details.
Where: Studio City Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 12511 Moorpark Street, Studio City, CA 91604
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/fiction-book-club-0
WeHo Reads Event: Telling Family Secrets via WeHo Arts, City of West Hollywood – Online Zoom & YouTube Event
What happens when writers dare to expose family secrets through stories and memoir?
To write is an act of exploration, revelation, and reckoning with the consequences of silence and speaking up. The first event in the WeHo Reads 2026 series brings together four acclaimed writers whose work dares to share what is often kept in the dark. Through fiction, memoir, and hybrid forms, these authors explore how telling family secrets can be a powerful and vulnerable creative act.
Toni Ann Johnson, author of the Arrington family saga, which includes her novella Homegoing, the Flannery O’Connor Award-winning Light Skin Gone to Waste, and her newest linked collection, winner of the Screen Door Press Prize, But Where’s Home?
Aimee Liu, bestselling author of the novels Glorious Boy, Flash House, Cloud Mountain, andFace, as well as the memoirs Solitaire andGaining.
Juanita E. Mantz (JEM), author of the memoir Tales of an Inland Empire Girl, who is also a lawyer/deputy public defender, a performer, and the host of the Life of JEM podcast.
Hannah Sward, award-winning author of Strip: A Memoir whose work has appeared in publications such as the LA Times, HuffPost, and NY Times (Tiny Love Stories).
Where: WeHo Arts, City of West Hollywood
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: Online Zoom & YouTube Event
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/weho-reads-telling-family-secrets-tickets-1981060604597
Shut Up and Write in Los Feliz at Big Bar, The Alcove – In-Person Event
Join Los Feliz writers again every Wednesday to WRITE | HANG | REPEAT at Big Bar, The Alcove in Los Feliz, every Wednesday evening in February (on the 4th, 11th, 18th & 25th).
All writing levels and forms are welcome.
Where: Big Bar, The Alcove
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 6:45 pm – 8:15 pm
Address: 1929 Hillhurst Ave., Los Feliz, CA 90027
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Romance Supper Club Launch Event at Nature Studios – In-Person Event
Romance Supper Club is a new book club and it’s mostly an excuse to eat dinner together and talk about romance once a month.
Welcome to Romance Supper Club 🍷📚
A monthly dinner book club hosted by The Fleuria. We’ll gather over a meal to chat about books, mostly romance, sometimes adjacent, always good. No pressure to finish the book. No pop quizzes. Just thoughtful conversation and a table full of readers.
Our first night is a kickoff, so think cozy dinner party vibes. No required read. Bring a recent favorite to share if you’d like, and we’ll vote on future picks together.
If you joined us for floral book club, this will feel familiar, just with more room to grow.
Get your ticket at the link in bio.
Where: Nature Studios
Date: Wednesday, the 18th
Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 23427 S. Western Ave., Torrance, CA
Website: https://www.instagram.com
RECESS Open Mic: PUA Turns 8 at SIPA HQ, Palms Up Academy – In-Person Event
RECESS Open Mic is at SIPA HQ on Wednesdays.
Come celebrate 8 years of RECESS Mic! There wit be a roster of special performances this year in #HistoricFilipinotown.
Standard mic RSVP; rules and entry apply.
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.
Host: Lady Basco
NOTE: Only self-sign-ups are allowed.
20 slots available; 15 slots for dinner served; remaining slots for faculty.
See site for further details,
NOTE: See site for RSVP, cost, guidelines, and details.
Where: SIPA HQ
Date: Wednesday, the 18th
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.instagram.com
At Skylight: Larisa Pham, with Jean Kyoung Frazier, & Discipline at Skylight – In-Person Event
Larisa Pham, in conversation with Jean Kyoung Frazier, will discuss Discipline.
Christine is on tour for her novel, a revenge fantasy based on a real-life relationship gone bad with an older professor ten years prior. Now on the road, she’s seeking answers—about how to live a good life and what it means to make art—through intimate conversations with strangers, past lovers, and friends.
But when the antagonist of her novel—her old painting professor—reaches out in a series of sly communiques after years of silence to tell her that he’s read her book, Christine must reckon with what it means to lose the reins of a narrative she wrote precisely to maintain control. When her professor invites her to join him at his house, on a remote island off the coast of Maine, their encounter threatens to change the very foundations of her life as she’s imagined it.
A pristine and provocative high-wire act toggling the fictions we construct for ourselves just to survive and the possibilities that lie beyond them, Discipline launches a spellbinding inquiry into the nature of art-making and rigor, intimacy and attention, punishment and release.
Larissa Pham is the author of the essay collection Pop Song, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize. Her writing has appeared in Granta, The Nation, The New York Times Book Review, Bookforum, Aperture, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA in fiction from the Bennington Writing Seminars and is an assistant professor of writing at The New School. Discipline is her first novel.
Jean Kyoung Frazier is a writer living in Los Angeles. Her debut novel Pizza Girl was published by Knopf Doubleday in 2020. She also writes for television.
Where: Skylight
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-larissa-pham-presents-discipline-w-jean-kyoung-frazier
Banned Books Club: Things Fall Apart at Underdog Bookstore Monrovia – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Banned Books Club meets every third Wednesday at Underdog Bookstore to discuss a new banned or challenged book each month.
For those wishing to join virtually, a Zoom link will be shared with all attendees prior to the event.
Our Banned Books Club pick for February 18th is Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe.
You can pick up a copy in store or keep supporting Underdog by listening to the audiobook from our libro.fm or downloading the ebook from our bookshop.org.
RSVP: Suggested donation of $5-20 or donate a gently used banned book.
Where: Underdog Bookstore
Date: Wednesday the 18th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 312 Myrtle Ave., Monrovia, CA 91016
Website: https://www.underdogbookstore.org/events/banned-books-club-december-xrzdg-5m839
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 — CLI/WSP Night: Tonia McMillan & Paper Dolls, Lipstick, and Leather (with love and some other stuff);
- 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 18th
Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm
Address: 4321 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Story Salon at Art Parlor: California in Valley Village – In-Person & Virtual Hybrid Event
Los Angeles’s longest running storytelling venue is now a hybrid event!
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!
Tickets can be purchased early with the link in bio or at storysalon.com.
Theme: Freestyle!
Where: Art Parlor
Date: Wednesday the 18th
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 Martin Jago 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.
Martin Jago is a British American poet based in Los Angeles. Author of Photofit (Pindrop Press, 2023) and a 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.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Wednesday, the 18th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: Online event (see site)
Website: https://beyondbaroque.org/index.html
Poetry Reading & Open Mic by Two Idiots Peddling Poetry with Ben Trigg and Guest Gahl Liberson at The Ugly Mug – In-Person Event
Host Ben Trigg welcomes Ghal Liberzon for a reading and open mic.
Gahl Liberzon is a writer, educator, and aspiring researcher in Long Beach, California. His work has appeared in The Museum of Americana and The Golden Shovel Anthology: New Poems Honoring Gwendolyn Brooks, and he has previously taught and performed throughout southeast Michigan, the greater Chicago area, and the greater Tokyo metropolitan area.
$5 cover fee, cash only
$5 cover fee, cash only
Where: The Ugly Mug, Orange
Date: Wednesday, the 18th
Time: 8 pm – 10 pm
Address: 261 N. Glassell St., Orange, CA 92866
Website: https://www.facebook.com/events/808327411949660
Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Come write with us!
Many people believe that a 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: Thursday the 19th
Time: 10 am – 11 am
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://villagewell.com
Mystery Book Discussion: Secret Identity at Palms Rancho Park Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event
Join us for an engaging conversation about whodunnits, thrillers, and cri-fi. We meet on the 3rd Thursday of the month, except in June this year. Copies available at reference and as e-books. Light refreshments provided by Friends of the Palms Rancho Park Library.
Feb. 19: Secret Identity by Alex Segura
Where: Palms Rancho Park Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 1:30 pm
Address: Online Event
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-discussion-2
Book Club for Adults: Simenon at Chet Holfield Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Whether you like historical fiction, sci-fi, romance, or memoirs, this book club reads it all. This month, join us for a discussion of various Detective Maigret novels by Georges Simenon. Pick up a copy at the information desk today! For adults.
Where: Chet Holfield Library, LACL
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 1060 S. Greenwood Ave., Montebello, CA 90640
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15550638
Poetry in the Afternoon: Beth Baird and Rick Leddy & Open Mic at SPARC Gallery, Pasadena – In-Person Event
Host Aaron Hernandez welcomes featured guests Beth Baird and Rick Leddy and an open mic opportunity to Poetry in the Afternoon on the 3rd Thursday of the month.
Southern California poets gather at the historic Fremont Center Theatre in South Pasadena to recite our poems. Hear L.A.’s best poets and read your work at our open mic.
Beth Baird is a published poet and singer/songwriter. She is author of a memoir, Love & Other Myths.
Rick Leddy is a local author and poet, former art director and journalist, and the author ofthe collection Metro Mona Lisa.
Where: SPARC Gallery, Pasadena
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 1000 Freemont Avenue, #120, South Pasadena, CA 91030
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Book Launch: Dr. Jaya John & Wildflowers Praying at Midnight at Octavia’s Bookshelf, Pasadena – In-Person Event
Community! We are so thrilled to be hosting the book launch for Dr. Jaiya John’s newest book of poetic soul medicine, Wildflowers Praying at Midnight. This will be a warm, intimate, and heart-full book event, with readings from Dr. John, community discussion, Q&A, as well as an opportunity for signing and photos. We will have a selection of Dr. John’s other works available for purchase.
We can’t wait to host this brilliant human and have you all join us!
Register at website.
Wildflowers Praying at Midnight is Jaiya John’s newest collection of poetic verses, rich with stories, prayers, devotions, affirmations, incantations, soul summoning, and mystic dreaming. For longtime and new readers of Jaiya John, Wildflowers provides fresh medicine for a humanity moving through profound collective harm, reckoning, revelation, and revival. In a voice both ancestral and prophetic, each page offers a lush garden of spiritual and social blooming. Nourishing salve and balm for this moment and beyond. Pollinated and nectar-rich in John’s customary Love-soaked language, this soul-stirring collection confronts all forms of oppression at their often-avoided root. Wildflowers Praying at Midnight soothes and guides your tender heart and our kindred way forward.
Where: Octavia’s Bookshelf
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 1353 North Hill Ave., Pasadena, CA 91104
Website: https://www.octaviasbookshelf.com/events/dr-jaiya-john-book-launch
Author Talk: The Adventures of Lens and Pen at Woodland Hills Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join guest speakers Homa Sarshar, Dr. Mondana Zandian, Bijan Tehrani, and Reza Allamehzadeh.
Reza Allamehzadeh’s The Adventures of Lens and Pen documents nearly six decades of his work in writing, filmmaking, and journalism. This latest book brings together personal reflections on his long career with the camera and the pen.
Where: Woodland Hills Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm
Address: 22200 Ventura Blvd., Woodland Hills, CA 91364
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/author-talk-adventures-lens-and-pen
Online Book Club: Cold Comfort Farm at West Los Angeles Regional Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event
The West LA Book Club meets on the third Thursday of each month. We alternate between fiction and nonfiction. Digital copies of selected titles are generally available on Libby or Hoopla three weeks before the discussion date.
Feb. 19: Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
RSVP:
For Zoom link, please contact Carrie at cdavies@lapl.org
Where: West Los Angeles Regional Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: Online Event (see site)
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/online-book-club-1
Adaptation Book Club: Emma Film Screeningat Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Film: Emma (2020), dir. Autumn de Wilde. Have Jane Austen’s Emma read before this film screening. The discussion on the book and the film will be the week after on February 26th at 6:00 pm!
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-19/adaptation-book-club-emma-film-screening
Bel Canto Book Club: Colored Television at Bel Canto Bookstore, Long Beach – In-Person Event
Bel Canto Book Club meets in person on the third Thursday of each month at our bookstore (2106 E 4th Street, LB) to discuss a hand-picked favorite chosen by bookstore owner Jhoanna.
Past book club favorites include: Chain Gang All Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, I Have Some Questions for You by Rebecca Makkai, and Yellowface by R. F. Kuang.
If you live in the Long Beach/LA area, you may purchase books directly from Bel Canto Books by visiting our Retro Row location (2106 E 4th Street) or our KUBO LB location (3976 Atlantic Avenue). A link is included below to purchase the book online via open_in_newBookshop.org.
Book Club Guidelines available at site.
Note: Please RSVP at site.
Where: Bel Canto Books, Retro Row
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm
Address: 2106 E. 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://withfriends.co/event
New Year New Books 2026: Pen America Members Event at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join your fellow LA PEN America members at our annual New Year New Books party to both celebrate all that literature brings us and defend the power of the written word! We’ll toast to our favorite books from 2025, hear what’s coming in the year ahead, share food and drink, and mingle with fellow writers, readers, and believers in the power of words to transform the world. We invite members and allies to join us in standing against censorship and for the joys that literature brings to our lives.
We will be celebrating alongside our Literary Host Committee, Laila Lalami, J.D. Mathes, Kathleen Sharp, and Sholeh Wolpe.
This is a member-exclusive event. If you are a member, please visit the member benefits page to access the registration link. Not a PEN America member? Join today!
Where: Diesel, A Bookstore
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 6:30 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Suite 33, Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2026-02-19/new-year-new-books-2026-pen-america-members-event
Grant Faulkner and Gail Butensky, with Francesca Lia Block, & Something Out There in the Distanceat Book Soup – In-Person Event
Grant Faulkner and Gail Butensky, in conversation with Francesca Lia Block, will discuss Something Out There in the Distance.
Two lovers go on one final road trip through the American desert, hoping that they can outrun life itself.
Flash-fiction master Grant Faulkner and photographer Gail Butensky have partnered to create this unique narrative made up of stories alongside edge-of-the-world photography. The book tells of two lovers taking a reckless, searching road trip through the American West. Dawn is a photographer who captures desert landscapes. Jonny drives just to drive, running away from the end of time or running toward the end of time, looking for a home even as his restlessness overtakes him. By turns funny, poignant, and heartbreaking, something out there in the distance is big in emotions while brief in words. An extraordinary collaboration between word and image, Dawn and Jonny’s journey transports us to a place, achingly familiar, populated by love, loss, and wonder.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 8818 W. Sunset Blvd. West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2026-02-19/grant-faulkner-gail-butensky
Book Event: Keeonna Harris, with Myriam Gurba & Mainline Mama at Reparations Club – In-Person Event
Please join us for a discussion on Mainline Mama by author Keeonna Harris in conversation with Myriam Gurba.
Keeonna and Jason met as young teens. Only fourteen, Keeonna had never had a boyfriend before, dreamed of attending Spelman to become an obstetrician, and thought she was “grown.” Within a year she was pregnant, and Jason was in prison, convicted of a carjacking and sentenced to twenty-two years. Overnight Keeonna had become a “mainline mama,” a parent facing the impossible task of raising a child—while still growing up herself—with an incarcerated partner.
In this devastating and triumphant memoir, Keeonna recalls her harrowing journey as a Mainline Mama, from learning to overcome the exhausting difficulties of navigating the carceral system in the United States, to transforming herself into an advocate for other women like her—the predominantly Black and brown women left behind to pick up the pieces of their families and fractured lives.
Keeonna speaks frankly about the depression and suicidal thoughts that threatened to defeat her, how she learned to rebuild her broken relationship with a mother that lost trust in her, and how time eased the shame, guilt, and stigma of being a young Black teen mom with a partner behind bars. She offers inspiration and solace, showing how to create moments of beauty, humanity, and love in a place designed to break spirits, such as picking the perfect wedding dress for a ceremony in a state prison visiting room.
Mainline Mama is about creating self-love and community—crucial acts of radical resistance against a prison industrial complex that is designed to dehumanize and to separate and shut away incarcerated individuals and their loved ones from the world.
Keeonna Harris is a writer, storyteller, mother of five, prison abolitionist, activist, and academic, born and raised in Watts and other parts of South Central Los Angeles. Her work focuses on health disparities and radical organizing for women connected to systems of mass incarceration, mothering, and community building as acts of radical defiance against carceral institutions. Harris has received several honors, including a 2018–2019 PEN America Writing for Justice Fellowship, a 2021 Tin House Summer Residency, a 2023 Baldwin for The Arts Residency, and a 2023 Hedgebrook Fellowship as the 2023 Edith Wharton Writer-in-Residence. She is a 2024 Haymarket Writing Freedom Fellow and a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Washington in the Department of Health Systems and Population Health. She is developing the Borderland Project, a mental health and community support system for women forced to navigate carceral institutions to maintain connections with incarcerated persons. She lives in Seattle.
Myriam Gurba is a writer and activist. She has authored five books, including Poppy State: A Labyrinth of Plants and a Story of Beginnings. Her essays have been published by the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Harper’s Bazaar, Vox, and Paris Review. She is a co-founder of Dignidad Literaria, a grassroots organization committed to combating racism in the book world. She believes that we can achieve a world free of rape culture and works hard to make that a reality. In her spare time, she enjoys solving crossword puzzles, baking, and annoying her cats.
Where: Reparations Club
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 3054 S Victoria Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90016
All Women’s Open Mic at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event
Village Well is partnering with local trauma-healing poet Kate Burns to provide a platform for female poets, musicians, storytellers, and comedians. While all are welcome to attend, this is an event that aims to amplify women’s voices only.
Acts are limited to 3-5 minutes in length. Sign-ups begin at 6:30 pm and conclude at 7:00 pm!
Also, please note that not all material may be considered “family-friendly” so please use discretion when deciding whether or not to bring children.
Get your tickets at website!
Where: Village Well Books & Coffee
Date: Thursday the 19th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://villagewell.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 a 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: Friday the 20th
Time: 9 am – 10 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
Date: Friday, the 20th
Time: 9:30 am
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/2026-02-20/weekly-pj-story-time
Book Club: North Woods at La Mirada Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss North Woods by Daniel Mason, a sweeping novel about a single house in the woods of New England, told through the lives of those who inhabit it across the centuries—a daring, moving tale of memory and fate. For adults.
Where: La Mirada Library, LACL
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 10:30 am – 11:30 am
Address: 13800 La Mirada Blvd., La Mirada, CA 90638
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15607323
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 20th
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 9900 Culver Blvd. #1B, Culver City, CA 90232
Website: https://shop.villagewell.com
Lunar New Year Storytime: Oliver Chin & Year of the Horse at Live Oak Library, LACL – In-Person Kids Event
Celebrate Lunar New Year! Children’s book author and storyteller, Oliver Chin, will introduce children to Lunar New Year traditions, animals of the zodiac, and share his book Year of the Horse: Tales from the Chinese Zodiac. For ages 5 – 12.
Attendance is limited, and advance registration is required. Please register every individual in your party. This will be used to save your spots in the program. We cannot guarantee availability for any unregistered attendees.
Where: Live Oak Library, LACL
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 22 W. Live Oak Ave., Arcadia, CA 91007
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15639660
Mystery Book Club: The Deepest Lake at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Join us to discuss The Deepest Lakeby Andromeda Romano-Lax.
A grieving mother goes undercover to investigate her daughter’s mysterious death at a luxury memoir-writing workshop on the shores of Lake Atitlán, Guatemala in this atmospheric thriller for fans of HBO’s The White Lotus, Lisa Jewell, and Ashley Audrain.
Includes an excerpt of What Boys Learn, the standalone suspense novel from Andromeda Romano-Lax about a high school guidance counselor’s growing fear that her son may have had a role in the deaths of two teenage girls in a wealthy Chicago suburb.
Rose, the mother of twentysomething aspiring writer Jules, has waited three months for answers about her daughter’s death. Why was she swimming alone when she feared the water? Why did she stop texting days before she was last seen?
When the official investigation rules the death an accidental drowning, the body possibly lost forever in Central America’s deepest lake, an unsatisfied Rose travels to the memoir workshop herself. She hopes to draw her own conclusion—and find closure. When Rose arrives, she is swept into the curious world created by her daughter’s literary hero, the famous writing teacher Eva Marshall, a charismatic woman known for her candid—and controversial—memoirs. As Rose uncovers details about the days leading up to Jules’s disappearance, she begins to suspect that this glamorous retreat package is hiding ugly truths. Is Lake Atitlán a place where traumatized women come to heal or a place where deeper injury is inflicted?
The Deepest Lake is both a sharp look at the sometimes toxic, exclusionary world of high-class writing workshops and an achingly poignant view of a mother’s grief.
Andromeda Romano-Lax is the author of five novels translated into eleven languages, including The Spanish Bow, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, and Annie and the Wolves, selected by Booklist as a Top Ten Historical Novel. Her novels reflect her interest in topics as varied as art acquisition during the Nazi era (The Detour), psychological scandals of the 1920s (Behave), and artificial intelligence and the future of eldercare (Plum Rains). Born in Chicago, she lived in Alaska (where she co-founded 49 Writers), Taiwan, and Mexico before settling on a small island in British Columbia, Canada.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-20/mystery-book-club-deepest-lake
Reading & Book Signing: Melinah Ani Yemenidjian & The Split Pomegranate at LibroMobile Bookstore, Santa Ana – In-Person Event
Join us at LibroMobile for a reading and book signing of Melineh Ani Yemenidjian’s debut poetic memoir, The Split Pomegranate.
The Split Pomegranate is an intimate and fiercely honest collection exploring self-awareness and resilience while challenging societal doubt. Divided into four parts, it traces the poet’s journey through heritage, a nourished yet isolated childhood, the joys and destruction of love, undiagnosed bipolar disorder, and the affirmations born of recovery. Each poem is both a standalone gem and part of a larger meditation offering readers raw truths and lyrical reflections that linger long after the final page.
Where: LibroMobile
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 6 pm – 7 pm
Address: 1150 S. Bristol St., #A3., Santa Ana, CA 92704
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Celeste Donohue & Hollywood Factotum at Book Soup – In-Person Event
Author Celeste Dononue discusses and signs Hollywood Factotum.
When Celeste Donohue moved to Hollywood in 1990 to chase her dream of becoming an entertainer, she never imagined that it would take decades-and 49 day jobs-to find what she was truly searching for. Alongside celebrity encounters and casting calls came financial struggles, emotional chaos, and an endless parade of difficult bosses. In the midst of it all, Celeste began to wonder if the real obstacle was herself. That realization sparked a deep personal transformation, leading to a kind of fulfilment she hadn’t expected-one rooted not in fame, but in self-awareness and evolution. Hollywood Factotum is a candid, witty, and heartfelt account of what it really takes to pursue a dream and survive in a city that tests your every limit.
Where: Book Soup
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 8818 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069
Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2026-02-20/celeste-donohue
At Skylight: Grant Grinder, with Rufi Thorpe, & So Old, So Young at Skylight – In-Person Event
Grant Grinder, in conversation with Rufi Thorpe, will discuss So Old, So Young.
From the bestselling author of The People We Hate at the Wedding, comes a generation-defining novel that is part love story, part tragic comedy. Five parties over the course of twenty years bring six college friends together, exploring the ways we run from and cling to our friends in love, life, and death.
For Marco and Mia, Sasha and Theo, Richie and Adam, the one constant in life after college together has been change. New jobs. New cities. New spouses. New children. Through it all, one thing they thought would always stay the same is their friendship. But time has a way of breaking even the strongest bonds, and testing what we thought we knew. From East Village apartment parties and disastrous destination weddings, to fortieth birthdays and suburban backyard barbecues, Grant Ginder’s resonant, funny, and deeply moving novel is a story about the growing pains of the Millennial generation, and a celebration of how love can shift, stumble, and grow into something bigger than we ever could have imagined.
Grant Ginder is the author of five novels, including Let’s Not Do That Again and The People We Hate at the Wedding, now a major motion picture starring Allison Janney, Kristen Bell, and Ben Platt. Originally from Southern California, Ginder received his MFA from New York University, where he teaches writing.
Rufi Thorpe is the author of four novels, most recently Margo’s Got Money Troubles which was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize and the Mark Twain Prize, a Book of the Month pick as well as winner of the Libby Award for Best Bookclub Pick, and is soon to be a series on Apple TV. The Knockout Queen was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner award and a Book of the Month pick, and her first novel The Girls from Corona del Mar was long-listed for the Dylan Thomas Prize and the First Novel Prize. Her work has been translated into 18 languages. She received her MFA from the University of Virginia and now teaches at The Book Incubator, an online MFA alternative program. She lives in California with her husband and two sons.
Where: Skylight
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027
Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-grant-ginder-presents-so-old-so-young-w-rufi-thorpe
Open Mic Nightat Underdog Bookstore Monrovia – In-Person Event
We host an Open Mic Night at Underdog Bookstore on the third Friday of every month to showcase and celebrate the creative talents of our local community, including poetry, music, and more!
While walk-in sign-ups are welcome on the night, if you’d like to be listed as a featured performer and guarantee your spot, you can apply here.
Suggested donation $5-20 or donate a gently used book by an LGBTQIA+, BIPOC or Disabled author.
Where: Underdog Bookstore
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 312 Myrtle Ave., Monrovia, CA 91016
Website: https://www.underdogbookstore.org/events
Simona Supekar, with Mark Haskell Smith, & Stock Photo (Object Lessons) at Vroman’s – In-Person Event
Simona Supekar, in conversation with Mark Haskell Smith, will discuss and sign Stock Photo (Object Lessons).
Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things.
Part memoir, part cultural criticism, Stock Photo mines the significance of the stock photo in our everyday lives, from the ads and websites we browse, to the menus and memes that we consume. Through interviews with stock photography experts, photographers, models, consumers, and other stakeholders, Simona Supekar explores the evolution of the industry by tracing the creation of a stock photo from concept to usage while highlighting significant historical moments.
Supekar weaves in her own experiences as a keyworder for a stock photography company while reckoning with her Asian American/South Asian identity in a post-9/11 world. Stock Photo also addresses how these images have the power to shape our perceptions about race, class/caste, gender, ability, and more, thus underscoring the importance of representation even in something as innocuous as a stock photo.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Friday the 20th
Time: 7 pm – 8 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
The Golden Mean: A Reading Series at Beyond Baroque – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Join us for a night of poetry and prose with writers based in Los Angeles.
Join us for the return of The Golden Mean, a quarterly reading series 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: Nick Martino, Austen Leah Rose, Amanda Scharf, Thomas Renjili, curated and hosted by Matthew Gellman.
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.
Nick Martino is a poet and teacher from Milwaukee. His debut poetry collection Scrap Book (Alice James Books) won the 2024 Alice James Editors’ Choice Award and will be published in 2026. His poems are published or forthcoming from Ploughshares, Best New Poets, Gulf Coast, Poetry Daily, Ninth Letter, The Boston Review, and The Southern Review, among others. A finalist for the 2024 Sewanee Review Poetry Prize, he holds an MFA from the University of California, Irvine where he received the 2022 Excellence in Poetry Prize. He lives in LA.
Austen Leah Rose is the author of Once, This Forest Belonged to a Storm which won the Juniper Prize from the University of Massachusetts Press. Her poems have appeared in The Sewanee Review, Narrative, The Iowa Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, and elsewhere. She has a PhD from the University of Southern California where she is currently a Dornsife Fellow.
Amanda Maret Scharf is the author of To Make a Bell Ring Back, winner of the 2025 Four Way Books Levis Prize in Poetry (forthcoming, spring 2027) and coauthor of the collaborative chapbooks, Metal House of Cards (Finishing Line Press) and Astral Gaze (dancing girl press, forthcoming). Her poems can be found in Narrative, Poetry Northwest, Iowa Review, Gulf Coast, Poet Lore, and elsewhere. She teaches at USC and lives in Los Angeles with her wife and their dog, Silver.
Thomas Renjilian is a fiction writer and poet from Scranton, Pennsylvania. A graduate of Vassar College, he received his MFA from Oregon State University and is a PhD candidate at the University of Southern California. His stories and poems appear in The American Poetry Review, Kenyon Review, Gulf Coast, The Missouri Review, Denver Quarterly, Electric Literature, and other publications. He edits fiction for Joyland Magazine and lives in Los Angeles.
Following the readings, be sure to join us for a reception & book signings.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Friday, the 20th
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291
SWAAM Spoken Word Art & Music Event at Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center – In-Person Event
SWAAM Spoken Word Art & Music is offered every 1st & 3rd Friday of the month and hosted by Loranzo Frank.
Featured guests: TBA
Tickets at Eventbrite.
NOTE: See site for details.
Where: Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center
Date: Friday, the 20th
Time: 8 pm – 12 am
Address: 4305 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008
Website: https://www.depoet.info/swaam
Third Fridays Rapp Saloon Reading Series & Open Mic with host Elena Secota at Rapp Saloon, Santa Monica – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Third Fridays at Rapp Saloon: Open Mic & Featured Readers, will be this week, and is offered every 1st Friday of the month.
First Friday: Cynthia Alessandra Briano
Second Friday: Russell Greene
Third Friday: Elena Secota
Fourth Friday: Jim Bolt
Fifth Friday: James Evert Jones
This is a hybrid event, live in-person while offering a Zoom option for our performers and guests.
Our featured guest poets and artists this month TBA.
NOTE: See site or flyer for details.
Where: Rapp Saloon at HISUA
Date: Friday, the 20th
Time: 8 pm – 11 pm
Address: 1436 2nd St., Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://www.facebook.com/RappSaloonReading or https://www.instagram.com
Graphic Novel Book Club: Big Jim and the White Boy via Bel Canto Books – Online Zoom Event
The book for February is Big Jim and the White Boy: An American Classis Reimagined by David F. Walker.
Where: Bel Canto Books
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 10 am – 12 pm
Address; Online Event (see site)
Website: https://withfriends.co/event
Book Club: Parable of the Sower at Gardena Mayme Dear Library, LACL – In-Person Event
The book for February is Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler. For adults.
Join our book club for a lively discussion. Copies of the book are available at the customer service desk and on Libby/Overdrive. The selection for February is Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler.
In 2025 California, an eighteen-year old African American woman suffering from a hereditary trait that causes her to feel others’ pain as well as her own, flees northward from her small community and its desperate savages.
Where: Gardena Mayme Dear Library, LACL
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address; 1731 Gardena Blvd., Gardena, CA 90247
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15019407
Poetry Writing Studio with Charlotte Ward at Malibu Library, LACL – In-Person Event
Join Malibu Poet Laureate Charlotte Ward for a generative poetry writing studio where we will cycle with each other’s energies, discuss poems to stimulate our imaginations & write original poems from prompts or personal impetus. For adults.
We’ll explore, express, and celebrate all forms of energy.
This studio environment provided by the City of Malibu is designed for everyone, regardless of experience. Come prepared with pen, notepad, and fervor. Led by Malibu Poet Laureate Charlotte Ward.
Where: Malibu Library, LACL
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 11 am – 1 pm
Address: 23519 West Civic Center Way, Malibu, CA 90265
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15617171
Storytime & Book Signing: Baseball for Breakfast with Judy Campbell Smith at Once Upon a Time, Montrose – In-Person Event
Join author Judy Campbell Smith for this (mostly) true story that is a glimpse of real baseball history in Baseball for Breakfast. Judy will read her new picture book, answer any questions from the audience, and then sign books. Best for ages 5+.
Judy Campbell-Smith writes the picture books she wishes she had as a child that spark curiosity and celebrate diversity. Her books are an engaging mix of fact and fiction, and she is often inspired by true stories and real people in her work. She is the author of Ice Cream Everywhere: Sweet Stories from Around the World. Judy is very active in the kidlit community and lives in Southern California with her husband and two children.
Where: Once Upon a Time, Montrose
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 11 am – 1 pm
Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020
Website: https://www.shoponceuponatime.com/event/baseball-breakfast
Storytime & Book Signing: Call Me Moby with Lars Kenseth at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
A lovable white whale tries to befriend a shipful of sailors with hilarious results, in this clever debut from a celebrated New Yorker cartoonist and television writer. Perfect for fans of Jon Klassen and Jory John.
Meet Physeter Macrocephalus – but you can call him Moby.
He’s got the BIGGEST toothy smile. He’s always up for a game of tag. And his backflips can’t be beat! Who wouldn’t want to be his pal?
So, when he meets a ship full of sailors out on the ocean, he just knows they will get along swimmingly. Moby is as fin-tastic and friendly as he can be, but the guys still seem a little…salty. What could he be doing wrong?
This clever riff on the Melville classic is at its heart a story about how to make friends – and find ones who appreciate the real you.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-02-21/lars-kenseth-reads-signs-call-me-moby
Book Club: James at Felipe de Neve Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
In celebration of African American History Month, please join us for a book club discussion of Percival Everett’s James. The audiobook is available to download on Hoopla with your LAPL library card. If you have any questions or want to sign up, please email felipe@lapl.org or sign up in person at the info desk. Coffee and snacks will be served.
Where: Felipe de Neve Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 11:30 am – 12:30 pm
Address: 2820 W. 6th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90057
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/book-club-discussion-james-percival-everett
Creative Writing Workshop at Lakeview Terrace Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Your imagination can take you anywhere! Where do you want to go with your creative writing in 2026? Share your story, zine, or poetry at the library-or just listen. This will be a safe place to explore your inner voice. Learn and grow through your writing this year.
Where: Lake View Terrace Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 12 pm – 1:30 pm
Address: 12002 Osborne St., Lake View Terrace, CA 91342
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/creative-writing-workshop-5
Writing a Love Poem: Messy & Brite with Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo at Campo de Cahuenga Museum – In-Person Event
Join Campo de Cahuenga Museum for a love poetry workshop led by award-winning poet and professor, Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo.
In this one-hour writing lab, we will explore love poems from the 20th and 21st century and use them as jumping off points for our own poems of romantic and sensual love. With a focus on the “you,” we will get down to, what Eileen Myles calls the “messy & brite” parts of worship, obsession, and the body. Bring your writing tools and an open heart and dive in with a community of poets.
Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo is the daughter of Mexican immigrants and author of Incantation: Love Poems for Battle Sites and Posada: Offerings of Witness and Refuge. A former Steinbeck Fellow and Poets & Writers California Writers Exchange winner, Bermejo’s poetry and essays can be found at Acentos Review, Huizache, LA Review of Books, The Offing, [Pank], Santa Fe Writers Project, and other journals. Her poem “Battlegrounds” is featured in Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day, On Being’s Poetry Unbound, and Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World. Her most recent essay, “How to Write a Love Poem” can be found in Cleaver Magazine. She is the director of Women Who Submit.
*Please reserve a spot. Registration is required for workshops to ensure we get a head count and have all the necessary materials. If you hit the cap at Eventbrite, please email us at rap-campodecahuenga@lacity.org*
Where: Campo de Cahuenga
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 12 pm – 1:30 pm
Address: 3919 Lankershim Blvd., Studio City, CA 91605
Author Event: Jennifer Shay Carta & What Happened to Anabel Taylor at The Open Book, Pasadena – In-Person Event
Meet the author: Jennifer Shay Carta! Pick up a signed copy of her book What Happened To Anabel Taylor. “It’s addictively twisty and deeply.”
When a leaked video reveals Anabel Taylor in an affair with twenty-year-old rising star Cody Quinn, her perfect life implodes. The world sees scandal. Her husband sees betrayal. Anabel sees nothing — because she doesn’t remember any of it.
As memories of the affair and the childhood she buried begin to surface, Anabel is forced to confront the truth she’s spent a lifetime escaping. Someone wants her to remember. Someone else needs her to stay silent.
To reclaim her life, Anabel must face the girl she once was, and the woman she became to survive.
Pick up a signed copy of What Happened to Anabel Taylor and chat with @authorjennifershaycarta.
Where: The Open Book, Pasadena
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 12:30 pm – 2:30 pm
Address: 300 E. Colorado Blvd., #161, Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/meet-the-author-jennifer-shay-carta-at-the-open-book-pasadena-tickets-1980512009735 or https://www.instagram.com
Saturday Afternoon Book Club: Becomingat Vermont Square Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event
Join us for an engaging Book Club conversation as we read Becoming by Michelle Obama. In this inspiring memoir, Obama shares her journey from the South Side of Chicago to the White House, reflecting on the experiences, relationships, and values that shaped her along the way.
Together, we’ll discuss themes of identity, purpose, resilience, and public service, and explore how her story speaks to personal growth and finding one’s voice. All readers are welcome to share insights, listen, and connect in a thoughtful community discussion.
Where: Vermont Square Branch Library, LAPL
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 1 pm – 2 pm
Address: 1201 W. 48th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90037
Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/saturday-afternoon-book-club-5
Sisters in Crime Los Angeles: Love and Murder at Agoura Hills Library LACL – In-Person Event
Join us as we welcome authors from Sisters in Crime Los Angeles, Anne Louise Bannon, Ellen Byron, and Patricia Smiley, as they discuss their works, followed by a Q&A with the audience. For ages 18 and up.
Copies of the author’s books are available to check out through the library.
Attendance is limited, and advance registration is required. Please register every individual in your party. This will be used to save your spots in the program. We cannot guarantee availability for any unregistered attendees.
Where: Agoura Hills Library, LACL
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 1 pm – 2:30 pm
Address: 29901 Ladyface Ct., Agoura Hills, CA 91301
Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15642610
Author Event: Kelly Nelson & The Devil & the Details at Arvida Book Co., Tustin – In-Person Event
Join us for an afternoon with Kelly Nelson author of The Devil and the Details. This novel is a dark, emotionally charged slow-burn romance that explores how easily passion can blur into possession—and what it takes to reclaim your power when love becomes the cage” (open_in_newkellyrnelsonstoryteller.com).
Come for the curiosity, stay for the story.
Where: Arvida Book Co., Tustin
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 1 pm
Address: 115 W. Main Street, Tustin, CA 92780
Website: https://withfriends.co/event or https://www.instagram.com
Celebrate Lunar New Year with Kaya Press in Echo Park – In-Person Event
Join us to celebrate Lunar New Year with a Zine Making Workshop hosted by The Fleuria.
As we move toward the Year of the Fire Horse, we’re reflecting on renewal not as abstraction, but as practice—how communities rebuild, nourish, and protect one another. In that spirit, we invite our community in Los Angeles to come together in Echo Park on February 21st from 1 – 3 pm (exact address to be sent by email to RSVP’d attendees). We’ll be making a collective zine while enjoying light bites, drinks, and good company. RSVP by clicking this link!
As part of Kaya Press’ ongoing commitment to distributing the means of publication, we are always looking for ways to engage people, share the tools of publishing, and get our voices and art out there in the world. We invite you to join us in making a collective zine reflecting on the Year of the Fire Horse and the dynamic, transformative power of poetry, language, and collectives. Feel free to bring a poem, drawing, or anything else you’d like to contribute–or just come hang out with us! All materials will be provided. A copy of the resulting zine will be sent to all attendees.
Where: Echo Park (exact address to be sent via email)
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 1 pm – 3 pm
Address: TBA
Website: https://kaya.com/category/events/
Building Legacies: Black Excellence in Crime Fiction with Aaron Philip Clark, Gary Phillips, Rachel Howzell Hall & Friends at Lore Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us for a panel discussion with leading Black voices in crime, mystery and suspense writing.
Join us for wine, refreshments, discussions, and community building as we celebrate the contributions of local authors and the legacies they’re creating.
Eager to preorder upcoming titles from our authors?
Preorder Eriq La Salle’s forthcoming title, LAWS OF SOLOMON.
Preorder Rachel Howzell Hall’s MIST AND MALICE.
Where: Lore Bookstore
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 1 pm – 3 pm
Address: 4334 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008
Website: https://www.bookswell.club/event/building-legacies-black-excellence-in-crime-fiction/
L. A. Book Launch: Gedda Ilves & Stranger’s Journey at Beyond Baroque – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Join us for a book launch celebration for the collection Stranger’s Journey by Gedda Ilves.
The afternoon will feature readings by Gedda Ilves, alongside Mariano Zaro, Jim Natal, and Gloria Vando.
Gedda Ilves, award winning poet, has been a beacon at Beyond Baroque for some years. Born in Harbin, China, Gedda grew up in Harbin and Shanghai, emigrating in 1949 and eventually arriving in Los Angeles by way of South Africa and Brazil. Her 5th book of poetry, As Butterly to a River, was published in 2019 by Conflux Press. At over 250 pages, this wonderful collection includes not only new poems, but also selections from her previous books; work spanning the last 15 years. Her poems have appeared in numerous anthologies and journals, and the recognition Gedda has garnered includes the Editor’s Choice Award for Outstanding Achievement in Poetry from poetry.com and the International Library of Poetry, runner up for the Paris Book Festival Award, finalist for the Eric Hoffer Award, and awards from The London, Paris. and Los Angeles Book Festivals. Gedda’s first four books of poems are catalogued in the Los Angeles Central Library.
Mariano Zaro is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently The Weight of Sound (Walton Well Press), Decoding Sparrows (What Books Press, Los Angeles) and Padre Tierra (Olifante, Zaragoza, Spain). His poems and short stories have been published in anthologies and literary journals in Mexico, Spain and the United States. His translations include Buda en llamas by Tony Barnstone and Cómo escribir una canción de amor by Sholeh Wolpé. He is a professor of Spanish at Río Hondo Community College (Whittier, CA).
Los Angeles poet and literary presenter Jim Natal is the author of five full-length poetry books including Spare Room: Haibun Variations and Memory and Rain as well as the chapbook Étude in the Form of a Crow. A new collection, Everything Changes Everything, is forthcoming in 2026. His work has appeared widely in journals and anthologies.
Gloria Vando is the author of three poetry books, Promesas: Geography of the Impossible, Shadows and Supposes (Arte De Publico) and Woven Voices (Scapegoat Press) and has won numerous awards, including the Poetry Society of America’s di Castagnola Award, Latino Literary Hall of Fames: Best Poetry Book of the Year, and others. She’s founding publisher/editor of Helicon Nine, which received the Kansas Governor’s Arts Award, is a contributing editor to the North American Review, and serves on the boards of the Venice Arts Council and Beyond Baroque in Los Angeles.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Saturday, the 21st
Time: 3 pm – 4:30 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291
Saturday Afternoon Poetry: Robbi Nestor & Barry Vitcov – Online Zoom Event
Readings by featured poets Robbi Nestor and Barry Vitcov and Poets published in Four Feathers Pres online edition: LOVE.
Don Kingfisher Campbell hosts and curates these events.
Where: Saturday Afternoon Poetry Online
Date: Saturday, the 21st
Time: 3 pm – 4:30 pm
Address: Online Zoom Event
Website: https://saturdayafternoonpoetry.blogspot.com/
Before the Ban Book Club: Free Lunch at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss Free Lunch by Rex Ogle.
Winner of the 2020 YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Award.
Instead of giving him lunch money, Rex’s mom has signed him up for free meals. As a poor kid in a wealthy school district, better-off kids crowd impatiently behind him as he tries to explain to the cashier that he’s on the free meal program. The lunch lady is hard of hearing, so Rex has to shout.
Free Lunch is the story of Rex’s efforts to navigate his first semester of sixth grade—who to sit with, not being able to join the football team, Halloween in a handmade costume, classmates and a teacher who take one look at him and decide he’s trouble—all while wearing secondhand clothes and being hungry. His mom and her boyfriend are out of work, and life at home is punctuated by outbursts of violence. Halfway through the semester, his family is evicted and ends up in government-subsidized housing in view of the school. Rex lingers at the end of last period every day until the buses have left, so no one will see where he lives.
Unsparing and realistic, Free Lunch is a story of hardship threaded with hope and moments of grace. Rex’s voice is compelling and authentic, and Free Lunch is a true, timely, and essential work that illuminates the lived experience of poverty in America.
Rex Ogle is the author of Free Lunch, which won the YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults Award; Abuela Don’t Forget Me, a finalist for the YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults Award; Punching Bag; and the novel When We Ride. He lives in Los Angeles, California.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 3:30 pm – 5:30 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-21/ban-book-club-free-lunch-2nd-session
Susan Walter & Murder at 30,000 Feet at Vroman’s – In-Person Event
Susan Walter will discuss and sign Murder at 30,000 Feet.
Under the cover of turbulence, a killer strikes. With nowhere to land and nowhere to hide, who will save the passengers from this nightmare at 30,000 feet?
It’s a ticket to paradise. Flight 868 with nonstop service to San Juan, Puerto Rico. Over a dozen tipsy passengers are off to a destination wedding. A team of high school baseball players are headed to a tournament. The plane is packed with people eager to escape their lives, and others who can’t wait to return to their beloved home.
But sweet anticipation turns to terror when a lightning strike short-circuits the avionics and plunges the plane into darkness. When the lights come back on, a passenger is found brutally murdered, with only a bewildered air marshal to solve the crime. He soon realizes that several passengers are harboring dark secrets, but the identity of the murderer eludes him. There’s only one certainty: the killer is on the plane.
Thousands of feet above the earth with thunderstorms closing in, the danger outside is as grave as the mounting threat within. Can the captain outrun the storm? Or will the murderer among them bring the plane down first?
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Saturday the 21st –
Time: 4 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-02-21/susan-walter
Sci-Fi Fantasy Book Club: The Apothecary Diaries at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Participants will discuss The Apothecary Diaries (Light Novel) #1 by Natsu Hyuuga.
A palace servant trained in herbal medicine finds herself at the heart of imperial intrigue in this lushly illustrated historical mystery.
Maomao leads an unassuming life with her apothecary father, but kidnappers whisk her away to a world of consorts and serving women in the empire’s rear palace. Sold into imperial servitude, the girl keeps her quick wit, sharp mind, and medical knowledge a secret. But the head eunuch, Jinshi, shatters Maomao’s low profile when she catches his eye. He perceives her true skills and makes her a lady-in-waiting to the rear palace’s top consort. Can Maomao quietly pass her term as her lady’s food tester, or will observational prowess and curiosity push her into danger as she uncovers turmoil at court?
This first installment in an ongoing light novel series starring an unforgettable female apothecary blends historical mystery and palace intrigue with a dash of romance—inspiring the popular The Apothecary Diaries manga anime adaptations!
Natsu Hyuuga is the author of The Apothecary Diaries novel series.
Touco Shino is the illustrator of The Apothecary Diaries novel series.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 5 pm – 6 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Poesia for the People: Desamores, Desahogos: Bilingual Readings at Stay Studio, Downey – In-Person Event
A bilingual open mic night for love, healing, and everything the heart holds. Guest poets, surprise performances.
Natalie Sierra (@pandorademise) is a first-generation Latinx poet & author. Natalie studied journalism at Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut, CA. Their work has been featured online and in print, in the Sinister Smile Press horror anthologies, Her Heart Poetry, Fine Print Paper, Ink and Nebula, Quail Bell Magazine, South Broadway Ghost Society, Westwind Magazine, a Journal for the Arts at UCLA, and the Los Angeles Times. She lives in Pomona, CA where she is the President of the nonprofit bookstore Café con Libros Press.
Sofia Aguilar (@sofiaxaguilar) is a Chicana writer, editor, teaching artist, community organizer, and library professional based on the traditional homelands of the Tongva, Kizh, and Chumash peoples (Los Angeles, California). Her work has appeared in the L.A. Times, Latino Book Review, Acentos Review, and New Orleans Review, among other publications. She is the author of zine and chapbook publications including Streaming Service: golden shovels made for tv (2021) and Streaming Service: season two (2022), both self-published. Her debut children’s picture book Queer Latine Heroes: 25 Changemakers from Latin America and the U.S. from History and Today was published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers in 2025.
Damaris Rose (@thedamarisrose) lives in Los Angeles and lives Unapologetically as a woman. Rose is the novelist of Lily’s Fire, a poet and Self-Intimacy Coach.
Hosted By:
Jean-Pierre Rueda (@poetatico) is a poet and cultural advocate originally from San José, Costa Rica, now based in Compton, California. He is known for his bilingual poetry collections, including “Herencias” and “Amor entre aguaceros / Love Between Downpours,” which explore themes of nostalgia, identity, and the connection to one’s homeland.
Alegría Zuluaga (@aizt_) is a published author who holds local writing workshops. Writing and taking care of people is her passion. That’s why she is studying to become a birth worker. Zuluaga holds a bachelors degree in Comparative World Literature with a minor in Linguistics from CSULB.
💸 Suggested $15 donation
50% of proceeds benefit @stayartsorg youth programs!
18+
Learn more and RSVP: stayarts.org/poesia
Where: Stay Studio, Downey
Date: Saturday, the 21st
Time: 6 pm – 8 pm (Doors at 5:30 pm)
Address: 11140 Downey Ave., Downey, CA 90241
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Queer Book Club: Clap When You Land at Bel Canto Books @LogansLovelyLibrary, Long Beach – In-Person Event
The book for February is Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo.
Where: Bel Canto Books @LogansLovelyLibrary, Retro Row
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 7 pm
Address: 2106 E. 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://withfriends.co/event
An Evening of Poetry in Celebration of tic tic tic by Hiedi Seaborn at Beyond Baroque – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event
Join us to celebrate Heidi Seaborn and her new collection tic tic tic, with guests Erin Marie Lynch, Matthew Gellman, & Nick Martino.
Both “memoir and protest”, tic tic tic elevates the tension between the urgency of the moment and history’s expanse, between an individual’s response and the inevitable legacy of collective generations. tic tic tic is a clear-eyed lyric take on the chaos of our times, and an affirmation of the human spirit. In a special format, tic tic tic offers poetry for the soul and 23 beautiful and stunning black and white photographs that tell their own story. This is a poetry collection to read, to share and display.
Heidi Seaborn is the author of Marilyn: Essays & Poems (Collector’s Edition of An Insomniac’s Slumber Party with Marilyn Monroe) (2022) and Give a Girl Chaos (see what she can do) (2019). She is the winner of The Missouri Review’s Jeffrey E. Smith Editor’s Prize and has won or been shortlisted for over sixty literary awards or recognitions. She holds degrees from Stanford University and New York University and serves as executive editor of The Adroit Journal.
Erin Marie Lynch is the author of Removal Acts (Graywolf Press, October 2023). Her poems appear in POETRY, New England Review, DIAGRAM, Narrative, Poetry Daily, Best New Poets, and other publications. She has received awards and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, MacDowell, the Wurlitzer Foundation, Indigenous Nations Poets, and the Hugo House. She was born and raised in Oregon; she is a direct descendant of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. Currently, she is a PhD candidate in Creative Writing and Literature at the University of Southern California. She lives in Los Angeles.
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.
Nick Martino is a poet and teacher from Milwaukee. His debut poetry collection Scrap Book (Alice James Books) won the 2024 Alice James Editors’ Choice Award and will be published in 2026. His poems are published or forthcoming from Ploughshares, Best New Poets, Gulf Coast, Poetry Daily, Ninth Letter, The Boston Review, and The Southern Review, among others. A finalist for the 2024 Sewanee Review Poetry Prize, he holds an MFA from the University of California, Irvine where he received the 2022 Excellence in Poetry Prize. He lives in LA.
NOTE: See site for further details, tickets, and information.
Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
Date: Saturday, the 21st
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291
Book Event: Gabrielle Felder, Dusah Wiseman, and Juju Baeat Reparations Club – In-Person Event
Join Rep Club for a triple-header, collective conversation demystifying healing & celebrating the magic in our words with authors and spiritual practitioners Gabrielle Felder (The Five Blessings of Ifá), Dusah Wiseman (Dear Cycle Breaker), and Juju Bae (The Book of Juju).
The Five Blessings of Ifá – Gabrielle Felder
Understanding where you come from is crucial in understandingwhere you are going.
The Five Blessings of Ifá explores how Black communities across the diaspora draw strength from ancestral wisdom, family, community care, and mutual aid, using the principles of Ifá—a West African spiritual tradition—as a guiding framework. Gabrielle Felder provides a blueprint for living a more fulfilled and abundant life through the blessings of AIKU (longevity), AJE (wealth), AYA AND OKO (relationships), OMO (children), and ISEGUN (victory over negative forces), providing practical examples of how Black folks have built resilience and learned to thrive in the face of oppression.
Dear Cycle Breaker – Dusah Wiseman
The practices and channeled messages within this book support you in going deep within your shadows to unlock the potent medicine of combining your light and dark, reclaiming your inner magic, and unmasking the true potential of your wild, wise, and whole self. When you reconnect with the divine feminine and tap into the ancient wisdom of the powerful women who came before you, you become a walking embodiment of love, magic, compassion, and power.
The Book of Juju – Juju Bae
In her debut book, podcaster, priestess, and all-around badass witch Juju Bae teaches you how to connect with your ancestors, as well as how to create a spiritual practice that respectfully incorporates their wisdom while remaining uniquely yours. It’s also the story of the necessity and vitality of Black spirituality, from the Yoruba pantheon of Ifa to the freedom-fighting origins of Black American Hoodoo.
Gabrielle Felder (she/they) is a writer, data analyst, and aborisa born and raised in Orange County, California and is currently based in Los Angeles, California. She explores the history of the African diaspora, drawing from her interdisciplinary background in ecology, anthropology, and data analytics. Passionate about community work, she has trained as a postpartum doula, worked in community gardens, and led Afro-Indigenous ceremonies. She’s shared her work through speaking engagements with UC Davis Women’s Resources and Research Center and the Feminist Center for Creative Work.
Dusah Wiseman, also known as SERPENT GODDESS, fell in love with shamanic practices as a child, and they have laid the foundation for her well-being. She has trained with indigenous elders and notable industry leaders, and her medicine bag includes yoga, pranayama, meditation, qigong, herbalism, music, and somatic healing through a trauma-informed lens. She believes in the art of inner alchemy and facilitates these tools to assist others who are looking to go deep within their shadows to unlock the potent medicine of combining both their light and dark to unmask their true power and potential. Sitting in ceremony is her favorite way to connect with the Divine.
Juju Bae is an accomplished TV personality, spiritual educator, and Ọṣun priestess within the Yoruba tradition. In addition to starring in the Hulu docuseries Living for the Dead, she is the founder of Juju Bae, a multimedia Black-centric resource that seeks to demystify the Black occult. She is the host of the acclaimed A Little Juju podcast that encourages Black people to find home in Africana spiritual practices and thought. She helps people, young and old, to remember that we have tools and guidance with us as we journey through this lifetime. She is a sought-after spiritual teacher, singer, and holds a B.A. in psychology from Spelman College.
Where: Reparations Club
Date: Saturday the 21st
Time: 7 pm (Doors at 6:30 pm)
Address: 3054 South Victoria Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90016
Obsidian Tongues Open Mic: Jozer Guerrero at Lopez Farm, Pomona – In-Person Event
Ceasar K. Avelar presents Obsidian Tongues Open Mic every 3rd Saturday of the month at Lopez Farm in Pomona
Featured poet: Jozer Guerrero.
Jozer Guerrero is a poet/musician based out of Denver, CO. Jozer’s work has been featured on HBO, MTV, Univision, TED Talks, PBS and American Theater Magazine. Jozer’s poetry can be described as a Spanglish roller coaster combining comedy with political commentary, prepare yourself to laugh and cry all in one sitting.
Where poets plant seeds.
Where: Lopez Farm, Pomona
Date: Saturday, the 21st
Time: 7:30 pm – 9 pm
Address: 1034 W. Mission Blvd., Pomona, CA 91766
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 for Poetry on Demand 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 22nd
Time: 10 am – 5 pm (market); 12 pm – 5 pm (poets on demand)
Address: 7850 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90046
Website: https://www.lapoetsociety.org/
Chicano Elegance Presents: Matt Sedillo at Tepito Coffee, Pasadena – In-Person Event
Tepito Coffee is proud to partner with Chicano Elegance to celebrate the beauty, creativity, and power of our culture through lowriders, fashion, musiw & community.
Cruisin’ Colorado is back and this one is special. Featuring the powerful voice and poetry of @matt_sedillo
Matt Sedillo is an international poet, author, and spoken word performance artist. He is the author of three books, most recently Mexican Style.
This isn’t just an event, it’s a tribute to Chicano identity, style, and the generations who turned culture into art and resilience into elegance.
Join us for a morning of cafecito, classic cars, runway moments, and community pride. More announcements about this special event coming soon.
NOTE: Check every Sunday for story time and reading events
Where: Tepito Coffee
Date: Sunday, the 22nd
Time: 10 am – 2 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Local Author Day (Young Readers Edition): Susana Porras & Danny’s Trials at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event
Danny’s Trails: Mossley, England, is loosely based on a true story and is filled with youthful creativity, and lessons in inner awakening, and mindfulness. This children’s book is appropriate for children ages 6-9. Consequently, the story’s imaginative use of real landmarks, walkable trails, and map makes it engaging for readers of all ages.
Where: Vroman’s
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 11 am – 12 pm
Address: 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101
Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-02-22/local-author-day-young-readers
Latinx Book Club: OYE: A Novel at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss OYE: A Novel by Melissa Mogollon.
Structured as a series of one-sided phone calls from our spunky, sarcastic narrator, Luciana, to her older sister, Mari, this wildly inventive debut “jump-starts your heart in the same way it piques your ear” (Xochitl Gonzalez). As the baby of her large Colombian American family, Luciana is usually relegated to the sidelines. But now she finds herself as the only voice of reason in the face of an unexpected crisis: A hurricane is heading straight for Miami, and her eccentric grandmother, Abue, is refusing to evacuate. Abue is so one-of-a-kind she’s basically in her own universe, and while she often drives Luciana nuts, they’re the only ones who truly understand each other. So, when Abue, normally glamorous and full of life, receives a shocking medical diagnosis during the storm, Luciana’s world is upended.
When Abue moves into Luciana’s bedroom, their complicated bond intensifies. Luciana would rather be skating or sneaking out to meet girls, but Abue’s wild demands and unpredictable antics are a welcome distraction for Luciana from her misguided mother, absent sister, and uncertain future. Forced to step into the role of caretaker, translator, and keeper of the devastating family secrets that Abue begins to share, Luciana suddenly finds herself center stage, facing down adulthood—and rising to the occasion.
As Luciana chronicles the events of her disrupted senior year of high school over the phone to Mari, Oye unfolds like the most fascinating and entertaining conversation you’ve ever eavesdropped on: a rollicking, heartfelt, and utterly unique novel that celebrates the beauty revealed and resilience required when rewriting your own story.
Melissa Mogollon holds an MFA in fiction from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and a BA from George Washington University. Originally from Colombia and raised in Florida, she now teaches at a boarding school in Rhode Island, where she lives with her partner and dog. Oye is her first novel.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 2 pm – 3 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-22/latinx-book-club-oye
Book Event: Glenton Richards & The Honor Society at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event
Join us to welcome Glenton Richards to the store to discuss and sign The Honor Society.
Thirteen-year-old Archie Adams never expected his biggest mistake—breaking into the wrong house—to land him at Saint Mary’s Academy, an elite boarding school with a perfect reputation. But behind the polished halls lies a massive secret: the school is actually run by the CIA and is a training ground for teen spies. With new friends Min and Tegan, Archie uncovers a hidden world of espionage, tech, and conspiracy secrets that powerful people want buried. A fast-paced adventure filled with action, mystery, and heart, The Honor Society is perfect for fans of Spy School and Alex Rider.
Glenton Richards is a television writer known for his work on the Hugo-nominated sci-fi series, The Expanse, and also having worked in writers’ rooms for shows like Fargo and American Crime. A Dallas native, he now writes action-packed middle-grade fiction featuring diverse heroes. The Honor Society is his debut novel.
Where: Deisel, A Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 3 pm – 5 pm
Address: 225 26th St., Suite 33, Santa Monica, CA 90402
Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2026-02-22/glenton-richards-honor-society
Sacred Ink & Black Love: Open Mic & Guided Writing Workshop with Ravina & Guests at Plantitas, Long Beach – In-Person Event
An afternoon honoring Black History Month, Poetry & the Arts by Writing As Healing (WAHLA) Featuring Long Beach Neverspeak! and PW.
Writing As Healing (WAHLA) presents to you: SACRED INK & BLACK LOVE: An Afternoon celebrating Black History Month, Poetry & the Arts featuring Long Beach Neverspeak! (Philosophy, Tommy Domino, Dr. V, Shy but Flyy and RAVINA) & “PW” (Poet & DJ); hosted and curated by RAVINA.
Event includes: Guided writing workshop, panel, featured performances, open mic, DJ Set & vendors!
This event will include an all levels guided generative writing workshop, open mic, panel, featured performances, a DJ set and a chance to meet these incredible featured artists up close and personal at a book signing after. This celebratory afternoon was curated specifically to celebrate and honor the legacy of Black Artistry, and its influence, legacy and impact on our artivism, voice, and mission. Together we will take up space, and speak our truths, we will write and release. Participants are guaranteed to leave with a new piece through a dynamic set of features, guided prompts, mindfulness, community, and spoken word. We will journey deep within the soul to excavate the words that have been yearning to be set free!
ENTRY & ADMISSION: Doors open 2:30 pm
$20 cover includes general admission, journal & writing utensil, VIP meet and greet, open mic & workshop entry, refreshments. All ages welcome.
RAVINA is a South Asian bestselling author, spoken word poet & licensed therapist, based in Long Beach CA. YELLOW is her collection poetry published by World Stage Press & recipient of the Long Beach Best Poetry Collection of 2021. RAVINA has performed poetry on nationally and internationally on acclaimed stages including the United Nations, and the House of Blues. Ravina is a touring and performing spoken word artist with the collective NeverSpeak Long Beach!
Philosophy is an extremely accomplished and debonair poet whose professional credits include TV One’s “Verses & Flow; Opening act for Grammy Award Winner Gary Clark Jr. and songstress Alice Smith; Featured artist for The Fly Poet Showcase; Key Note Poet for the 2021Black/Pan African Graduation for CSU Long Beach; Opening act for world renowned poet, Saul Williams on his ‘Martyr Loser’ tour. He put forth the legislation for the Youth Poet Laureate Program in Long Beach Ca; He was Recruited by Google to implement Spoken Word workshops.
Shy But Flyy is a Blues, Jazz, and spoken- word artist currently located in Long Beach CA. Shy But Flyy leads her own blues band that plays locally at restaurants and festivals. She has also graced the stage internationally in London for the past two years. In 2025 she received the “rising star award” from long beach blues festival. Look out for her book of poetry titled The Meaning of The Blues. Shy has hosted, performed and curated blues and poetry events world wide and continues building her legacy as the “Queen of Long Beach Entertainment”, as she is affectionately known in Long Beach Neverspeak.
Tommy Domino an Alumni from the Community Literature Initiative is a spoken blues poet raised in Northwest Pasadena. Member of the Stillwater’s Writers Collective since (2012). His work is featured in two Anthologies: Sounds for the Water (2013) & Poets, Allies for Resistance (2015) and Black Minds Publishing (2/2021). Co-Founder of Poetry Friends & Drinks in 2016. His book Switches, Hot wheel Tracks & Extensions Cords was published by World Stage Press (2018). He has performed at tributes for: The 50th Anniversary of The Watts Writers Workshop of 1965, The Watts Prophets and The Last Poets. Served as a member of Diverse Verses and Co-Producer of The Annual Pan African Film Spoken Word Festival from (2017-2021). He is a member of the poetry collective @NeverSpeakLB. Facilitates the Long Beach poetry cohorts for the Community Literature Initiative (2020-Pres.) Community Literature Initiative Teacher of the Year (2022) His new collection Closer in the Rearview was released last fall and continues to hit stages city and nationwide.
Dr. Nooshin Valizadeh (she/hers) is a trauma-informed violence preventionist, educator, poet and author with a deep commitment to advancing equity, inclusion and belonging in educational and organizational contexts. With a distinct focus on intersectionality, she approaches every initiative with an appreciation for the interconnected nature of identity and the challenges faced by marginalized communities. Dr. Nooshin is a trilingual, passionate advocate for professional development, leveraging her expertise to enhance practitioner efficacy, and cultivate a more inclusive and equitable workplace climate. Her clients include school districts, universities, politicians, Fortune 500 companies, and more. A skilled spoken-word artist, she advocates for empowerment and awareness of the global community of historically marginalized survivors of violence, as well as a nuanced and deeper understanding of identity and society around us. On the day of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation in 2018, she was asked to perform her “Survivor Solidarity” poem in front of over 22,000 people, and was picked up by World Stage Press soon after. Her poetry book WOMXN, gives voice to the survivorhood and resistance of a womxn’s existence in America in the form of chapters that demonstrate ways in which WOMXN can be emotionally unhoused in exile, empowered in solidarity and more.
“PW” (Poet & DJ)
Pw is an author, DJ, and Tuskegee University alumna whose work operates with precision, cultural authority, and intent. Her debut poetry collection, Fever Memory (World Stage Press, 2023), is archived throughout the Los Angeles Public Library system, and she co-produced Long Beach Spits Fire (2024) with the Long Beach Arts Council and Community Literature Initiative. As DJ Pw., she is a resident and ongoing house DJ for Shades of Afrika’s Griot Café and Slanguage, where her controlled, intergenerational sets blend soul, house, hip-hop, and global sound into cohesive, high-impact experiences.
Where: Plantitas, Long Beach
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 3 pm – 5 pm
Address: 2011 E. 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814
In Conversation: Shobha Rao + Lilliam Rivera & Tiny Threads at Bel Canto Books, Long Beach – In-Person Event
Join us to meet authors Shobha Rao and Lilliam Rivera and discuss Lilliam’s new novel, Tiny Threads.
Shobha Rao moved to the United States from India at the age of seven. She is the author of the short story collection, An Unrestored Woman, and the novel, Girls Burn Brighter. Rao is the winner of the Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Fiction and was a Grace Paley Teaching Fellow at The New School. Her story “Kavitha and Mustafa” was chosen by T.C. Boyle for inclusion in Best American Short Stories. Girls Burn Brighter was long listed for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and was a finalist for the California Book Award and the Goodreads Choice Awards. She lives in San Francisco.
Lilliam Rivera is a MacDowell fellow and an award-winning author of eight works of fiction: four young adult novels, three middle grade books, and a graphic novel for DC Comics. Her books have been awarded a Pura Belpré Honor, been featured on NPR, New Yorker, Los Angeles Times, NY Times, and multiple “best of” lists. Her novel Never Look Back is slated for a movie adaptation. A Bronx, New York native, Lilliam currently lives in Los Angeles.
Where: Bel Canto KUBO
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 3976 Atlantic Ave., Long Beach, CA 90814
Website: https://withfriends.co/event
Zillennial Book Club: All the Colors of the Dark at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event
Join us to discuss All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker.
1975 is a time of change in America. The Vietnam War is ending. Muhammad Ali is fighting Joe Frazier. And in the small town of Monta Clare, Missouri, girls are disappearing.
When the daughter of a wealthy family is targeted, the most unlikely hero emerges—Patch, a local boy, who saves the girl, and, in doing so, leaves heartache in his wake.
Patch and those who love him soon discover that the line between triumph and tragedy has never been finer. And that their search for answers will lead them to truths that could mean losing one another.
A missing person mystery, a serial killer thriller, a love story, a unique twist on each, Chris Whitaker has written a novel about what lurks in the shadows of obsession and the blinding light of hope.
Chris Whitaker is the award-winning author of Tall Oaks, All the Wicked Girls, and the New York Times bestseller We Begin at the End. Chris lives in the UK.
Where: Cellar Door Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 4 pm – 5 pm
Address: 473 E. Alessandro Blvd., Suite B, Riverside, CA 92508
Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-02-22/zillennial-book-club-all-colors-dark
Author Event: Radha Lin Chaddah & And the Ancestors Sing at Flintridge Bookstore – In-Person Event
Radha Lin Chaddah will present and discuss And the Ancestors Sing.
In 1978, as the Cultural Revolution fades into history, Lei is bartered away into marriage for two cartons of cigarettes and a handful of eggs. She finds herself in the unfamiliar village of her new husband where she is met with indifference. When a disaster upends their world, Lei and her husband are forced to join China’s vast wave of city-bound, rural migrants, leaving behind children whom they may never see again.
Sixteen-year-old LuLu arrives in Shanghai with nothing but ambition. Denied a factory job and determined to keep her family from starving, she turns to sex work, navigating the dangers of the city’s underbelly with sharp wit and a fierce will to survive. When a powerful client offers her a chance at security, LuLu faces an impossible choice: seize a future that could lift her family from poverty, or risk everything for a life on her own terms. Immersive, evocative, and impeccably detailed,
And The Ancestors Sing is a sweeping, multigenerational story of sacrifice, survival, and the unbreakable pull of home.
Where: Chevalier’s
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004
Website: https://chevaliersbooks.com/event/2026-02-22/and-ancestors-sing
Author Event: Jaime Parker Stickle, with Tarra Stevenson, & Vicious Cycle at Flintridge Bookstore – In-Person Event
Jaime Parker Stickle, in conversation with Tarra Stevenson, willpresent and discuss Vicious Cycle.
Former broadcast journalist and new mother Corey Tracey-Lieberman wakes up to nightmarish news: two teenage girls found hanged in a nearby park. Even more unsettling is how the news casts the tragedy as the result of increasing street crime, as if the victims’ lives didn’t really matter.
When police efforts fall short, Corey launches her own investigation, flexing her idle sleuthing skills with baby in tow.
Vicious Cycle is a gripping debut novel, a psychological roller-coaster ride set in sunny Los Angeles that delivers an emotional gut punch tempered by belly laughs. It is a tour de force certain to thrill all readers.
Where: Flintridge Bookstore
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm
Address: 858 Foothill Blvd., La Cañada Flintridge, CA 91011
Moms Who Write Poetry Circle: Camille Hernandez & motherlands at 12th House Tea Sanctuary – In-Person Event
Moms Who Write host Nancy Lynee Woo is excited to celebrate the release of Motherlands by Camille Hernandez, Poet Laureate of Anaheim.
Join a cozy poetry circle to share in the joys and challenges of being mothers and writers, hear Camille read her new work, and then enjoy some precious creative writing/art time, with a special prompt offered by Camille as well as other creative stations, and time to share.
This beautiful tea house welcomes you to relax and connect over tea and cookies, included in your ticket.
“Motherlands is a lyrical meditation on the parallel journeys of motherhood, immigration, and amputation. Each journey is a radical act of care and a type of haunting. Camille Hernandez navigates the shifting terrain between daughter and mother, homeland and new land, memory, and body.”
$22 ticket includes tea and cookies.
Where: 12th House Tea Sanctuary
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 4 pm – 7 pm
Address: 1950 W. Willow St., Long Beach, CA 90810
Website: https://www.instagram.com
Book Launch: Western Armenian Music: From Asia Minor to the United States by Hachig Kazarian at The Center for Armenian Arts – In-Person Event
BOOK LAUNCH WITH LIVE MUSICAL EXAMPLES
Guest Speaker: Author Hachig Kazarian
With an introduction by: Professor Barlow Der Mugrdechian
Silenced for over one hundred years, the Western Armenian music brought to America by the first Armenian immigrants has become an integral part of Armenian culture in the United States. Western Armenian Music: From Asia Minor to the United States examines the many facets of Western Armenian music, and how it has been neglected due to the Armenian Genocide of 1915 and the deleterious feelings left upon the Armenian people.
Kazarian’s lecture will incorporate topics from his book while focusing on the musical relationship between Armenian folk music and Armenian sacred music. Throughout the session, attendees will gain a comprehensive understanding of how these two distinct musical traditions are related through live performance and recorded musical examples.
Hachig Kazarian was born in Detroit, Michigan and is a retired secondary instrumental music educator with 46 years of teaching experience. He received his professional credentials from the Juilliard School of Music, where he earned a B.S. and M.A. degree in clarinet performance. He also attended Eastern Michigan University, where he received an M.A. degree in Music Literature/ Ethnomusicology. Kazarian has performed Western Armenian music for many Armenian churches, societies, and patriotic organizations throughout the United States.
Prof. Barlow Der Mugrdechian is the Berberian Coordinator of the Armenian Studies Program and general editor of the Armenian Series of The Press at Fresno State.
Where: The Center for Armenian Arts
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 5 pm – 7 pm
Address: 250 N. Orange St., Glendale, CA 91203
The Witching Hour Poetry Show + Open Mic: Cast Your Spellat The Glendale Room – In-Person Event
L(it) Girl Presents – The Witching Hour: Join us for a bewitching evening of poetry.
Hosted by Madam Madness. Get your tarot cards read and watch as she transfigures those readings into bewitching poetry! 🐈⬛ Interested in CASTING YOUR OWN SPELL at our open mic? ⭐️ Save your spot TODAY!
$5 For Performers // $10 To Watch
Where: The Glendale Room
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 7 pm – 9 pm
Address: 127 Artsakh Ave., Glendale, CA 91206
Website: https://www.theglendaleroom.com/calendar
Historical Romance Book Club: Never Cross a Highlander at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event
Orders manager Katie S. leads our Historical Romance Book Club.
Participants will discuss Never Cross a Highlander by Lisa Rayne.
Meets on the 4th Sunday of the month at 7:15 pm in the main store. No membership is necessary, but RSVP is required.
Where: The Ripped Bodice
Date: Sunday the 22nd
Time: 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm
Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232
Los Angeles Literature 