Los Angeles Literature Events: 4/27/26 – 5/03/26

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: Monday the 27^th

Time: 9 am – 10 am

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

Website: Event Page

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

Writing a book, poem, or screenplay? Need deadlines? Want constructive feedback? Then this is the place for you. Bring 5 – 10 double-spaced typed pages to read. Everyone will get a chance to read.

New: This group is also working to publish a collaborative book through Library resources, specifically through the Indie Author Project, which is accessible to people across California. If you are interested in this, please email Adult Librarian, Michele Robinson at mrobinson@lapl.org for more information.

RSVP:

This group meets in-person and on Zoom every Monday, except holidays. For the Zoom login information, please email the Robertson Library at rbrtsn@lapl.org.

Where: Robertson Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 11 am – 12:30 pm

Address: 1719 S. Robertson Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90035

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

Queer Book Club: Cleavage at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event

Join us to discuss Cleavage: Men, Women, and the Space Between Us by Jennifer Finney Boylan.

What is the difference between men and women? Jennifer Finney Boylan, bestselling author of She’s Not There and co-author of Mad Honey with Jodi Picoult, examines the divisions—as well as the common ground—between the genders, and reflects on her own experiences, both difficult and joyful, as a transgender American.

Jennifer Finney Boylan’s She’s Not There was the first bestselling work written by a transgender American. Since its publication twenty years ago, she has become the go-to person for insight into the impact of gender on our lives, from the food we eat to the dreams we dream, both for ourselves and for our children. But Cleavage is more than a deep dive into gender identity; it’s also a look at the difference between coming out as trans in 2000—when many people reacted to Boylan’s transition with love—and the present era of blowback and fear.

How does gender affect our sense of self? Our body image? The passage of time? The friends we lose—and keep? Boylan considers her womanhood, reflects on the boys and men who shaped her, and reconceives of herself as a writer, activist, parent, and spouse. With heart-wrenching honesty, she illustrates the feeling of liminality that followed her to adulthood, but demonstrates the redemptive power of love through it all.

With Boylan’s trademark humor and poignancy, Cleavage is a sharp, witty, and captivating look at the triumphs and losses of a life lived in two genders. Cleavage provides hope for a future in which we all have the freedom to live joyfully as men, as women, and in the space between us.

Jennifer Finney Boylan is the author of nineteen books, including Mad Honey, coauthored with Jodi Picoult. Her memoir, She’s Not There, was the first bestselling work by a transgender American. Since 2014, she has been the inaugural Anna Quindlen Writer in Residence at Barnard College of Columbia University; she is also on the faculty of the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference of Middlebury College and the Sirenland Writers Conference in Positano, Italy. She is the former President of PEN America, and from 2011 to 2018 she was a member of the Board of Directors of GLAAD, including four years as national cochair. In 2022-23 she was a Fellow at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. She graduated from Wesleyan University and Johns Hopkins, and she holds doctorates honoris causa from Sarah Lawrence College, the New School, and Wesleyan University. For many years she was a contributing opinion writer for the opinion section of the New York Times. Her work has also appeared in the New Yorker, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, Literary Hub, Down East, and many other publications. She lives in Maine and New York with her wife, Deirdre. They have two children: a daughter, Zai, and a son, Sean.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

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

Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-04-27/queer-book-club-cleavage

Mar Vista Book Club: Crook Manifesto at Mar Vista Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

All readers are welcome to join our book club; no sign-up is necessary. To find out about each month’s title, please get in touch with the branch. Copies of the book can be checked out at the Reference Desk.

Participants will discuss Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead.

Where: Mar Vista Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6:30 pm

Address: 12006 Venice Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90066

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/mar-vista-book-club

Book Club: Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore via Sherman Oaks Martin Pollard Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

All readers are welcome to discuss Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan.

The Great Recession has shuffled Clay Jannon away from life as a San Francisco web-design drone and into the aisles of Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore. But after a few days on the job, Clay discovers that the store is more curious than either its name or its gnomic owner might suggest. The customers are few, and they never seem to buy anything; instead, they “check out” large, obscure volumes from strange corners of the store. Suspicious, Clay engineers an analysis of the clientele’s behavior, seeking help from his variously talented friends. But when they bring their findings to Mr. Penumbra, they discover the bookstore’s secrets extend far beyond its walls. Rendered with irresistible brio and dazzling intelligence, Robin Sloan’s Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore is exactly what it sounds like: an establishment you have to enter, and will never want to leave.

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

Where: Sherman Oaks Martin Pollard Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6:30 pm

Address: Online Event (see site)

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/sherman-oaks-book-club-mr-penumbras-24-hour-bookstore-robin-sloan

Ticketed: Special Author Event: Nicola Harrison & The Island Club at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event

Join us to welcome back Nicola Harrison to celebrate the release of her new novel, The Island Club, on Monday, April 27th at 6:30pm. Nicola’s previous book, Hotel Laguna, was also celebrated at pages and was a favorite among our historical fiction readers.

This is a ticketed event – preorder your copy of The Island Club with pages for entry. We appreciate your support of the author and pages by joining us!

An unputdownable novel of loves lost and found, shocking secrets—and the power of female friendship.

1956: On idyllic Balboa Island, just off the California coast, life seems peaceful and welcoming. But when the lives of three women begin to unravel in shockingly different ways, an unlikely friendship—and the game of tennis—may be the only thing that can save them.

Milly Kinkaid’s plan to fix her crumbling marriage seems to be falling apart before it even begins. She believed that moving her young family from Hollywood to Balboa Island might entice her increasingly distant husband to come home earlier after work. Instead, he’s barely coming home at all.

Society matriarch Sylvia Johnson and her husband have been pillars of their community for decades and have just recently begun a new business venture: The Island Club, a place for members to swim, play tennis and dine in style. But when she learns that he has been risking their financial security and putting their family’s future in grave danger, she’s not only poised to lose the club, but the entire community she holds dear.

Meanwhile, standoffish loner Adele Lambert’s entire world is on the brink of being destroyed if the dark secrets of her past and her hidden identity is revealed. Twenty years ago, she ran from a shameful scandal and left behind the only thing she ever loved. Now, terrified that the anonymity she’s spent decades guarding will be exposed, but desperate to stay afloat, she risks everything to return to the game that brought her to her knees all those years before.

Set against the sun-drenched beaches of Balboa Island, with its prim and proper 1950s facade, The Island Club is a story of love, loneliness and the lies we tell ourselves—and what can be gained when the truth is finally revealed.

Nicola Harrison is the author of Montauk, The Show Girl, Hotel Laguna, and The Island Club. Born and raised in England, she moved with her family to Southern California when she was 14. She is a graduate of UCLA and received her MFA in Creative Writing from Stony Brook University. Prior to writing novels, she worked as a fashion journalist in New York City, where she lived for 17 years. Now she resides in Manhattan Beach, California, with her husband, two sons and a high maintenance chihuahua named Lily.

Where: pages: a bookstore

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 6:30 pm

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

Website: https://pagesabookstore.com/event/2026-04-27/special-author-event-nicola-harrison

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 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 3575 University Ave. Riverside, CA 92501

Website: https://www.facebook.com

Jordan Ritter Conn, with Mallory Rubin, & American Men at Book Soup – In-Person Event

Jordan Ritter Conn, in conversation with Mallory Rubin, will discuss and sign his book American Men.

American Men is a deeply intimate portrait of the lives of four men that the author examines—in profound and comprehensive ways—what it means to be a man in America.

Men wield outsized power across all major institutions. But they are falling behind across all measures of well-being and success. They include loving husbands and absent fathers, corporate strivers and displaced workers, the objects and instruments of incredible violence. They are half the population. And yet when mentioned as a bloc, it’s often to ask the question: What’s wrong with them?

American Men is a book that burrows deep into the lives of four men, exploring how each of them construct their relationship to masculinity, and how they navigate that relationship over time. They include Ryan, an amateur MMA fighter from the Akwesasne Mohawk territory, struggling to come to terms with both his sexuality as a closeted gay man and his draw toward bar room violence; Gideon, an itinerant, tall and handsome West Point graduate and former baseball star who unravels when he encounters challenges to his status as the white masculine ideal; Joseph, a Seattle law student whose marriage teeters on the brink of turmoil as he tries on his own to contend with the effects of childhood sexual trauma; and Nate, a young Ohio man still living at home and trying to establish security for himself in a rural pocket of a red state, where he’s under threat as someone who is Black, trans, and poor. Written with searing intimacy after five years of reporting, American Men interweaves their stories into a mosaic that explores identity, heritage, and the pressures and performance of modern American masculinity.

NOTE: See site for link and details.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 8818 Sunset Boulevard, West Hollywood, CA 90069

Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2026-04-27/jordan-ritter-conn

L.A. Chapbook Launch: Sophie Appel & Mud Swallow at Poetic Research Bureau – In-Person Event

Sophie Appel will present and discuss her chapbook Mud Swallow, with guests: Ben Babbit, Ali Eyal, David Horvitz, Amalia Irons, Joseph Mosconi, Zara Schuster, and Hannah Tishkoff.

The “Mud Swallow” or the cliff swallow or American cliff swallow (Petrochelidon pyrrhonota) is a songbird member of the passerine bird family Hirundinidae, the swallows and martins. Mud Swallows arrive in California in February to begin building nests out of mud under freeway overpasses, bridges, cliffs, and eaves. They breed from March through September, often returning to the same nesting sites year after year, before migrating back to South America. Mud Swallow is also a collection of poems about longing, yearning, believing, praying, lamenting, retrieving, longing, abandoning, singing to and remembering love all up and down the state of California.

Sophie Appel is a poet and historical map archivist living in Los Angeles. She tends to The Beach and Five Thirty Four. She is the host of Spit in the Ocean, a monthly online reading series on Lower Grand Radio. She is the author of The World’s Largest Cherry Pie.

NOTE: See site for link and details.

Where: Poetic Research Bureau

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 2220 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90057

Website: https://www.poeticresearch.com/events/sophie-appels-mud-swallow

At Skylight: Xochitl Gonzalez, with Justina Machado, & Last Night in Brooklyn at Skylight – In-Person Event

Xochitl Gonzalez, in conversation with Justina Machado, will discuss Last Night in Brooklyn, a captivating story about a young woman whose life becomes ensnared in her glamorous neighbor’s secret past.

SPRING, 2007

At twenty-six, Alicia Canales Forten feels smothered by her future. She’s in a long-distance relationship, living at home with her mother’s beliefs, saving up for her wedding to a future doctor. But after Alicia ventures out one night, in the neighborhood of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, she finds herself lured by the siren song of youth and possibility that the striving crowd of creatives holds, and moves in.

No one embodies this milieu more than La Garza, a larger-than-life, up-and-coming fashion designer whose epic house parties fuel neighborhood lore. La Garza’s life, observed by Alicia from her apartment across the street, seems to hold the allure and fearlessness Alicia has never dared to imagine for herself.

But when Alicia’s wealthy banker cousin moves to the neighborhood, she finds herself increasingly drawn into both his and La Garza’s precarious lives.

Against the backdrop of a potentially life-changing presidential election and a looming once-in-a-generation fiscal crisis, Last Night in Brooklyn explores the dark compromise of the American Dream for people of color living, unknowingly, in the twilight of a cultural moment. It is a story about everything money can buy—and the destruction of what it can’t.

Xochitl Gonzalez is the New York Times bestselling author of the award-winning novel Olga Dies Dreaming and the Reese’s Book Club Pick Anita de Monte Laughs Last. She is a contributor to The Atlantic, where she was recognized as a 2023 Pulitzer Prize finalist in Commentary. A native Brooklynite and proud public school graduate, Gonzalez holds a BA from Brown University and an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

Justina Machado was nominated for a Tony for her performance of ‘Carmen Garcia’ in REAL WOMEN HAVE CURVES on Broadway. She is currently recurring as EVA on MATLOCK on CBS and will feature in the upcoming mockumentary THE MAKING OF JESUS DIABETES, story by Michael Naughton, Andrew Friedman and Bob Odenkirk. She starred in the Netflix series PULSE from Zoe Robyn and Carlton Cuse and the Amazon/Blumhouse series THE HORROR OF DOLORES ROACH. Machado starred in the hit comedy ONE DAY AT A TIME opposite Rita Moreno and produced by the late great Norman Lear. Machado is well-known for her role as ‘Vanessa Diaz’ in HBO’s SIX FEET UNDER. Machado recurred on JANE THE VIRGIN and was a series regular on QUEEN OF THE SOUTH as fan favorite ‘Brenda Parra.’

In film, Machado starred in THE THROWBACK directed by Mario Garcia opposite Will Sasso, Lifetime’s SWITCHED BEFORE BIRTH, and in Netflix’s ALL TOGETHER NOW. Additional television credits include SUPERSTORE, GREY’S ANATOMY, UGLY BETTY, ER, WELCOME TO THE FAMILY, PRIVATE PRACTICE, DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES, DEVIOUS MAIDS, SWITCHED AT BIRTH, THE FOSTERS, MURDER POLICE, and Max’s TUCA & BERTIE.

NOTE: See site to RSVP.

Where: Skylight

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm

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

Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-xochitl-gonzalez-presents-last-night-brooklyn-w-justina-machado

Ticketed: Maria Semple, with Jeanette McCurdy, & Go Gentle at Vroman’s Off-site at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

Maria Semple, in conversation with Jeanette McCurdy, will discuss and sign Go Gentle.

The New York Times bestselling author of Where’d You Go, Bernadette returns to form in her most exuberant and life-affirming novel yet with the story of one woman’s cheerful determination to live a life of the mind only to have the heart force its way in.

Adora Hazzard has it all figured out. A Stoic philosopher and divorcée, she lives a contented life on New York City’s Upper West Side. Having discovered that the secret to happiness is to desire only what you have, she’s applied this insight to blissful effect: relishing her teenage daughter, the freedom of being solo, and her job as a moral tutor for the twin boys of an old-money family. She’s even assembled a “coven”—like-minded women who live on the same floor in the legendary Ansonia—and is making active efforts to grow its membership. Adora’s carefully curated life is humming along brilliantly until a chance meeting with a handsome stranger.

Soon, her ordered world is upended by black-market art deals, secret rendezvous, and international intrigue…and her past—which she has worked so hard to bury—lands like a bomb in her present. Inflamed by unquenchable desire, Adora finds herself a woman wanting more: and she’ll risk everything to get it.

Adora Hazzard’s journey of self-discovery will grip you from the start. Romantic, hilarious, intelligent, and bursting with the stuff of life, Go Gentle is a thrilling story of one woman’s mid-life transformation, cementing Maria Semple in the pantheon of our most exciting and important contemporary writers.

RSVP for this ticketed event.

Where: Vroman’s Off-site at Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Monday the 27^th

Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91101

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-04-27/maria-semple

Monday Night Fiction Workshop with Raquel Baker at 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 27^th

Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm

Address: Zoom Online Event (see site)

Website: Free Workshop Page

Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 10 am – 11 am

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

Website: Event Page

NEW! Toddler Tuesdays: A Travelin’ Storytime – Session 1 at Santa Monica 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: Santa Monica Main Library, SMPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 10:30 am – 11 am

Address: 601 Santa Moncia Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90401

Website: SMPL Event Page

Virtual Book Club: The Last of Earth by Deepa Anappara via La Crescenta Library, LACL – Online Event

Join us for the Virtual Book Club. In April we will be discussing The Last of Earth by Deepa Anappara. For adults.

Please contact Marta Wiggins at mwiggins@library.lacounty.gov for your link to join.

Each week we will read and discuss 1/4 of the book. Please see the weekly discussion breakdown below.

Week 4: April 28: Chapters 115 – Epilogue — Pages 242 – to the end of the book

1869. Tibet is closed to Europeans, an infuriating obstruction for the rapidly expanding British Empire. In response, Britain begins training Indians-permitted to cross borders that white men may not-to undertake illicit, dangerous surveying expeditions into Tibet. Balram is one such surveyor-spy, an Indian schoolteacher who, for several years, has worked for the British, often alongside his dearest friend, Gyan. But Gyan went missing on his last expedition and is rumored to be imprisoned within Tibet. Desperate to rescue his friend, Balram agrees to guide an English captain on a foolhardy mission: After years of paying others to do the exploring, the captain, disguised as a monk, wants to personally chart a river that runs through southern Tibet. Their path will cross fatefully with that of another Westerner in disguise, fifty-year-old Katherine. Denied a fellowship in the all-male Royal Geographical Society in London, she intends to be the first European woman to reach Lhasa. As Balram and Katherine make their way into Tibet, they will face storms and bandits, snow leopards and soldiers, fevers and frostbite. What’s more, they will have to battle their own doubts, ambitions, grief, and pasts in order to survive the treacherous landscape. A polyphonic novel about the various ways humans try to leave a mark on the world-from the enduring nature of family and friendship to the egomania and obsessions of the colonial enterprise-The Last of Earth confirms Deepa Anappara as one of our greatest and most ambitious storytellers.

Where: La Crescenta Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

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 Santa Monica 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: Pico Branch Library SMPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 11:30 am – 12 pm

Address: 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90401

Website: SMPL Event Page

Bestsellers Book Club: None of This Is True by Lisa Jewell at Stevenson Ranch Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us for the Bestsellers Book Club. In April we will be discussing None of This Is True by Lisa Jewell. For adults.

Celebrating her forty-fifth birthday at her local pub, popular podcaster Alix Summers crosses paths with an unassuming woman called Josie Fair. Josie, it turns out, is also celebrating her forty-fifth birthday. They are, in fact, birthday twins. A few days later, Alix and Josie bump into each other again, this time outside Alix’s children’s school. Josie has been listening to Alix’s podcasts and thinks she might be an interesting subject for her series. She is, she tells Alix, on the cusp of great changes in her life. Josie’s life appears to be strange and complicated, and although Alix finds her unsettling, she can’t quite resist the temptation to keep making the podcast.

Where: Stevenson Ranch Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 12 pm – 1 pm

Address: 25950 The Old Rd., Stevenson Ranch, CA 91381

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16069123

One Book, One Coast Book Discussion: They Called Us Enemy at Westchester – Loyola Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Please join the Westchester Senior Center Book Club at the Westchester Senior Center to discuss this year’s One Book, One Coast selection, They Called Us Enemy by George Takei.

Where: Westchester – Loyola BranchLibrary, LAPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 3 pm

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

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/one-book-one-coast-book-discussion

Meet Author/Illustrator, Marcelo Verdad & The Dream Catcher and The Worst Teddy Ever at Felipe De Neve Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Author/Illustrator, Marcelo Verdad, will read aloud from his two books, The Dream Catcher and The Worst Teddy Ever, after which children in the audience will join him in a drawing demonstration. For children of all ages and their families.

El autor y ilustrador Marcelo Verdad leerá en voz alta fragmentos de sus dos libros, El atrapasueños y El peor Teddy del mundo, después los niños presentes lo acompañarán a una demostración de dibujo. Para niños de todas las edades y sus familias.

Where: Felipe De Neve BranchLibrary, LAPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 4:15 pm

Address: 2820 W. 6th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90057

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/tuesday-afternoon-book-club-3

Zoom Book Club: The Other Americans via Venice – Abbot Kinney Memorial Branch Library, LAPL – Online Zoom Event

Join us on the last Tuesday of the month for a lively discussion of our current selection.

Apr. 28: The Other Americans, Laila Lalami

RSVP:

Email venice@lapl.org for Zoom link.

Where: Venice – Abbot Kinney Memorial BranchLibrary, LAPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 5 pm

Address: Online Zoom Event

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

LGBTQ+ Book Club: Ander & Santi Were Here at West Hollywood Library, LACL – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

Join the LGBTQ+ Book Club for a hybrid (in-person and online) discussion of Ander & Santi Were Here by Jonny Garza Villa. For adults.

This is a hybrid event and will be hosted in-person in the West Hollywood Library Community Meeting Room as well as on Zoom. Please register at the link below to receive the link to the meeting via email.

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

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

Please contact the library to borrow a print copy of the book. eBook is available through Libby app/OverDrive and downloadable audiobook is available through Libby app/OverDrive as well as hoopla digital (no wait).

The Santos Vista neighborhood of San Antonio, Texas, is all Ander Martínez has ever known. The smell of pan dulce. The mixture of Spanish and English filling the streets. And especially their job at their family’s taquería. It’s the place that has inspired Ander as a muralist, and, as they get ready to leave for art school, it’s all of these things that give them hesitancy. That gives them the thought, are they ready to leave it all behind?

To keep Ander from becoming complacent during their gap year, their family “fires” them so they can transition from restaurant life to focusing on their murals and prepare for college. That is, until they meet Santiago López Alvarado, the hot new waiter. Falling for each other becomes as natural as breathing. Through Santi’s eyes, Ander starts to understand who they are and want to be as an artist, and Ander becomes Santi’s first steps toward making Santos Vista and the United States feel like home.

Until ICE agents come for Santi, and Ander realizes how fragile that sense of home is. How love can only hold on so long when the whole world is against them. And when, eventually, the world starts to win.

Where: West HollywoodLibrary, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Address: 625 N. San Vicente Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15777151

Hooked on Books Book Club: They Called Us Enemy at Quartz Hill Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us we reflect on the One Book, One Coast selection, George Takei’s They Called Us Enemy. Copies are available at the Customer Service desk and newcomers are always welcome! For adults

In 1942, at the order of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, every person of Japanese descent on the west coast was rounded up and shipped to one of ten “relocation centers,” hundreds or thousands of miles from home, where they would be held for years under armed guard. They Called Us Enemy is actor George Takei’s firsthand account of those years behind barbed wire, the joys and terrors of growing up under legalized racism, his mother’s hard choices, his father’s faith in democracy, and the way those experiences planted the seeds for his astonishing future.

Where: Quartz HillLibrary, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Address: 5040 W. Ave M 2, Quartz Hill, CA 93536

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15968045

Lomita Book Club: They Called Us Enemy at Lomita Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us as we reflect on the One Book, One Coast selection, George Takei’s They Called Us Enemy. Copies are available at the Customer Service desk and newcomers are always welcome! For adults

Where: Lomita Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Address: 24200 Narbonne Ave., Lomita, CA 90717

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15950628

Iacobani Book Club: Life of Pi at Angelo M. Iacobani Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us for our monthly book club! This month we’ll be discussing Life of Pi by Yann Martel. Copies of the book will be available at the customer service desk. This program is for adults.

This title is also available in e-book and e-audio formats through Libby and Hoopla

Where: Iacobani Library, LACL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Address: 4990 Clark Ave., Lakewood, CA 90712

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16172684

Phi-Sci Book Club: Eve via Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – Online Zoom Event

Join us to discuss Eve: How the Human Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution by Cat Bohannon.

How did the female body drive 200 million years of human evolution? • Why do women live longer than men? • Why are women more likely to get Alzheimer’s? • Why do girls score better at every academic subject than boys until puberty, when suddenly their scores plummet? • Is sexism useful for evolution? • And why, seriously why, do women have to sweat through our sheets every night when we hit menopause?

These questions are producing some truly exciting science – and in Eve, with boundless curiosity and sharp wit, Cat Bohannon covers the past 200 million years to explain the specific science behind the development of the female sex: “We need a kind of user’s manual for the female mammal. A no-nonsense, hard-hitting, seriously researched (but readable) account of what we are. How female bodies evolved, how they work, what it really means to biologically be a woman. Something that would rewrite the story of womanhood. This book is that story. We have to put the female body in the picture. If we don’t, it’s not just feminism that’s compromised. Modern medicine, neurobiology, paleoanthropology, even evolutionary biology all take a hit when we ignore the fact that half of us have breasts. So, it’s time we talk about breasts. Breasts, and blood, and fat, and vaginas, and wombs: all of it. How they came to be and how we live with them now, no matter how weird or hilarious the truth is.

Eve is not only a sweeping revision of human history, it’s an urgent and necessary corrective for a world that has focused primarily on the male body for far too long. Picking up where Sapiens left off, Eve will completely change what you think you know about evolution and why Homo sapiens has become such a successful and dominant species.

Cat Bohannon is a researcher and author with a Ph.D. from Columbia University in the evolution of narrative and cognition. Her essays and poems have appeared in Scientific American, Mind, Science Magazine, The Best American Nonrequired Reading, The Georgia Review, The Story Collider, and Poets Against the War. She lives with her family in Seattle.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Address: Online Zoom Event

Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-04-28/phy-sci-book-club-eve

The Mystery Book Club: None of This Is True at Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Join us this month for a discussion of None of This Is True by Lisa Jewel. For adults.

All are welcome!

Where: Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

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

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-61

Ann Carlson, with Mary Nichols, & Smog and Sunshine at Chevalier’s Bookstore – In-Person Event

Join author Ann Carlson, in conversation with Mary Nichols, Former Chair, California Air Resources Board, to discuss Smog and Sunshine.

Carlson’s book is a stirring account of one of our greatest environmental success stories: cleaning up Southern California’s air.

From the 1940s through the 1980s, Los Angeles children breathed air so heavy with lead it poisoned their blood. In 1970, officials declared smog alerts on 235 days. The last smog alert came in 2003, and lead has virtually disappeared from the air. This is the story of how it happened—and an inspiring reminder of what determined scientists, lawyers, community members, and public officials can achieve together.

In Smog and Sunshine, environmental law expert and LA native Ann Carlson recounts the dramatic policy fights and the determined scientists, lawyers, and community members who worked alongside public officials to face off against major polluters and save their city. In a time of unprecedented climate change and skepticism about government and science, this book is an inspiring reminder of what concerned residents, individual leaders, and all levels of government can achieve by working together.

Where: Chevalier’s

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm

Address: 133 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90004

Website: https://chevaliersbooks.com/event/2026-04-28/ann-carlson-smog-and-sunshine

Michael Ellas, with Nicholas Meyer, & Bender’s LA at Diesel, A Bookstore– In-Person Event

Michael Elias, in conversation with Nicholas Meyer, will discuss Bender’s LA.

Set in the coke-dusted canyons and smoke-filled bars of Hollywood, Bender’s L.A. follows writer David Bender as he attempts to rewrite his life after his wife walks out with a single sentence and a suitcase.

While the Vietnam War casts its shadow over L.A., Bender plays tennis with a fugitive Abbie Hoffman, runs afoul of Nixon’s FBI, arms himself against a homicidal producer, and slips backward in time to fall in love with a young Marilyn Monroe. Guided by a Sun-Tzu-quoting uber-agent and a best friend suspiciously like Eve Babitz, Bender navigates a city where radical politics and extraordinary privilege uneasily coexist.

Wry, elegiac, and sharply observed, Bender’s L.A. captures a generation that learned to live comfortably while a distant war reshaped the country—and a man who must decide whether success has cost him the things that mattered, or whether he ever truly possessed them at all. With Chekhovian melancholy and a wink to Nathaniel West, Scott Fitzgerald, and Philip Roth, Elias offers a bittersweet mediation on love, memory, and the Hollywood machine along with the misfits it sometimes mangles along the way. In this tragicomedy about nostalgia and recovery, Bender prevails.

Michael Elias’s screen credits include The Jerk, Young Doctors in Love, and Lush Life. He and Rich Eustis created the series “Head of the Class”. Novels are The Last Conquistador, published by Open Road Media, and You Can Go Home Now, published by HarperCollins. His play The Catskill Sonata was named one of the best plays of the year by LA Weekly. Elias is a regular contributor to Air Mail. He lives in Los Angeles and is married to Bianca Roberts.

Nicholas Meyer is the “editor” of several Watson manuscripts, including The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, which spent forty weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. His screenplay of the film received an Oscar nomination. His film credits include writing and directing Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, and Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. He wrote and directed Time After Time, co-created Medici: Masters of Florence, and directed The Day After, about nuclear war that attracted the largest audience ever for a television movie. A native of New York City, he lives in Santa Monica, California.

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6:30 pm

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

Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2026-04-28/michael-elias-benders-la

Sci-Fi/Fantasy Book Club: She Who Became the Sun at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event

The Village Well Book Club offshoot is the Sci-fi Fantasy Book Club! To the Tolkien nerds, SJM stans, and R.F. Kuang enjoyers, this group is for you! On the fourth Tuesday of every month, we will come together and discuss a story that falls within the realms of either science fiction or fantasy (or sometimes both!). To join our emailing list, reach out to events@villagewell.com.

This month’s pick is She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan.

In a famine-stricken village on a dusty yellow plain, two children are given two fates. A boy, greatness. A girl, nothingness…

In 1345, China lies under harsh Mongol rule. For the starving peasants of the Central Plains, greatness is something found only in stories. When the Zhu family’s eighth-born son, Zhu Chongba, is given a fate of greatness, everyone is mystified as to how it will come to pass. The fate of nothingness received by the family’s clever and capable second daughter, on the other hand, is only as expected.

When a bandit attack orphans the two children, though, it is Zhu Chongba who succumbs to despair and dies. Desperate to escape her own fated death, the girl uses her brother’s identity to enter a monastery as a young male novice. There, propelled by her burning desire to survive, Zhu learns she is capable of doing whatever it takes, no matter how callous, to stay hidden from her fate.

After her sanctuary is destroyed for supporting the rebellion against Mongol rule, Zhu takes the chance to claim another future altogether: her brother’s abandoned greatness.

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm

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

Website: Event Page

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

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

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

Free event. 21+

Note: Please RSVP at site.

Where: The Aftermath Bar

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 10 pm

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

Website: Instagram Page

Christian John Wikane, with Thelma Houston, & A Night at the Disco at Book Soup – In-Person Event

Christian John Wikane, in conversation with Grammy Award Winning Motown Legend Thelma Houston, will discuss A Night at the Disco.

A Night at the Disco is a celebration of groundbreaking dance music from 1970-’79. An unprecedented collection of photographs of more than 100 artists, illuminating the styles and sounds from a decade that sparked a global phenomenon in music and culture. Exclusive comments from Donna Summer, Barry Gibb, Debbie Harry, Giorgio Moroder, founding members of CHIC, Labelle, The Trammps, Village People, Earth, Wind & Fire, and dozens more artists, songwriters and producers, offering fascinating insights that tell the stories behind the beats. From underground New York clubs to discothèques across the globe, A Night at the Disco illustrates how artists spanning soul, pop, disco, funk, jazz and rock defined nightlife during the 1970s and influenced popular music to the present day.

With a foreword by Verdine White of Earth, Wind & Fire, this is a real treat for music, dance and disco fans everywhere.

Where: Book Soup

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

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

Website: https://booksoup.com/event/2026-04-28/christian-john-wikane

North Fig Book Club: Lote at North Figueroa Bookshop – In-Person Event

Participants will discuss Lote by Sheila Von Reinhold, a queer, decadent, and formally inventive book about a Black women named Mathilda who becomes obsessed with Black modernist poet Hermia Druitt, leading her on a journey through secret societies, art history, and the archives of the 1920s and 30s “Bright Young Things.”

RSVP at website!

Where: North Figueroa Bookshop

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 6040 N. Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90042

Website: https://northfigbookshop.com/event/#calendar-8a0f87f6-17d6-4f10-9815-04df4c8251ba-event-59f9fd3e-0029-424e-ad54-863f0c9ce40f

Nonfiction Book Club: Air-Borne at pages: a bookstore – In-Person Event

Our Nonfiction Book Club meets monthly, generally on the fourth Tuesday of each month at 7:00 pm.

Facilitated by Mark Polak.

Participants will discuss Air-Borne: The Hidden History of the Life We Breathe by Carl Zimmer.

RSVP for further information.

Where: pages: a bookstore

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

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

Website: https://pagesabookstore.com/event/2026-04-28/nonfiction-book-club

At Dynasty Typewriter: Saul Williams, with Morgan Sorne, & Martyr Loser King at Skylight Off-site at Dynasty Typewriter – In-Person Event

Saul Willams, in conversation with Morgan Sorne, will discuss Martyr Loser King: A Graphic Novel.

Incisive questions about capitalism, colonialism, and the future of technology abound in this cyberpunk fable from visionary poet, performer, and director Saul Williams.

Can you name the ghost in your machine? The precious ore coltan can be found in every cell phone and computer on earth. And in a small East African country, both the Black population and the land are exploited for this precious resource—the people as a source of cheap, expendable labor; the land as a mining site and international dumping ground for defunct technology.

Yet from the rubble, creativity, and rebellion rise. An encounter between a miner and an otherworldly stranger named Neptune results in the birth of a hacker named MartyrLoserKing, and the launch of a global cyberattack. Their plan will rock the world to its foundations, upend centuries of institutional abuse, and, perhaps, usher in a new age of understanding.

Steeped in mythology and history and inspired by present-day events, this cyberpunk fable from visionary poet, musician, and director Saul Williams is both a cautionary tale and a hopeful vision of the future.

Saul Williams is a poet, musician, and actor. He is the co-director, screenwriter, and composer of the science-fiction musical Neptune Frost. Saul made his acting and screenwriting debut in the 1998 feature Slam, which won Sundance’s Grand Jury Prize and the Cannes Film Festival’s Caméra d’Or. Saul has released six albums and has published five books of poetry.

Morgan Sorne is an award-winning multidisciplinary artist, composer, worldbuilder, and musician whose primary instrument is his five-octave voice. He’s known for his visual works and immersive sound sculptures, and his original music can be heard in film, television, and video games, including Dark Matter, The Witcher: Blood Origin, American Horror Story, and more.

NOTE: See site to RSVP.

Where: Dynasty Typewriter

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm

Address: 2511 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90057

Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/dynasty-typewriter-saul-williams-presents-martyr-loser-king-w-morgan-sorne

Scott Kurashige, with Dr. Margo Okazawa-Rey, & American Peril: The Violent History of Anti-Asian Racism at Vroman’s – In-Person Event

Scott Kurashige, in conversation with Dr. Margo Okazawa-Rey, will discuss and sign American Peril: The Violent History of Anti-Asian Racism.

This probing account shines a new light on the problem of anti-Asian violence and inspires us to build lasting solidarity.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, racist demagoguery fomented a campaign of terror against Asian Americans. But these attacks were part of a much longer pattern that made anti-Asian racism integral to the outbreak of white supremacist, misogynist, and colonial violence across 175 years of U.S. history. Written in the radical spirit of Howard Zinn, American Peril represents the culmination of thirty-five years of study and activism by award-winning scholar Scott Kurashige.

From the lynching of Asian immigrants during the exclusion era to the U.S. military’s slaughter of Asian civilians, the book connects domestic and global events that have been erased from the official record. Going beyond victimhood, it traces the rise of Asian American community protest and activism in response to the 1982 murder of Vincent Chin and other overlooked tragedies. While many have worked to legislate and prosecute hate crimes, Kurashige argues that hope lies in grassroots activism for multiracial solidarity.

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Tuesday the 28^th

Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm

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

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-04-28/scott-kurashige

The Virtual Cobalt Series & Open Mic: Ric Lupert and featured poet Dujie Tahat – Online Zoom Event

Cobalt Poets Reading & Open Mic and host Rick Lupert welcomes featured poet Dujie Tahat.

Dujie Tahat is a Filipino-Jordanian immigrant living in Washington state. They are the author of three chapbooks: Here I Am O My God, selected for a Poetry Society of America Chapbook Fellowship; Salat, winner of the Tupelo Press Sunken Garden Chapbook Award and longlisted for the 2020 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry Collection; and Balikbayan, finalist for The New Michigan Press / DIAGRAM chapbook contest and the Center for Book Arts honoree. Dujie has earned fellowships from the National Book Critics Circle, Hugo House, Jack Straw Writing Program, and the Poetry Incubator, as well as scholarships from Bread Loaf and Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Along with Luther Hughes and Gabrielle Bates, they cohost The Poet Salon podcast. Dujie serves as Critic-at-Large for Poetry Northwest and poetry editor for Moss. They got their start as a Seattle Poetry Slam Finalist, a collegiate grand slam champion, and Seattle Youth Speaks Grand Slam Champion, representing Seattle at HBO’s Brave New Voices. Dujie is an MFA candidate at Warren Wilson College.

Where: Cobalt Poets – Online Zoom Event

Date: Tuesday, the 28^th

Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm

Address: Online event (see site)

Website: Event Page

Da Poetry Lounge Open Mic 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.

$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 28^th

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: Instagram Page

Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event

Come join acclaimed author and writing instructor Francesca Lia Block MWF 9-10 am and TuTh 10 am for a brief intro, discussion of her highly-effective 12 Question method, and 40 minutes of free writing on any topic without judgment. Afterwards you will be able to share a bit about your process and ask Francesca brief questions about your writing.

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 9 am – 10 am

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

Website: Event Page

2^nd Annual Santa Ana College Poetry & Literary Festival (Day 1 of 2) at SAC Outdoor Amphitheatre – In-Person Event

Join host Professor Donato Martinez and Sant Ana College for their 2^nd Annual Poetry & Literary Festival to be held in the SAC Outdoor Amphitheatre on Wednesday and Thursday, April 29 & 30, 2026, from 10 am to 3 pm.

Schedule:

10 am: OC Female Writers:

Cecilia Sanchez

Paola Gutierrez

Angeline Veyna

11 am: ILL Anthology Writers

Peter Lechuga

Lara Foy

Anonymous 1

1 pm: San Diego Chicana/Latinx Poets

Karla Cordero

Angleica Yanez

Sonia Gutierrez

2 pm: LGBTQ Writers

Missy Fuego

Maestro DeSean

Brian Sonia-Wallace

Where: Santa Ana College, SAC Outdoor Amphitheatre

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 10 am – 3 pm

Address: 1530 W. 17th St., Santa Ana, CA 92706

Website: Instagram Page

Special Storytime: Vanessa Guevara & When We Play at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids Event

Special Storytime celebrating Autism Awareness Month, author Vanessa Guevara will read and discuss her book When We Play: Understanding Autism Through the Joy of Play.

Vanessa is a mother of two with a master’s in Applied Behavioral Analysis, who has supported and worked with the neurodivergent community for over fifteen years. In her spare time, she enjoys group workout classes and reading. We are so excited to have her join us!

You can learn more about her here:

Instagram: @veelovies

Website: booksbyvanessa.com

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 11 am – 11:45 am

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

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-04-29/special-storytime-celebrating-autism-acceptance-month-author-vanessa-guevara

The Stories We Tell: A Queer Poetry Month Celebration Event at Pasadena City College Writing Center – In-Person Event

Join the Pride Center and the Writing Center to celebrate a dual book Launch with English Professor Katara’s and Pride Center Resource Advocate Jess Saravia.

There will be a conversation, Q&A, and author readings for a dual book launch: with English Professor E. Katherine Kattaras and the book How to Come Out to the Jasmine First, and Pride Center Resource Advocate Jess Saravia and the book Euthanasia: A collection of Poetry.

20 free copies of Euthanasia will be available and signed by the author!

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: PCC Writing Center, C345

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 12 pm – 1 pm

Address: 1570 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91106

Website: Instagram Page

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 2^nd Monday of the month on KPFK Los Angeles 90.7 FM.

NOTE: See site for details.

Where: KPFK 90.7 FM

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 2 pm – 2:30 pm

Address: On-air Event

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

Book Club: Life of Pi at Angelo M. Iacobani Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us for our monthly book club! This month we’ll be discussing Life of Pi by Yann Martel. Copies of the book will be available at the customer service desk. For Adults

This title is also available in e-book and e-audio formats through Libby and Hoopla.

Where: Iacobani Library,LACL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 3 pm – 4 pm

Address: 4990 Clark Ave., Lakewood, CA 90712

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16172685

Sci-Fi Book Club: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami at Van Nuys Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Please join our Science Fiction Book Club where Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by author Haruki Murakami will be discussed. Copies of this novel are available with library Cybernaut.

Synopsis: Across two parallel narratives, Murakami weaves an extraordinary tale combining the fantastical with the psychological.

Where: Van NuysBranch Library,LAPL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 5 pm – 6 pm

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

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/sci-fi-book-club-hard-boiled-wonderland-and-end-world-haruki-murakami

Canyon Readers Collective Book Club: The Berry Pickers at Topanga Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us for a discussion of The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters, where a child’s disappearance ripples across generations, exploring identity, family, and loss. For adults.

Copies are available for checkout at the Circulation Desk.

Where: Topanga Library,LACL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 122 N. Topanga Canyon Blvd., Topanga, CA 90290

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16192235

Wildfire Survivor Community Writing Group at Playa Vista Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Please join us for a prompt writing group for survivors of the L.A. wildfires, hosted by Saved by a Story. Come together as a community to write about the cherished places we have been, what we have lost and found, and how we can chart a way forward. Ignite your creativity, share your stories, and find connection in this supportive and non-judgmental environment.

Where: Playa VistaBranch Library,LAPL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6:15 pm

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

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/wildfire-survivor-community-writing-group

Mystery & Thriller Book Club: We’re All Guilty Here at Studio City Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Join us on the last Wednesday of every month for our Mystery & Thriller book club! Participants will discuss this month’s selection, We’re All Guilty Here by Karin Slaughter.

RSVP:

Please email studio@lapl.org for details

Where: Studio City Branch Library,LAPL

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6:30 pm

Address: 12511 Moorpark Street, Studio City, CA 91604

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

Claire Wadsworth and Nikki Hill, with Ben Mims, & La Copine: New California Cooking from an Oasis in the Desert at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event

Join us to welcome Claire Wadsworth and Nikki Hill, in conversation with Ben Mims, to discuss their cookbook, La Copine: New California Cooking from an Oasis in the Desert.

Throughout the book, readers will find recipes that capture La Copine’s signature approach: vegetable-forward but never virtue-signaling, comforting without being heavy, bold but balanced. More than a collection of recipes, La Copine is also an invitation into the community Claire and Nikki have built in the desert—the regulars, the travelers, the queer haven they’ve nurtured outside of Los Angeles.

Claire Wadsworth and Nikki Hill opened La Copine in 2015, shortly after getting married, to re-create the night they first met. What began as an eclectic, “IYKYK” restaurant has grown into a destination beloved by California locals, travelers, and celebrities alike, and is a pillar of the California queer scene.

Ben Mims is a former cooking columnist for the Los Angeles Times. He has written three cookbooks and has worked as a food editor and recipe developer for several food media publications, such as Lucky Peach, Food & Wine, Saveur, and Buzzfeed/Tasty. Born and raised in Mississippi, he spends his weekends stocking his freezer with biscuits and making fruit jam.

Where: Diesel, A Bookstore

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm

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

Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2026-04-29/claire-wadsworth-nikki-hill-la-copine-new-california-cooking

Shut Up and Write in Los Felizat Big Bar, The Alcove – In-Person Event

Come write with us! Every Wednesday (April 8, April 15, April 22, April 29) we’re writing at the @bigbaralcove.

We’re always on the side!

6:45 pm to 7 pm getting settled

7 pm check in

Write for an hour!

8ish check out!

All writers of all levels welcome!

WRITE | HANG | REPEAT

Where: Big Bar, The Alcove

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 6:45 pm – 8:15 pm

Address: 1929 Hillhurst Ave., Los Feliz, CA 90027

Website: Instagram Page

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 29^th

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: Instagram Page

At Skylight: Noam Schreiber, with Brooks Barnes, & Mutiny at Skylight – In-Person Event

Noam Schreiber, in conversation with Brooks Barnes, will discussMutiny: The Rise and Revolt of the College-Educated Working Class.

The story of a disillusioned generation that set out to reclaim its dignity and take on corporate America.

In recent years, young college grads have faced an alarming reality: crushing debt, unemployment, and jobs below their qualifications. They are frustrated that the time and money they invested in a degree have failed to bring about the opportunities they were promised.

The anger of this college-educated working class began to boil over during the Covid pandemic, when workers at Starbucks cafes and Apple stores shocked corporate America by voting to unionize. The seemingly spontaneous rebellion soon spread to video game studios and tech companies, and to Hollywood writers and actors, who waged historic strikes the following year.

In each case, frustrated college graduates were at the center of the uprising. When New York Times reporter Noam Scheiber met Sydney Mitchel, a writers guild strike captain at the Disney lot, he learned that she had once been a writer on a network television show, but had settled for a job as a writer’s assistant after a year of unemployment.

Mutiny is the revelatory account of a generation made confident by their historic educational achievements, only to become disillusioned when their degrees yielded far less than they were taught to expect.

With striking empathy, Scheiber paints a vivid portrait of this new working class while telling the dramatic story of its revolt against the status quo. He describes how recent developments like the proliferation of artificial intelligence and the war in Gaza have further fueled its discontent, and he explains why the college-educated working class will continue to demand change in the workplace, in cities like New York, and in national politics for years to come.

Noam Scheiber covers workers for The New York Times. Before that, he covered economic policy and three presidential campaigns for The New Republic. His first book was The Escape Artists. He holds a master’s degree in economics from the University of Oxford.

Brooks Barnes is a senior staff writer at The New York Times. He covers the entertainment business, with a particular focus on the Walt Disney Company. He joined The Times in 2007 and lives in Los Angeles with his husband. Prior to The Times, he was a reporter at The Wall Street Journal, starting in 1999 in the newspaper’s Seattle bureau.

NOTE: See site to RSVP.

Where: Skylight

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 7 pm – 8:30 pm

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

Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-noam-scheiber-presents-mutiny-w-brooks-barnes

Triptych: Reading Series by Shy Watson at Stories Books & Cafe – In-Person Event

Join us for Triptych: Reading Series by Shy Watson.

Shy Watson is a PhD candidate in Creative Writing & Literature at the University of Southern California. She has authored two full-length poetry collections: Horror Vacui (House of Vlad) and Cheap Yellow (Civil Coping Mechanisms).

Where: Stories Books & Café

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

Address: 1716 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90026

Website: https://www.storiesla.com/events/4256220260429

Anansi Writers Workshop at The World Stage – In-Person Event

The Anansi Writers Workshop was founded in 1990 by Kamau Daáood, Akilah Oliver, Nafis Nabawi and Anthony Lyons. In 1993, Michael Datcher initiated the development of a three-part format for the workshop. Our tradition of a community workshop began in the late 1960s at the Watts Writers’ Workshop, where World Stage co-founder Kamau Daáood started his writing career. Hosted by Jessica Gallion aka “Yellawoman.”

7:30 pm – 8:30 pm — Formal workshop;
8:30 pm – 9:00 pm — TBA;
9:05 pm – 10:00 pm — Open mic.

Suggested: $10.00 Donation via PayPal: The World Stage Gallery.

NOTE: See site for further details and any change in the schedule. Contact on Instagram @ _yellawoman.

Where: The World Stage (use left rear entrance)

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 7:30 pm – 10 pm

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

Website: Instagram Page

Story Salon LA at Art Parlor, 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: I Didn’t Know I Had It in Me Lordy!

Where: Art Parlor

Date: Wednesday the 29^th

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

Address: 5302 Laurel Canyon Blvd., Valley Village, CA 91607

Website: Instagram Page

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 29^th

Time: 8 pm – 10 pm

Address: Online event (see site)

Website: Free Workshop Page

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

Host Ben Trigg welcomes John Martinez for a reading and open mic.

John Martinez has been writing and publishing poetry since he was 14 years old. He studied English Literature and Poetry at Fresno State University, under the renown, Pulitzer Prize poet, Phillip Levine. In 2018, he published a book of Spanish poems entitled Mi Sol. And his new book of poems, Tale of Submission, is currently being published by Flower Song Press. He has recently, published in Altadena Review, a collection of poems edited by Peter J. Harris, and published two poems in an Anthology of contemporary Chicano Poetry published in Spain. Martinez makes his home in Upland, California and to date, continues his career as an administrator for a Los Angeles law firm.

$5 cover fee, cash only

Where: The Ugly Mug, Orange

Date: Wednesday, the 29^th

Time: 8 pm – 10 pm

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

Website: https://www.facebook.com/events/1849962052328445

Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 10 am – 11 am

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

Website: Event Page

2^nd Annual Santa Ana College Poetry & Literary Festival (Day 2 of 2) at SAC Outdoor Amphitheatre – In-Person Event

Schedule:

10 am: OC Spoken Word Poets:

Oscar Velasquez

David Alvarado

Gustavo Hernandez

11 am: Riot of Roses Writers

Brenda Vaca

Consuelo

Pam Concepcion

1 pm: IE Urban Poets

Donato Martinez

Erick Aguinaldo

Anthony Blacksher

2 pm: Slam Poets

Davia A. Romero

Cory Cofer (Besskepp)

Jonathan Kermah (Kerm)

Where: Santa Ana College, SAC Outdoor Amphitheatre

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 10 am – 3 pm

Address: 1530 W. 17th St., Santa Ana, CA 92706

Website: Instagram Page

“Saved by a Story” Seniors Writing Groupat Westwood Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Come enjoy creativity and community in a nonjudgmental environment. Discover the bounty of stories that lie within!

Please note that in April, the group meets on the fifth Thursday.

Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 1 pm – 2:30 pm

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

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/saved-story-seniors-writing-group

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

Join us to explore The Wedding People by Alison Espach. When Phoebe Stone arrives at the grand Cornwall Inn wearing a green dress and gold heels, not a bag in sight, she’s mistaken by everyone in the lobby for one of the wedding people! For adults.

Where: Lloyd Taber-Marina del Rey Library, LACL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 2 pm – 3 pm

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

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16074367

Eagle Rock Book Group: The Heist at Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

The Eagle Rock Book Club explores both acclaimed newer books and rediscovered classics of the past.  

The selection for April is The Heist by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg. This series opener introduces Special Agent Kate O’Hare. The FBI forces her to work with con man Nicholas Fox in order to take down a corrupt investment banker who has been hiding out on a private island in Indonesia.  

The library will have copies to check out, or check our e-media page for electronic access on Libby and hoopla.

Where: Eagle Rock Branch Library,LAPL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 3 pm

Address: 5027 Caspar Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90041

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/eagle-rock-book-club-9

One Book, One Coast: Telling Your Own Story: They Called Us Enemy at Exposition Park – Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Have a story to tell? Learn how to turn your experiences and ideas into a graphic novel. In this creative workshop, participants will explore how words and images work together to tell powerful stories.

Inspired by the book They Called Us Enemy by George Takei.

¿Tienes una historia que contar? ¡Aprende cómo convertir tus experiencias e ideas en una novela gráfica! En este taller creativo, los participantes explorarán cómo las palabras y las imágenes trabajan juntas para contar historias poderosas.

Nos inspiramos en el libro They Called Us Enemy de George Takei.

Where: Exposition Park – Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Regional Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 4 pm – 5 pm

Address: 3900 S. Western Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90062

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/one-book-one-coast-how-tell-your-story-graphic-novel-style

Meet the Author! With Sandra Martin Denís at Palms – Rancho Park Branch Library, LAPL– In-Person Kids Event

Author Sandra Martin Denís will read her book Why the Turtle Walks So Slowly: A Cuban Folktale Adapted and Retold, and answer questions about writing. Then we’ll decorate drums and make some music.

Recommended for ages 4 years and older.

Where: Palms – Rancho Park Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 4:15 pm – 5 pm

Address: 2920 Overland Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90064

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/meet-author-sandra-martin-denis

Book Club: They Called Us Enemy at Charter Oak Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Join us for a community reading program of exceptional scope – one book for all of the west coast. This special book club will feature discussion about They Called Us Enemy by George Takei. For teens, ages 13- 17.

One Book, One Coast brings together library systems across California, Washington State, and Oregon for a shared community reading program that celebrates literacy, learning, community, and civil discourse.

Learn more about this initiative at LACountyLibrary.org/one-book-one-coast/

Co-sponsored by the Friends of the West Covina Library on behalf of Charter Oak Library. Parents & Guardians: Please be aware that refreshments will be served at this program. A list of ingredients will be available.

Where: Charter Oak Library, LACL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 4:30 pm – 5:30 pm

Address: 20540 E. Arrow Hwy., Covina, CA 91724

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16108437

Author Event: Patty Seyburn & Lisa Alvarez at Contemporary Art Museum, CSULB – In-Person Event

Join Patty Seyburn and Lisa Alvarez at the CSULB campus art museum on Thursday April 30 from 5:30-6:30. Andrew Tonkovich will host and moderate.

Patty Seyburn’s new book Jukebox involks memories as well as songs and messages that touch and resonate with us all.

Lisa Alvarez’s Some Final Beauty contains both beautiful and melancholy storytelling of Southern California.

Free! Books for sale and treats to eat.

Where: Cal State Long Beach, Contemporary Art Museum

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm

Address: 250 Bellflower Blvd, Long Beach, CA 90840

Website: Instagram Page

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

Where: Lloyd Taber-Marina del Rey Library, LACL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

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

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16074368

Cookies & Comics Graphic Novel Book Club at Westwood Branch Library, LAPL – Online Event

Do you love graphic novels? Then this is the club for you! This month’s title is Pim & Francie: The Golden Bear Days by Al Columbia. Collecting more than a decade’s worth of excavations, comic strips, animation stills, storybook covers, and more, this broken jigsaw puzzle of a graphic novel tells the story of Pim and Francie—childlike male and female imps—whose irresponsible antics get them into horrific, fantastic trouble. The brilliant, fairy-tale-like backdrops hint at further layers of reality lurking beneath every gingerbread house. You can grab this title on hoopla with your library card.

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

RSVP:

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

Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 6:30 pm

Address: Online Event (see site)

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/cookies-comics-graphic-novel-book-club-18

Jeremy Narby, PhD, with Jon Christensen, & The Book of Cannabis: The History and Future of the Plant and the Drug at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event

Join us to welcome Jeremy Narby, PhD, in conversation with Jon Christensen, director of the Laboratory for Environmental Narrative Strategies (LENS) at UCLA, to discuss and sign The Book of Cannabis: The History and Future of the Plant and the Drug.

A revelatory journey through the tangled roots of cannabis―its ancient uses, political battles, and scientific renaissance―by acclaimed anthropologist Jeremy Narby.

In The Book of Cannabis, Jeremy Narby―renowned author of The Cosmic Serpent―delivers a sweeping, clear-eyed exploration of cannabis as both plant and cultural phenomenon. From its ancient medicinal and ritualistic roles to its vilification, Narby traces how cannabis became one of the most controversial plants in modern history.

With the global shift toward legalization, Narby dives into the latest science on cannabis’s therapeutic potential and risks, especially in the era of high-potency strains and edibles. He unpacks the plant’s transformation through selective breeding and examines its evolving impact on health, society, and the environment. The book also explores the implications of cannabis’s changing legal status and its intersection with issues of social justice and public policy.

Accessible, nuanced, and deeply informed, this is essential reading for cannabis users, industry professionals, educators, and policymakers alike. Narby’s anthropological lens offers a unique perspective on the plant’s journey, making The Book of Cannabis a vital guide to understanding cannabis in all its complexity.

Jeremy Narby, Ph.D., studied history at the University of Kent at Canterbury and earned a doctorate in anthropology from Stanford University. Since 1990, he has coordinated projects supporting Amazonian communities through the Swiss NGO Nouvelle Planète, focusing on land rights, bilingual education, and sustainable forestry. He is the author of The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge and Intelligence in Nature: An Inquiry into Knowledge, and co-editor with Francis Huxley of Shamans Through Time: 500 Years on the Path to Knowledge. His most recent work, co-authored with Rafael Chanchari Pizuri, is Plant Teachers: Tobacco and Ayahuasca.

Where: Diesel, A Bookstore

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 6:30 pm – 8 pm

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

Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2026-04-30/jeremy-narby-book-cannabis-history-and-future-plant-and-drug

Tia Chucha’s Book Launch: Alan Chazaro and Guests & These Space Ships Weren’t Built for Us at Tia Chucha’s Centro Cultural & Bookstore – In-Person Event

Tia Chucha Press is proud to announce our most recent publication, These Spaceships Weren’t Built for Us by Alan Chazaro. This poetry collection launches a speculative, lyrical odyssey through Latinx identity, diaspora, and memory, where the immigrant experience becomes a poetic voyage, rooted in resistance, love, and enduring pull of home.

Join us on Thursday, April 30th for a Book Release and Reading with author Alan Chazaro, featuring guests Daniel Hernandez, Jose Hernandez Diaz, & Angela Mendoza.

Daniel Hernandez is a well-known poet and young adult author who has written numerous poetry collections and has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Jose Hernandez Diaz is a Mexican American writer, editor, and teacher. The author of Bad Mexican, Bad American (Acre Books, 2024), and The Fire Eater (Texas Review Press, 2020), he is a 2017 National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellow. Diaz lives in Norwalk, California.

Angela Mendoza is a Chicana, Central American-American writer hailing from the Bay Area in Northern California. She recently graduated from the MFA program at San Diego State University, where she taught classes in literature and creative writing. She’s presented at the RE: Border conference in San Diego as well as the Latinx Literary Conference in New York City. The former co-editor of Fiction International, she is currently working on her debut novel.

No registration required.

Where: Tia Chucha’s Centro Cultural & Bookstore

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 12677 Glenoaks Blvd., Sylmar, CA 91342

Website: Instagram Page

Coffee, Waffles & Poetry: Features & Open Mic via VOTH Online Event – Online Event

After a 3-year hibernation, the virtual show is back. A lot has happened and a lot has changed including the fundamental structure of this show.

This event is offered every 1^st & last Thursday of the month.

FEATURES: @felipe.garcia.j and @venice__waves

Let’s talk! Let’s laugh! Let’s heal together with love, magic, and truth.

Love and light,

VOTH

Where: VOTH Online Zoom Event

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm

Address: Online: Meeting ID: 588 521 5193 & Passcode: 5683054448

Website: Instagram Page

Ticketed: Jordan Harper, with S.A. Cosby, & A Violent Masterpiece at Vroman’s, Pasadena – In-Person Event

Jordan Harper, in conversation with S.A. Cosby, will discuss A Violent Masterpiece.

The next epic crime novel from Jordan Harper, a story of Los Angeles power brokers and those at the edge, and a single shattering incident that threatens to bring it all crashing down.

Los Angeles, right now. America with its back up against the wall. This Frankenstein’s monster of crimes and lurid dreams sewn together into something like a city.

A city ready to explode: A Hollywood pedophile is arrested and is ready to tear down the city to get his freedom. A young woman goes missing—and men in black rubber gloves who look like cops clean out her apartment in the middle of the night. And the serial killer known as the LA Ripper is on the loose, leaving tragic/graphic/brutal crime scenes in his wake. Three people trying to keep their heads above the dirty water will find themselves coming together to unite these strands into one enormous, unspeakable crime.

Jake Deal is a gonzo live-streaming nightcrawler, beaming the city’s chaos straight to his audience of blood-hungry subscribers, giving them the view from the top of the mushroom cloud—until a job he can’t refuse drags him back into his old life of Hollywood glamour, drugs, sex and sleaze. Armed with cameras and hidden mics, he’ll infiltrate private clubs, gather high-class dirt, and stumble onto a conspiracy woven into the center of LA’s most powerful men, who call themselves “The Kids in the Candy Store.”

Doug Gibson is a street lawyer, who fights for his clients against the army of cops, prosecutors, and judges; he is the knife they bring to the gunfight. But when he’s hired by a Hollywood pedophile ready to sell out his friends for a chance for freedom, he’ll take on a fight bigger than he could have imagined. And when his client “commits suicide” in prison, Gibson will have to stop being a weapon—and become a warrior.

Kara Delgado works for an underground private concierge company—a make-a-wish foundation for the terminally rich. She scores drugs, makes connections, and plans multi-million dollar sex parties. She has learned the secret truth of this world: there are no rules, only prices. Her best friend Phoebe has gone missing, and Kara’s the only person who knows that Phoebe’s place was wiped clean of evidence by men in black rubber gloves. But when she begins to unravel the mystery of what happened to Phoebe, and its connection to the killer known as the LA Ripper, it will drag her into the dark heart of the city.

As Jake, Doug and Kara all investigate these crimes, they’ll encounter ketamine-addled sitcom stars, bloody riots, homeless gangsters, a killer cop on death row, secret vaults in Beverly Hills, tech-bro orgies, medical cannibals, true crime junkies, private security wet-work teams, reality shows, street takeovers, car chases, coyotes, a sadistic Tarzan, and a three day, fifty million dollar wedding, before everything is revealed and they must each make their choice about how to fight back in this violent world before the bloody, blazing conclusion.

This is a ticketed program and will take place at Vroman’s Bookstore, located at 695 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91101.

Your Eventbrite ticket will include a copy of A Violent Masterpiece, to be handed out at check-in on the night of the program.

A public book signing will follow the conversation.

RSVP

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Thursday the 30^th

Time: 7 pm – 8 pm

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

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-04-30/ticketed-jordan-harper-conversation-sa-cosby-discusses-signs-violent-masterpiece

Lit Angels: Morning Writing with Francesca Lia Block at Village Well Books & Coffee – In-Person Event

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Friday the 1^st

Time: 9 am – 10 am

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

Website: Event Page

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 1^st

Time: 9:30 am

Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020

Website: Once Upon a Time Event Page

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 1^st

Time: 11 am – 12 pm

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

Website: Event Page

Flintridge Bookstore at 2026 Lit Fest in the Dena – In-Person Event

Join us to purchase books and for signings by featured authors.

Where: Flintridge Bookstore Off-site, Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Friday the 1^st

Time: 6 pm – 9:30 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

2026 Lit Fest in the Dena Event (Day 1 of 2), Events at 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm, at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

LitFest in the Dena takes place Friday, May 1st, 2026, from 6:00 pm – 9:30 pm and Saturday, May 2nd, 2026, from 10:00 am – 5:30 pm at Pasadena Presbyterian Church, located at 585 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91101.

There are multiple locations within the Church for our panels, workshops, and readings. Fellowship Hall, South Hall, and The Chapel are on the ground floor while The Library and The Study are on the second floor. Authors and visitors to the festival will be directed by ushers and signage to their specific locations.

Food, Pop-ups, and vendors are also available.

See complete schedule at website.

EVENT SCHEDULE

6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

SOUTH HALL:

Celebrating Pasadena with Altadena Poet Laureates—Sehba Sarwar, moderator, Lester Graves Lennon, Carla Sameth, Teresa Mei Chuc, Hazel Calyton-Harrison, Thelma Reyna, Ellin Lipkin, Arlene Terzian-Zieitounian.

FELLOWSHIP HALL:

Storytelling as a Political Force—Victoria Patterson (moderator), Dana Johnson, Lisa Alverez, Mary Camarillo

THE CHAPEL:

The Wisdom Years: Memoir Beyond Mid-Life—Mary Lea Carroll, Julie H, Parker, Shandela Contreras, Margot Hover, Pamela Nickel Williams (moderator)

THE LIBRARY:

Parable of the Writer: Channeling Hope & Fear into Sci-Fi—Ciena Valenzuela-Peterson (moderator), Valentina Gomez

THE STUDY:

Organizing for Good: A People’s Guide for Action—Brian Biery (moderator), Marcus Renner, RJ Sakai

Where: Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Friday the 1^st(Day 1 of 2)

Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

Fall of Freedom Open Mic & Features with The People’s Mic & Trenches Full of Poets at Avenue 50 Studio – In-Person Event

Power to the People!

Stay May Day Strong! No work, no school, no shopping.

Uplift international workers.

$5 donation. No one turned away.

Where: Avenue 50 Studio

Date: Friday the 1^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 3714 N. Figueroa St., Los Angeles 90065

Website: Instagram Page

Fresh Fish Fridays Open Mic with LA Poet Society at Senor Fish Eagle Rock – In-Person Event

Community! Come join LA Poet Society for Fresh Friday THIS FRIDAY, 7 pm –10 pm in Eagle Rock at Señor Fish in Eagle Rock.

Open mic signups are at 7:30, 5 minutes per person.

Confirm at website for further details.

Where: Senior Fish, Eagle Rock

Date: Friday the 1^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 4803 Eagle Rock Blvd., Downtown L.A. 90013

Website: Instagram Page

Lyrical Flames Open Mic Event with Lida Parent Harris at Shit Art Club DTLA – In-Person Event

Lida Parent Harris presents Lyrical Flames Features & Open Mic Event at Shit Art Club.

Features include: Akoldpiece, poet and Richard Marchetta, musician. See site for more details.

Where: Lyrical Flames at Shit Art Club, DTLA

Date: Friday the 1^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 130 E. 4^th St., Downtown L.A. 90013

Website: Instagram Page

At Skylight: S.A. Griffin, with Guests/Contributors, & Catching Fire: The Los Angeles Wildfires Skylight – In-Person Event

S.A. Griffin, with readings by contributors, will present the anthology Catching Fire: The Los Angeles Wildfires: January 5 thru February 1, 2025.

Fueled by dry conditions and relentless Santa Ana winds rushing over the landscape with speeds upwards of 100 miles per hour, everything bending to the will of the wind, the spark of Los Angeles’s January 2025 fires exploded into an unprecedented gut wrenching apocalypse.

In this superbly curated collection, edited by award-winning L.A. poets S.A. Griffin and Richard Modiano, contemporary poets and writers from L.A. and beyond explore the intense horror of devastating loss, the helplessness of watching from across the country, the grief in the aftermath, and the resolve to rise again together from the ashes.

Contributors include: Susan Auerbach, Lin Nelson Benedek, Mary Anne Berry, Michelle Bitting, Laurel Ann Bogen, Lynne Bronstein, Jeffrey Bryant, Mona Jean Cedar, Teresa Mei Chuc, Jeanette Clough, Brendan Constantine, Iris De Anda, Alexis Rhone Fancher, Rich Ferguson, Kathleen Florence, Land Flowers, Kat Georges, S.A. Griffin, Spencer L. Griffin, Susan Hayden, Steve Hochman, jerry the priest, La Romb eacute, Tom Laichas, Rick Lupert, Suzanne Lummis, Phoebe MacAdams, Sarah Maclay, kamla maya, Holaday Mason, Ellyn Maybe, Richard Modiano, Bill Mohr, Chris Morris, K.R. Morrison, Majid Naficy, Jim Natal, Harry E. Northup, Cynthia Perello, Puma Perl, Kennon B. Raines, Nicca Ray, Riot Renwick, Marilyn N. Robertson, Beth Ruscio, Cathie Sandstrom, Dan Saucedo, Maryrose Smyth, Mike Sonksen, A.K. Toney, David L. Ulin, jimmy vega, Pam Ward, Dig Wayne, Hilda Weiss, Jessica M. Wilson, Gail Wronsky, and Z.

S.A. Griffin is the author of Pandemic Soul Music (Punk Hostage Press) and co-editor of The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry (Thunder Mouth Press, Firecracker Award). In April-June 2010 he toured the U.S. with Elsie the Poetry Bomb, a 7-foot-tall Vietnam era practice bomb converted into an art object and filled with poetry from around the world in an effort to create and inspire civil disagreements. Carma Bum, father, husband, and Vietnam era veteran of the USAF.

Jeffrey Bryant is a Pushcart nominated queer poet from Los Angeles. His work has appeared in the LA Weekly, L.A. Times, Poetic Diversity, New Verse News, Poetrysuperhighway.com, Synkroniciti, Quill and Echo, Tension Literary, Journal of the Plague Years, Coiled Serpent, Altadena Literary Review, Shadowplay and Sparring with Beatnik Ghosts. He is a featured poet in the forthcoming spring edition of Cholla Needles Literary Journal. His debut collection The Catacombs of Vanished Lovers (2025, Cherry Pie Press).

Mona Jean Cedar has been spilling her spoken word poetry with American Sign Language (ASL) around the globe for over 30 years. Her poetry pedigree includes being on the Long Beach Slam team; interpreted for the National Slams and the Women of the World Slams; interpreting for the Coupe du Monde de Poesie in Paris for five years when in the final year she actually competed and represented the USA; multitudinous readings, a few Dada events.

Susan Hayden is author of the hybrid memoir; Now You Are a Missing Person (Moon Tide Press). It was a Kirkus Reviews’ Best Indie Book of 2024, after receiving the Kirkus Star. She’s been published in numerous anthologies, including From Venice to Venice: Poets of California and Italy (El Martillo Press), Beat Not Beat (Moon Tide Press) and The Black Body (Seven Stories Press). She is Creator/Producer of Library Girl, now in its 17th year.

Steve Hochman has covered music for 40 years, most prominently with the Los Angeles Times, Rolling Stone, KPCC and KQED. Currently he’s a featured writer in SPIN, New Orleans’ OffBeat and the Bluegrass Situation, and serves as a frequent moderator of events at the Grammy Museum. In recent years, with the loving encouragement of his wife, Susan Hayden, he has also embraced a more personal voice, writing pieces for her monthly live literary series, Library Girl.

Tom Laichas is author of three books of poetry, most recently Three Hundred Streets of Venice California (FutureCycle Press, 2023). His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Prairie Schooner, Plume, The Los Angeles Times, The Irish Times, Blue Unicorn and elsewhere. The featured American poet at the High Window Review (UK), his work has also won awards from Jabberwock Review, Puerto del Sol, and Prime 53. He lives with his family in Venice, California.

Phoebe MacAdams was born and raised in New York City but has mostly lived in California. She moved to LA in 1986. With the poets James Cushing, the late Holly Prado and Harry Northup, she is a founding member of Cahuenga Press, which now includes the poet Jeanette Clough. She taught English at Roosevelt High School in Boyle Heights until her retirement in 2011. She has published seven books of poetry, the last five with Cahuenga Press, including in 2016, her new and selected volume, The Large Economy of the Beautiful. In 2017, Beyond Baroque published Every Bird Helps: A Cancer Journal. She lives in Pasadena with her husband, Ron Ozuna.

Richard Modiano became active in the literary community connected to the Poetry Project where he came to know Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg, Anne Waldman, William S. Burroughs and Ted Berrigan. In 2001 he was a programmer at Beyond Baroque Literary/Arts Center, joined the Board of Trustees in 2006, and from 2010 to 2019, he served as Executive Director. The Huffington Post named him as one of 200 people doing the most to promote poetry in the United States. Richard Modiano is the winner of the 2022 Joe Hill Prize for labor poetry and is a Pushcart Prize nominee. His collection The Forbidden Lunchbox is published by Punk Hostage Press.

Bill Mohr has worked as an editor, publisher, literary historian, and poet since the early 1970s. His books include Holdouts: The Los Angeles Poetry Renaissance 1948- 1992 (University of Iowa Press; 2011) and a bilingual edition of poems, Pruebas Ocultas (Bonobos Editores, Mexico; 2015). What Books will publish Remiges: Collected Longer Poems in the fall of 2026.

A.K. Toney is a griot, musician, and educator. Toney is writing his first book along with a double-album chronicling his life as an ethnographer through the experiences of urban griot. As the Neo Griot, Toney uses musical accompaniment with poetry to provide call and response with listeners as a tool of engagement for participation. He is a founder and the Literacy Coordinator of Reading Is Poetry, LLC. readingispoetry.com. A.K. is also a jazz artist that has worked with Jimetta Rose, Georgia Ann Muldrow, Ryan Porter, Tatiana Tate, Allakoi Peete, Josef Leimberg, and Jamael Dean.

Dig Wayne teaches Method Acting at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in West Hollywood. Originally from Ohio, Dig has lived, worked, and practiced his art in New York City and London. He has published two books of poetry, Hip Pockets and Bongo Skin. His recent collection, One Fell Swoop was published by innateDIVINITYbooks. His poetry has been featured in a number of literary magazines and anthologies including the last two issues of The Sparring Artists: Anthology of Sparring with Beatnik Ghosts.

Where: Skylight

Date: Friday the 1^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

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

Website: https://www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-sa-griffin-presents-catching-fire-w-special-guests

Book Launch & Signing: Aesthetical Relations | Revised and Expanded by Christina Catherine Martinez at Stories Books & Café – In-Person Event

Aesthetical Relations is a constellation of essays on art, fashion, cancer, comedy, Los Angeles, and your mom. Martinez whips elements of fiction and stand-up material into bits and pieces addressing such concerns as: how many times you may kiss an art-world acquaintance, the theoretical stakes of sexting, and why German performance art is like French clowning. Aesthetical Relations is titled after Martinez’s ongoing conceptual comedy talk show of the same name. This new revised and expanded third edition includes new essays written from 2020-2025.

Christina Catherine Martinez (Mexican American, b. Bellflower, CA) lives and works between Los Angeles, Mexico City, and New England. She was named both a Comedian You Should Know by Vulture and a Comic to Watch by TimeOutLA, and is a recipient of an Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant for her varied approaches to art criticism, published in platforms such as The Los Angeles Times, Aperture, Frieze, Artforum, Bookforum, e-flux criticism, DOCUMENT Journal, Dirt.fyi and Texte Zur Kunst.

Where: Stories Books & Café

Date: Friday the 1^st

Time: 7 pm – 9 pm

Address: 1716 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90026

Website: https://storiesla.com/events

L.A. Book Launch: Alan Chazaro, with David Quioz and Joseph Rios, & These Spaceships Weren’t Built for Us at Beyond Baroque – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

The newest collection by poet Alan Chazaro.

Join us for a poetry reading celebrating These Spaceships Weren’t Built For Us, the new collection by Alan Chazaro. In this book, Chazaro reimagines space travel through the lens of his experience as the son of Mexican immigrants, moving between everyday settings and speculative worlds that reflect the tensions and possibilities of the present moment.

Alan Chazaro is the author of several previous collections and a graduate of June Jordan’s Poetry for the People program at UC Berkeley. His work has appeared in NPR, The Guardian, and the Los Angeles Times. He will be joined by David Quiroz, whose debut Dreamer Paradise explores the complexities of the undocumented and DACA experience, and Joseph Rios, former poet laureate of Fresno and author of Shadowboxing: Poems and Impersonations.

This collection is the first release from a publishing partnership between Red Hen Press, Tía Chucha Press, and Letras Latinas. The program is co-sponsored by Letras Latinas, the literary initiative at the University of Notre Dame’s Institute for Latino Studies.

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

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center

Date: Friday, the 1^st

Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm

Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90291

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/la-book-launch-these-spaceships-werent-built-for-us-by-alan-chazaro-tickets-1983046910692

2026 Lit Fest in the Dena Event (Day 1 of 2): Events at: 8 pm – 9 pm, at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

LitFest in the Dena takes place Friday, May 1st, 2026, from 6:00 pm –9:30 pm and Saturday, May 2nd, 2026, from 10:00 am – 5:30 pm at Pasadena Presbyterian Church, located at 585 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91101.

Food, Pop-ups, and vendors are also available.

See complete schedule at website.

EVENT SCHEDULE

8 pm – 9 pm

SOUTH HALL:

Wall Is Just a Wall—Sehba Sarwar (moderator), Olga Garcia Echeverria, Iyatunde Folyan, traci kato-kiriyama, Jessica Kashiwabara

FELLOWSHIP HALL:

Beyond Truman Capote: Recovering Victim Survivor Stories in Violent Histories—Jo Scott Coe (moderator), Cassandra Lane, Casandra Lopez, Victoria Waddle

THE CHAPEL:

La Loteria Against Time: Visual Archives, Oral Traditions, and Modern Meanings—Glory Arjona

THE LIBRARY:

The Queer of Spirit: Coming Out and Spiritual Journeys in Literature—Scott Coon, Rie Lee, Charles L. Close III, CB Lee (moderator)

THE STUDY:

The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice—Sonali Kolhatkar

Where: Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Friday the 1^st(Day 1 of 2)

Time: 8 pm – 9 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

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 6^th

Time: 8 pm – 12 am

Address: 4305 Degnan Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008

Website: https://www.depoet.info/swaam

Santa Monica Reading Series: First Fridays Open Mic with host Cynthia Alessandra Briano at Rapp Saloon, Santa Monica – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

Frist Fridays at Rapp Saloon is celebrating 10 years and has an Open Mic & Featured Readers every 1^st Friday of the month.

First Friday: Cynthia Alessandra Briano, Host

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 1^st

Time: 8 pm – 11 pm

Address: 1436 2nd St., Santa Monica, CA 90402

Website: Instagram Page

Western Edge Writers at Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Writers and aspiring writers, join us for a group that supports writing endeavors of all genres: fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and memoir.

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

Where: Eagle Rock Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 10 am

Address: 5027 Caspar Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90041

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

2026 Lit Fest in the Dena Event (Day 2 of 2), Events at 10 am – 11 am, at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

Food, Pop-ups, and vendors are also available.

See complete schedule at website.

EVENT SCHEDULE

10 am – 11 am

SOUTH HALL:

Possibilities Land! With Pasadena Rose Poets—Gerda Govine Ituarte (moderator), Teresa Mei Chuc, Damien Gonzalez, Hazel Clayton Harrison, Carla Sameth

FELLOWSHIP HALL:

Diasporan Witness and Wonder: 8^th Graders Respond—Shahe Mankerian (moderator), Dr. Vatche Mankerian, Hovsepian School 8^th Graders.

THE CHAPEL:

See Yourself on the Page: Publishing the Marginalized—J.A. Swayze, Brenda Vaca, Linda Ravenswood (moderator), Leland Cheuk

THE LIBRARY:

Mystery 101: The Art of Asking Why—Camille Cabrera (moderator), Jennifer J. Chow

THE STUDY:

Raising Teen Conscience: Special Issues in YA Lit—Christina Hoag (moderator), Tisha Marie Reichle-Aguilera, Reverie Fey, Francesca Lia Block

Where: Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Saturday the 2^nd(Day 2 of 2)

Time: 10 am – 11 am

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

Middle School Book Club: Vanya and the Wild Hunt at Agoura Hills Library, LACL – In-Person MG Event

Join us to discuss Vanya and the Wild Hunt by Sangu Mandanna. For ages 11 – 14.

Amari and the Night Brothers meet Nevermoor in this enchanting middle grade fantasy, inspired by Indian mythology and British folklore, about a neurodivergent heroine, a mysterious school, and a world of magical creatures.

Where: Agoura Hills Library, LACL

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 11 am – 12 pm

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

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16009220

Mystery Book Club: Child 44 at Westwood Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Read the book and join our lively discussion!

There is no meeting in December.

May 2: Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith.

Where: Westwood Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 11 am

Address: 1246 Glendon Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90024

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/mystery-book-club-14

گروه کتابخوانی فارسی در کتابخانه وست ولی Persian Book Club at West Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

RSVP:

تماس بگیرید roya.rahimi@lapl.org برای اطلاعات بیشتر با ایمیل

Description:

:کتاب خود ا به اشتراک بگذارید

کتابی را که خواندید به دیگران هم معرفی کنید

تحلیل کتاب/ بحث و گفتگوی دوستانه

Where: West Valley Regional Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 11 am – 1 pm

Address: 19036 Vanowen St., Reseda, CA 91335

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

Saturday Morning Book Discussion: Abundance at Palms – Rancho Park Branch Library, LAPL – In-Person Event

Join us for wide-ranging conversations. Copies available at reference and as ebooks. We continue reading off of the “100 Notable Books of the Year” from the New York Times. 

Apr. 11*: Abundance by Ezra Klein & Derek Thompson.

Note date and time change.

Where: Palms – Rancho Park Branch Library, LAPL

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 11 am – 1 pm

Address: 2920 Overland Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90064

Website: https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/saturday-morning-book-discussion

Storytime with Livia Blackburn & Bing’s Cherries at Village Well Bookstore – In-Person Event

Join us for storytime with Livia Blackburn to hear her read and discuss her new book Bing’s Cherries.

This story is a modern American tall tale woven by a girl and her father about Ah Bing, the Chinese immigrant behind the Pacific Northwest’s most delicious cherries.

You’ve heard of a Bing cherry, but did you know the story of the Chinese American immigrant for whom the dark, luscious cherry is named?

Long ago, Ah Bing was a father who travelled across the sea from China looking for work. It was in Oregon where he met a man who hired him to work in his orchards, where eventually, Bing cultivated the delicious cherries we know of today.

With touching text and lush illustrations, Livia Blackburne and Julia Kuo forge an unforgettable Chinese American folktale that has largely been untold. The backmatter includes a letter from the author and illustrator, as well as a recipe.

Livia Blackburne is a New York Times bestselling author of novels and picture books. Her titles include I Dream of Popo, which received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and Booklist; Midnight Thief, an Indies Introduce New Voices selection; and Rosemarked, A YALSA Teens Top Ten nominee. Born in Taiwan and raised in Albuquerque, she now lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughter.

Where: Village Well Books & Coffee

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 11 am – 12 pm

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

Website: Event Page

Double Story Time with authors Andy Harkness, Annabeth Bondor-Stone, and Connor White – In-Person Kids Event

Join Once Upon A Time for a morning of connection and adventure. Author Andy Harkness will read his new picture book Find the Sun. Then author team Annabeth Bondor-Stone and Connor White will read the new picture book Kitty Caterpillar.

Andy Harkness is the author and illustrator of Wolfboy, which received two starred reviews, Wolfboy is Scared, and of Bug Zoo. He is an award-winning art director who has worked on Moana, Frozen, and Wreck-it-Ralph, among other movies. After twenty-five years at Disney, he moved to Sony Pictures Animation. He is currently at Skydance Animation, where he is the production designer on an upcoming project. He lives in California with his family.

Annabeth Bondor-Stone and Connor White made their picture book debut with Space: The Final Pooping Frontier. Their other books include the Shivers! The Pirate series, Jaclyn Hyde, Time Tracers, and Quest for the Crystal Crown. The Emmy-nominated television writing pair are co-creators of Eva the Owlet on Apple TV+. Other TV credits include the Michelle Obama produced Netflix show Waffles and Mochi, Nickelodeon’s The Tiny Chef Show, and numerous other projects. They live in Los Angeles with their two children.

Where: Once Upon a Time

Date: Saturday, the 2^nd

Time: 11:00 am

Address: 2207 Honolulu Ave., Montrose, CA 91020

Website: Once Upon a Time Event Page

Pasadena Conservatory of Music Presents a Musical Storytime: If I Built a Car, by Chris Van Dusen at Vroman’s – In-Person Kids & Family Event

Join us to hear the Pasadena Conservatory of Music present a musical storytime to accompany a featured book: If I Built a Car by Chris Van Dusen. Caregivers and children aged 3-9 will enjoy story, craft activities, creative movement and a mini-concert!

Where: Vroman’s

Date: Saturday, the 2^nd

Time: 11:30 am

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

Website: https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-05-02/musical-storytime

2026 Lit Fest in the Dena Event (Day 2 of 2), Events at 11:30 am – 12:30 pm, at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

LitFest in the Dena takes place Friday, May 1st, 2026, from 6:00 pm – 9:30 pm and Saturday, May 2nd, 2026, from 11:30 am – 5:30 pm at Pasadena Presbyterian Church, located at 585 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91101.

Food, Pop-ups, and vendors are also available.

See complete schedule at website.

EVENT SCHEDULE

11:30 am – 12:30 pm

SOUTH HALL:

Gee I Can’t Wait to Age! Said No One Ever—Dena Sapnos-Hawkey (moderator), Akila Gibbs, Adriana Mendoza, Ellen Snortland

FELLOWSHIP HALL:

Writing the Crimes of Our Time—Aaron Philip Clark (moderator), Scott O’Connor, Cutis Ippolito, Gary Phillips

THE CHAPEL:

Letres Latino Reading—Francisco Aragon, Alan Chazaro, heidi andrea restrepo rhodes, Cloud Delfina Cardona, William Archila, Brent Ameneyro (moderator).

THE LIBRARY:

Starlit Scribes: Poetry That Changed Our Narratives—Wendy Van Camp (moderator), Bree Wernicke, Leeanne Kathleen Indigo, Denise Dumars.

THE STUDY:

Between Childhood and the World—Dan McCauley, Ryane Nicole Granados, Elisa Parhad, Margaret Finnegan (moderator)

Where: Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Saturday the 2^nd(Day 2 of 2)

Time: 11:30 am – 12:30 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

Writers Supporting Writers at West Hollywood Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Looking for a place to connect with fellow writers and grow your craft? Join Writers Supporting Writers! For adults.

Writers Supporting Writers is a monthly library writing group that meets on the first Saturday of every month for writing exercises, thoughtful discussions of attendees’ works in progress, and engaging analysis of published works. We offer an inclusive and supportive environment for writers of every background and experience level to create, share, and grow.

Where: West Hollywood Library, LACL

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 12 pm – 2 pm

Address: 625 N. San Vicente Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/15999898

Storytime & Signing: Authors’ Reading & Auntie Khristina’s Guide to Asian American Activism Bal Canto Bookstore, Long Beach – In-Person Event

Please join us for a storytime and signing with the authors of AUNTIE KRISTINA’S GUIDE TO ASIAN AMERICAN ACTIVISM, Kristina Wong, Theodore Chao, Anna Michelle Wang, and Jenessa Joffe.

Kristina Wong is an award-winning performance artist, guest comedian on late-night television, writer, and former elected official in Los Angeles Koreatown. She’s the first Asian American Woman to be named Pulitzer Prize Finalist in Drama for her solo show Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord. The show detailed her real-life leadership of the Auntie Sewing Squad, a massive mutual-aid network of volunteers led primarily by women of color who shipped tens of thousands of free homemade masks to vulnerable communities during the pandemic. She stars as “Auntie Kristina” in the Radical Cram School web series, which she created. She’s also the recipient of the Drama Desk Award for Best Solo Show, Guggenheim Fellowship, and Doris Duke Artist Award.

Theodore Chao is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Elementary and Bilingual Education at California State University, Fullerton, where he directs the Mathematics and Science Teacher Initiative (MSTI). His research centers on Digital Mathematics Storytelling to amplify counter-narratives that challenge harmful stereotypes in mathematics education, working particularly with immigrant communities. His work has been supported by the IES, NSF, and Fulbright. Dr. Chao currently co-hosts the TODOS: Mathematics for All Podcast, produced the Radical Cram School web series, and is co-author of Auntie Kristina’s Guide to Asian American Activism (April 2026), written with Kristina Wong, Anna Michelle Wang, and Jenessa Joffe. He began his education career as a middle school math teacher in Brooklyn.

Anna Michelle Wang co-wrote and co-produced the Radical Cram School web series, contributing as music director, lyricist, and puppeteer. She is a multifaceted artist and entrepreneur who narrated the Monster Diary series for Familius Publishing on Audible; wrote, produced, and performed the thirty-four-episode puppet home renovation web series The Hanna Rochelle Show; and performed excerpts of her new musical SANDWICHED at the 2018 and 2019 National Puppetry Conferences. She is a mother to three middle-school and high-school children.

Jenessa Joffe is a Los Angeles-based writer, director, producer, and mom whose kid-focused content serves up humor to inspire empathy—kind of like sneaking extra veggies into pizza sauce if that pizza could dismantle systemic inequality. Jenessa earned a BA in East Asian Studies from Wesleyan University and an MFA in Directing from the American Film Institute Conservatory. She co-wrote, co-produced and directed the Radical Cram School web series, and now runs her own production company.

Kindly RSVP

Where: Bel Canto Books, KUBO LB

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 12 pm – 1:30 pm

Address: 3976 Atlantic Ave., Long Beach, CA

Website: With Friends Event Page

Author Event: Marie Chan & Mamie Takes a Stand at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Event

Join us to meet author Marie Chan and discuss Mamie Takes a Stand The True Story of Mamie Tape, a Chinese American Girl’s Fight for School Rights to our store to talk about her book and the incredible real-life hero, Mamie Tape!

In the fall of 1884 in San Francisco, California, Mamie excitedly arrived for her first day at an American public school, only to find the principal blocking her way. Why? Because Mamie was Chinese. Thus began the Tape family’s yearlong struggle to secure Mamie’s right to attend public school. In the spring of 1885, Mamie’s case reached the California Supreme Court, who reaffirmed a lower court’s ruling that public schools should be open to children of all races.

Marie Chan shares stories that inspire love for all. Being the daughter of Taiwanese immigrants fueled her passion to write children’s books that amplify underrepresented voices, highlight hidden figures in Asian American history, and build cross-cultural awareness. She is a former California public school teacher and leads a trauma-informed support group for adoptive and foster parents. Marie’s children’s book, Mamie Takes a Stand: The True Story of Mamie Tape, a Chinese American Girl’s Fight for School Rights, received a Eureka! Gold Award for Excellence in Children’s Nonfiction and was listed in the Center for the Study of Multicultural Children’s Literature’s Best Books of 2024. Learn more at mariechan.com and connect with her on Instagram @mariechanbooks.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 12 pm – 1 pm

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

Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/mamietakesastand

Kids Graphic Novel Book Club: Ilustra: Daybreaker: Book 1 at Cellar Door Bookstore, Riverside – In-Person Kids Event

Join us to read and discuss Ilustra: Daybreaker: Book 1 by Tori Tadiar.

Mika always thought the gods and goddesses of the Philippines were no more than legend—until she wakes one and discovers a destiny she never imagined.

Though Mika Mirasol’s boarding school classmates tease her for clinging to the stories of legendary beings her lola raised her on, she can’t help but love them—those myths are all she has left of her guardian.

That is, until a year after Lola’s death, when a moth speaks to Mika in the old woman’s voice. Mika experiences a burst of inexplicable power, and in her panic, she accidentally casts a spell and binds herself to two eavesdropping classmates.

Literally stuck together, Mika, Halle, and Teo grudgingly set out to find a countercurse in ancient Filipino beliefs. But the more they learn, the more it seems that Lola’s tales were all true—and that Mika is destined to play a role in them.

The mythology of the Philippine Islands comes to life in this funny, warm, and enchanting graphic novel about making friends, learning to let go, and finding your place in the world.

Tori Tadiar is a Filipino comic artist based in rainy Metro Manila. She is an IT professional by day and works on comics and stories every chance she can get. Her goal is to tell stories that introduce and immerse readers in alternate worlds based on the culture of the land she calls home. When she’s not busy creating comics, Tori can be found relaxing at home with her husband Miko, figuring out how to be a mom to baby Leon, or occasionally exploring unfamiliar new places. Connect with her online @HaiToriArt on Instagram and @HaiTori on Facebook and X.

Where: Cellar Door Bookstore

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 1 pm – 2 pm

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

Website: https://cellardoorbookstore.com/event/2026-05-02/kids-graphic-novel-book-club-illustra-book-1-daybreaker

2026 Lit Fest in the Dena Event (Day 2 of 2), Events at 1 pm – 2 pm, at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

Food, Pop-ups, and vendors are also available.

See complete schedule at website.

EVENT SCHEDULE

1 pm – 2 pm

SOUTH HALL:

Brilliant Bilinguals – Diosa Xochiquetzalcoatl (moderator), Brenda Vaca, Paola Gutierrez, Jesenia Chavez, Adela Najarro.

FELLOWSHIP HALL:

Take the Mic, Change the Narrative: with Notes and Letters—Bill Cushing, Chuck Corbisiero.

THE CHAPEL:

Catching Fire: Poetry and Fiction on the 2025 Wildfires—S.A. Griffin (moderator), Richard Modiano, Susan Auerbach, Teresa Mei Chuc, Rich Ferguson, Kathleen Florence, Riot Renwick, Mike Sonksen, Pam Ward, Dig Wayne, Harry E. Northrup

THE LIBRARY:

Pieces of Us: PUSD Students on Fire, ICE, and Life—Adhalia Rivera (moderator), Lesley Chee, Julia Maritnez, Mariah Tillman.

THE STUDY:

Historical Fiction vs. History—Michele Zack (moderator), Michelle Huneven, William Deverell, Richard H. Moon.

Where: Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Saturday the 2^nd(Day 2 of 2)

Time: 1 pm – 2 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

Weekend Book Club: Don’t Let the Devil Ride: A Novel at Carson Library, LACL – In-Person Event

Patrons can join a facilitated discussion of fiction and nonfiction titles. A limited amount of titles are available for attendees to pick up at the library: Don’t Let the Devil Ride: A Novel by Ace Atkins. For adults.

Where: Carson Library, LACL

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 2 pm – 3 pm

Address: 151 E. Carson St., Carson, CA 90745

Website: https://visit.lacountylibrary.org/event/16127872

2026 Lit Fest in the Dena Event (Day 2 of 2), Events at 2:30 pm – 3:30 pm, at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

Food, Pop-ups, and vendors are also available.

See complete schedule at website.

EVENT SCHEDULE

2:30 pm – 3:30 pm

SOUTH HALL:

Shades and Shadows Presents: Imagine That!: Genre Fiction & The World That Could Be—Xach Fromson (moderator), Wesley Chu, John Jennings

FELLOWSHIP HALL:

When Myths & Facts Collide—Janet Wertman (moderator), Anne Louise Bannon, Jules Larimore

THE CHAPEL:

Speaking Truth to Power: Humanizing Immigrant Communities in the Time of ICE—Daniel Olivas, Lisa Alvarez, Adolfo Guzman-Lopez, Pedro Iniguez, Thomas E, Backer, PhD (moderator).

THE LIBRARY:

Breaking the Silence: Dismantling the Stigma of Childhood Sexual Assault Through Storytelling – Andrea Leeb, Leslie Johansen Nack, Anouska De Georgiou (moderator).

THE STUDY:

Stay Lit: with Cal Arts Alumni Poets – Sergio Hernandez (moderator), Daniel Baker Judd, Caroline Change, Rima Anosa, Laura Vena, Sara Finnerty Turgeon.

Where: Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Saturday the 2^nd(Day 2 of 2)

Time: 2:30 pm – 3:30 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

L.A. Book Launch: Carol V. Davis, with Lory Bedikian, & Hovering at Beyond Baroque – In-Person & Online Hybrid Event

Join us to hear Carol V. Davis present her new poetry collection, Hovering.

In her haunting new poetry collection, Hovering, Carol V. Davis explores how disease steals what makes us human. These poems explore what it means when language and memory uncouple like merry-go-round animals that break free and gallop off. Drawing on texts and traditions, the poems confront the reality of the void and the length of the journey. They delve into what is said, what is unsaid and what is lost by the people involved. These poems do not turn away, instead Davis courageously lifts dark moments to the light.

The author will be reading new and selected work with poet Lory Bedikian, author of Jagadakeer: Apology to the Body.

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

Where: Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center

Date: Saturday, the 2^nd

Time: 3 pm – 5 pm

Address: 681 Venice Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90291

Website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/la-book-launch-hovering-by-carol-v-davis-tickets-1987480855741

Saturday Afternoon Poetry: Poetry Writing Workshop led by DKC via Zoom – Online Zoom Event

Join us for a Poetry Writing Workshop led by DKC (Submit up to 3 poems totaling no more than 150 lines including the subject of or at least mentioning weather for Four Feathers Press online edition: FLOWER by emailing donkingfishercampbell@gmail.com by 11:59pm, May 15th)

Don Kingfisher Campbell hosts and curates these events.

Where: Saturday Afternoon Poetry, Online

Date: Saturday, the 2^nd

Time: 3 pm – 4:30 pm

Address: Online Zoom Event

Website: Saturday Afternoon Event Page

2026 Lit Fest in the Dena Event (Day 2 of 2), Events at 4 pm – 5 pm, at Pasadena Presbyterian Church – In-Person Event

Food, Pop-ups, and vendors are also available.

See complete schedule at website.

EVENT SCHEDULE

4 pm – 5 pm

SOUTH HALL:

Zepher Poets: A Conversation with Our Favorite Poets – Shahe Mankerian, Mary Angelino, Alene Terzian-Zeitounian, Armine Iknodossian (moderator), Arthur Kayzakian.

FELLOWSHIP HALL:

Sesentanera for Serros – Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo (moderator), Lucy Rodriguez-Hanley, Luivette Resto, Genesis Perez, Pam Ward.

THE CHAPEL:

Across Realms and Realities – Ophelia Wolf, Ryka Aoki, Sarah Gailey, Brandie June, Kathleen Kaufman (moderator).

THE LIBRARY:

Are Stories Beholden to Genre? – Carla Sameth, Noriko Nakuda, Melissa Chadburn, Sakae Manning (moderator).

THE STUDY:

Ripple Effect of Earning a Bachelor’s Degree in Prison – Dr. Tiffany Lim (moderator), Mario Guerra, Risala Rose-Aminifu, Jimmie Gilmer

Where: Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Date: Saturday the 2^nd(Day 2 of 2)

Time: 4 pm – 5 pm

Address: 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Ca 91101

Website: Lit Fest Schedule

PondWater Reading Series: Beth Marquez & Raquel Reyes-Lopez at Private Residence in Covina – In-Person Event

Join us every 1st Saturday of the month at 5 pm for the PondWater Society reading series hosted by Joanne Qualey Barnes. There will be wine and cheese, coffee and baked goods.

There will be breaks, in case you’ve come a long way, and need a break.

If you would like to stay for dinner, you are welcome. A $10.00 donation towards the dinner would be most appreciated.

Everyone is welcome, but you should probably know that this is not a child safe environment. This is a place to celebrate being adults. We’ve made it!

Beth Marquez has recent or upcoming publications in Lit Shark, Cathexis, October Hill, Spillway, Discretionary Love, and Cider Press Review. She is a Pushcart Prize nominee, a 2017 Pink Door Fellow, and holds three mathematics degrees. A freelance statistician and poet, she lost her Altadena home in the Eaton Fire of 2025 and has since been living in Highland Park, Los Angeles.

Raquel Reyes-Lopez is a first-generation Chicana poet whose work explores mental health, infertility, grief, and resilience. Her debut chapbook Born to Electrify was published by Sadie Girl Press. Her poetry appears in Rattle, Wild Roof Journal, and the San Diego Poetry Annual 2026, among others. with featured poets.

Where: PondWater Society

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 5 pm – 7 pm

Address: 16504 Masline St., Covina, CA

Website: Facebook Page

Monthly Open Mic with Reggie Peralta at LibroMobile, Santa Ana – In-Person Event

Join us every 1st Saturday of the month, 6 pm – 8 pm for our community open mic hosted by Santa Ana’s own Reggie Peralta!

Whether you’re a poet, musician, storyteller, or just here to listen, this space is for you. Step up to the mic or come support local voices!

RSVP

Where: LibroMobile, Santa Ana

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 6 pm – 8 pm

Address: 1150 S. Bristol St., #A3, Santa Ana, CA 92704

Website: https://www.libromobile.com/event-details/monthly-open-mic-with-reggie-peralta-1-2026-05-02-18-00

Space Stories XIII Open Mic Night at The Pop Hop – In-Person Event

Join us for Space Stories: Open Mic Night, a casual and fun space for performers, musicians, writers, poets, and artists to share their work! The show is produced and hosted by @thelemabean. Sign up to perform or buy tickets at: open_in_newmichellelema.com/spacestories

Produced and hosted by Midge Lema.

RSVP

Where: The Pop Hop Books

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 7 pm – 11:55 pm

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

Website: With Friends Page

Post MFA Blues Reading Event: Julia Ainey & Emerging Chapman Voices on the Mic at LibroMobile, Santa Ana – In-Person Event

Join us to celebrate with Julia Ainey, an MFA in Creative Writing candidate at Chapman University, joined by emerging Chapman voices on the Mic.

In partnership with & sponsored by The Frida Cinema & Downtown Santa Ana, we are hosting a series of 3 events.

Julia Ainley is an MFA Creative Writing candidate at Chapman University. She was honored as an Emerging Writer at the 2026 Literary Women’s Long Beach Festival of Authors. She’s from Fullerton, California and can be found haunting cafes throughout the OC.

Where: LibroMobile Stage in the Downtown artist Village

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

Time: 7:30 pm – 8:30 pm

Address: Downtown Artist Stage @Sycamore in Santa Ana, CA 92704

Website: https://www.libromobile.com/event-details/post-mfa-blues-a-live-reading-1st-saturday-artwalk

The Griot Café with Tommy Domino at Shades of Afrika, Long Beach – In-Person Event

Join host Tommy Domino for The Griot Café, which is held every 1^st Saturday of the month inside Shades of Afrika, Long Beach.

Enjoy open mic, spoken word, music and poetry.

Music vibes: DJ PW

$10 cash only

Where: Shades of Afrika, Long Beach

Date: Saturday the 2^nd

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

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

Website: Instagram Page

Creative Journaling Workshop with Amelie Haru at Bal Canto Bookstore, Long Beach – In-Person Event

Have you been curious about watercolor but aren’t quite sure where to begin? Maybe you’re returning after some time away, or simply looking for a relaxed, low-pressure way to paint. Join Amelia Haru at KUBO LB for a beginner-friendly workshop that offers a gentle introduction to watercolor. Learn more and RSVP!

Where: Bel Canto Books, KUBO LB

Date: Sunday the 3^rd

Time: 11 am – 3 pm

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

Website: https://belcantobooks.net/events

OC Poet Laureate Office Hours at LibroMobile – In-Person Event

OC Poet Laureate Gustavo Hernandez will hold office hours on a quarterly basis at Libromobile. Next Office hours will be held at 12 pm – 2 pm on May 3, 2026.

Where: LibroMobile

Date: Sunday the 3^rd

Time: 12 pm – 2 pm

Address: 1150 S. Bristol St. A3, Santa Ana, CA 92704

Website: https://www.libromobile.com/event-details/oc-poet-laureate-office-hours-with-gustavo-hernandez-2026-05-03-12-00

Poetry Event: Suzanne Lummis & Crime Wave, with feature Elisabeth Adwin Edwards at Avenue 50 Studio, Highland Park – In-Person Event

Avenue 50 Studio, in collaboration with Pop Hop Bookshop, is thrilled to host an afternoon of poetry with Suzanne Lummis, one of L.A.’s defining voices in poem noir. She’ll be reading from Crime Wave, her fourth collection named one of Literary Hub’s 100 Notable Small Press Books of 2025, followed by a book signing. 🖤📖

Opening the event is Highland Park’s own Elisabeth Adwin Edwards, an accomplished poet whose work has appeared in The Tampa Review, CALYX, and beyond.

Don’t miss it.

Where: Avenue 50 Studio (with Pop Hop)

Date: Sunday the 2^nd

Time: 2 pm – 4 pm

Address: 3714 N. Figueroa St., Highland Park, CA 90065

Website: Instagram Page

Poetry in the Park with Solange Aguilar & Red Like Earth at Chumash Indian Museum – In-Person Event

Join us for an outdoor reading from Solange Aguilar’s debut collection Red Like Earth. Experience Aguilar’s raw and dynamic storytelling, learn more about their creative process, and get your very own signed copy of Red Like Earth.

RSVP $10

Where: Chumash Indian Museum

Date: Sunday the 26^th

Time: 3 pm

Address: 3290 Lang Ranch Parkway, Thousand Oaks, CA 91362

Website: https://www.chumashmuseum.org/event-details/poetry-in-the-park

Constance Meyer & Plays Well With Others at Diesel, A Bookstore – In-Person Event

Constance Meyer will present and discuss Plays Well With Others.

Step backstage into the hidden world of the orchestra with Plays Well With Others, a captivating collection of essays by Hollywood session violinist Constance Meyer. With wit, warmth, and the keen eye of an insider, Meyer shines a spotlight on the unsung heroes of classical and studio music—the tuba players, percussionists, violists, and countless others whose artistry forms the backbone of every performance, yet whose stories are rarely told.

Constance Meyer is a native New Yorker living in Los Angeles. Constance comes from a long line of musicians and writers. As a violinist, she freelanced for over thirty years playing on films and in opera, ballet, and symphony orchestras. She wrote for The Sunday Los Angeles Times Calendar for several years and has written all her life. Plays Well with Others is her first book.

Where: Diesel, A Bookstore

Date: Sunday the 26^th

Time: 3 pm

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

Website: https://dieselbookstore.com/event/2026-05-03/constance-meyer-plays-well-others

Writers Group at North Figueroa Bookshop – In-Person Event

Bring paper and a pen, bring your laptop, bring a prompt to share, bring a project to work on or just come prepared to free write among other writers, and perhaps exchange projects and feedback!

Where: North Figueroa Bookshop

Date: Sunday the 3^rd

Time: 4:30 pm – closing

Address: 6040 N. Figuweroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90042

Website: https://northfigbookshop.com/event/#calendar-8a0f87f617d6-4f10-9815-04df4c8251ba-event-mabtzxoz-1777851000000

Celebrate Sunday Jump’s Open Mic Series’ 14^th Anniversary at Pilipino Workers Center – In-Person Event

Welcome to our 14th season of Sunday Jump! Join us in Historic Filipinotown, Los Angeles in the Pabelonia Community Sisters Room on the first floor of @pwcsc every first Sunday of the Month until November. Open mic sign-ups start at 4:30 pm and the event will be 5 pm – 7 pm.

Arrive early to get a taste of all the action, good eats, support local businesses, and sign up for a chance to get on stage. Streaming every show live on Twitch and YouTube – link in bio!

This year our seasonal theme is: Heat Rising 🔥

Heat is a powerful form of energy, vital for survival. It is supplied from the sun, the stove for a home-cooked meal, the hugs we give each other, redistributed through touch and connection. It is light, warmth, and care in times of turmoil. It can be found in the fire ignited within ourselves. Fire can burst into chaos, a symbol for uprisings and revolution, but also renewal. It rises and inspires change. It can also burn out and in the aftermath, allow growth and new life to emerge.

Each month, we will have a connecting theme regarding heat and just like us, whether individually or together – the different processes it may go through to rise up.

Performance feature: Elmer Abapo is a Filipino-American singer, songwriter, and producer based in Los Angeles, known for blending ’90s-inspired R&B, hip-hop, and soul. Formerly based in Las Vegas and with a background in architecture, he transitioned to full-time music to create intimate, storytelling-driven tracks that explore identity and ambition.

Chinese American Museum is in the Community Spotlight.

See website link for more details.

Where: Pilipino Workers Center

Date: Sunday the 3^rd

Time: 5 pm – 7 pm

Address:153 Glendale Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90026

Website: Instagram Page

May 2026 Queer Romance Book Club: Late Night at the Telegraph Club at The Ripped Bodice – In-Person Event

Bookseller Elizabeth leads our Queer Romance Book Club. The meeting is the 1st Sunday of the month at 7:15 pm.

Participants will discuss Late Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo.

No membership is necessary, but RSVP is required.

Where: The Ripped Bodice

Date: Sunday the 3^rd

Time: 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm

Address: 3806 Main St., Culver City, CA 90232

Website: https://www.therippedbodice.com/events-and-tickets

May 2026 Dazed and Confused Poetry Club at The Glendale Room – In-Person Event

Join host Fernado Funes for the Dazes and Confused Poetry Club every 1^st Sunday of the month.

Features TBA

Where: The Glendale Room

Date: Sunday the 3^rd

Time: 8:30 pm

Address: 127 Artsakh Ave., Glendale, CA 91206

Website: https://www.theglendaleroom.com/calendar

Los Angeles Literature

Online magazine covering L.A.'s vast literary community.

Los Angeles Literature Events: 4/27/26 – 5/03/26

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