Once again there will be no list of local literary events this week. Don’t worry, the list will return next week.
However, there are at least 62 new and used independent bookstores in Greater Los Ángeles, from The Open Book in Simi Valley to Arvida Book Co. in Tustin, from Small World Books on the Venice Boardwalk to Get Lit Books and Things in Moreno Valley, and everywhere in between. Many of these bookstores serve as a lifeline for the local literary community, hosting readings and open mics led by local poets and writers and bringing the voices of the literary community into the neighborhoods where these bookstores are located.
These bookstores include three radical, political bookstores: Page Against the Machine (Long Beach), All Power Books (West Adams District-LÁ), and Midnight Books (Downtown LÁ).
Page Against the Machine is owned and run by Chris Giaco, located somewhat off the beaten path at 2714 E. 4th St., Long Beach, CA 90814. Opened in 2019, the store was the result of Giaco combining his love of books and politics, after he began selling books while working in bookshops and at large chains to help pay his tuition in college.
It’s become a communal space not only for the local literary community, but for the wider community at large, where people can come together to discuss politics and discover political and activist literature. And every second Thursday of the month, except for the summer, Page Against the Machine hosts the open mic Trenches Full of Poets. Hosted by poets Nikolai Garcia and Mauricio Moreno, it has a Latinx bent, while being a safe space where all writers are able to share their unique voices and perspectives, especially for the writers and poets of color to speak their truths.
There are also the Black-owned bookstores: Malik’s Books (Baldwin-Hills Crenshaw Mall and Westfield-Culver City Mall); Octavia’s Bookshelf (Pasadena); Reparations Club (Crenshaw District); Get Lit Books and Things (Moreno Valley); and Lore (Leimert Park).
Reparations Club opened in 2019, founded and owned by Jazzi McGilbert. She opened it as a space for Black Angelenos made by Black people, to celebrate the Black experience, as its shelves of Black authors indicate. They host readings celebrating queer Black writers, Black poets, supporting local Black writers and amplifying overlooked voices. It’s a bookstore where conversations sprout up naturally between customers and employees, often intellectual, but always warm.
McGilbert was a bookish kid and an introvert and opening Reparations Club helped her to tap back into that side of herself. To “get back to this childlike energy that I had for reading,” she said in a 2022 interview for Image, the style and culture magazine from the LA Times.
Reparations Club is not hard to find. Its building sits on the corner of busy Jefferson Blvd. and Victoria Ave., a residential side street where it gets its address: 3054 S. Victoria Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90016. However, it’s a bit off the beaten path, as this stretch of Jefferson near the store is a mix of heavy commercial and light industrial, including storage, service businesses and creative/production studios, interspersed with retail, making it a surprise to find a bookstore nestled amongst this nondescript corridor.
There are also other independent bookstores that center the stories of different communities of color, that also host events. These include the Latinx bookstores Tía Chucha’s Centro Cultural and Bookstore (Sylmar), The Libros (Lincoln Heights-LÁ), LibroMobile (Santa Ana), and Casita Bookstore (Long Beach). Plus, the Filipino owned bookstore Bel Canto Books (Long Beach) and the Palestinian bookstore Watermelon Books (West Adams District-LÁ).
Among these bookstores, LibroMobile, part of the LibroMobile Art Cooperative (LMAC), from time to time, hosts readings, a monthly open mic, and office hours for the Orange County Poet Laurate one Sunday a month. They also host the yearly literary festival, LibroMobile’s Weekend Litfest.
LMAC is a small, hybrid nonprofit established in 2016 by local author Sarah Rafael Garcia in her hometown of Santa Ana, California, the county seat of Orange County. It began as a curbside vendor selling books and hosting workshops and literary readings through partnerships with established art spaces and local businesses. Garcia started the art cooperative, at the time, because there weren’t any bookstores in Santa Ana, a city whose population was, and still is, three-quarters Latinx.
Garcia wanted to serve her community by providing space, as its mission statement says, to “empower artists of color and [to] culturally enrich residents in Orange County.” Its foundation is build on “anti-gentrification movement culture” and continues to cultivate “diversity through literature and the arts by prioritizing Black, Indigenous, people of color” and LGBTQIA+ writers and artists and by “integrating free reading and writing programs, visual exhibits, and year-round creative workshops” when possible.
Plus, Garcia works to ensure that writers and artists are paid because she recognizes the value of their creative labor and how it helps sustain the local arts community, particularly local artists and writers of color.
LibroMobile is located in a bustling strip mall in southwest Santa Ana, surrounded by businesses that cater to the city’s Latinx population, including Northgate Market and the Bristol Swap Meet. Some businesses even display signs that are written in both English and Spanish. And the Bristol Swap Meet takes its name from Bristol Street, the major north-south commercial corridor that runs alongside it and is particularly important to west and south Santa Ana.
There are many other independent bookstores in Greater Los Ángeles that have been community staples for decades, hosting literary events or providing space for children to explore and fall in love with literature. There are others that opened their doors because a particular community lacked adequate access to literature. To fill a void.
The oldest is Vroman’s, located in Pasadena’s Playhouse District at 695 E. Colorado Boulevard. Founded in 1894 by Adam Clark Vroman, it opened as Vroman’s Book and Photographic Supply at 60 E. Colorado St. Today, Vroman’s hosts hundreds of events a year, including children’s story times, craft classes and book launch parties.
Book Soup was founded in 1975 by Glenn Goldman and David Mackler on Sunset Boulevard. Located at 8818 Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood, the store is popular with many in the entertainment industry. The store hosts many readings featuring celebrity authors including Annie Leibovitz, The Doors and Howard Stern.
Once Upon a Time is a children’s bookstore founded in 1966 by local mom and artist Jane Humphrey. When Humphrey retired in 2003, the Palacios family purchased the store after nobody else showed interest in buying it, not wanting Montrose to lose a community staple. In 2008, Publisher’s Weekly announced it was the country’s oldest children’s bookstore. On the about section of the store’s website, they say, “We pride ourselves on our recommendations, events, and activities that have built community and kept families coming back to us for generations.”
These bookstores, along with the others among the approximately 62 new and used bookstores throughout Greater Los Ángeles, are more than just places to buy books. They provide spaces for people to gather, engage in community, share stories and discover new and local writers. These include: Underdog Bookstore in Monrovia, an LGBTQIA+ bookstore that opened in 2023; Heartbound, a romance bookstore in Anaheim founded in 2023; and Cellar Door Books in Riverside that opened in 2012, the city’s only independent bookstore selling new books. They all help make sure there is a safe place for people to connect with the many stories and voices that make up Greater Los Ángeles and beyond.
Los Angeles Literature 