By Jill Leovy

From: The Los Angeles Times

Now we’re talking.

This is the refrain that leaps to mind after plunging into John Mack Faragher’s “Eternity Street” — and it is a plunge. Think of every Western movie you’ve ever watched, then consider: The darkest of them are soft, pink cotton candy compared to what actually occurred in lawless frontier towns such as Los Angeles.

But Faragher’s fascinating account of the twisted threads of murder, ethnic violence and mob justice in 19th century Southern California is not just a treat for L.A. history buffs. His book is also is on point.

Unlike so many chronicles of violence, it gets to the right question: Why do people get murdered — certain people, that is, at certain times, in certain ways?

Notice, the question is not why do people commit murder? That is a little like asking why people lust, hate and covet — and why they seek to prevail.

Because they do. Because they can.

Continue reading “Frontier justice was brutal in Los Angeles, and ‘Eternity Street’ gets to the heart of the matter”

by Nita Lelyveld

From: L.A. Times

The Green Poets of Venice appreciate the power in a pause.

They save space in their lives to contemplate. They write. Each week they meet to share the carefully chosen words they’ve distilled from their thoughts and experiences.

Now in its 14th year, their poetry workshop started in an adult education class at Santa Monica College. The students, while learning about great poems, were encouraged to write their own. Since it was new to them, instructor Bill Robertson labeled them “green.”

When the class was cut, Robertson continued guiding his poets for free. When he retired to Florida, they kept at it without him.

Continue reading “What the Green Poets of Venice reveal when they meet each Tuesday”

Open Mic Poetry Night

In celebration of World Poetry Day, we invite you to join us to listen or take turns at the microphone to read, recite and/or perform one poem at a time. Contact Silvia Cisneros at 310-458-8684 with any questions.

Where: Pico Branch, SMPL

Date: Monday the 21^st

Time: 6 pm – 7 pm

Address: 2201 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90405

Website: http://calendar.smgov.net/library/eventsignup.asp?ID=20097

Continue reading “Los Angeles Literature Events 3/21/16 – 3/27/16”

From: Labloga.com

by Michael Sedano

Billing themselves as Las Lunas Locas, thirty women from Los Angeles begin a caravan Thursday, driving from Los Angeles to San Francisco to launch a four-city poetry tour with readings also in Sacramento, Oakland, and Fresno.

Save the date! If you’re in the neighborhood, the readings will offer memorable work in a unique peripatetic ambiente.

Continue reading “Poetry Road Trip: 30 Poets, Four Cities, This Week”

Review by John Venegas

From: Angel City Review

 

Bear with me for a moment.

Have you ever been in group therapy? Group therapy has a stigma, partially deserved and largely undeserved, for being this boring, sad assemblage of people half-whispering self-help mantras or trying to find their collective “happy places”. But do you know what the real purpose of group therapy is? Empathy. In moments of depression and confusion, it is almost impossible not to feel an intense abandonment and persecution, as if the insanity of the world has turned its whimsical focus on you and you alone. Group therapy is meant to reveal to the individual seeking help that they are much more than just an individual; to lift the veil blocking out light and sound and connection with other people, many of whom are experiencing eerily similar pain and perceived isolation.

Continue reading “The Sky Isn’t Blue”