Los Angeles is home to many literary publications. Online and print journals abound. Even a nationally renown book review. This includes several journals with esteemed history. They publish Los Angeles writers, California writers, and writers from around the country and the world. Check them out. See what Los Angeles’ wordsmiths are up to. Fall in love and support the work these journals and reviews publish by subscribing or by making a charitable donation.

Air/Light

About: Air/Light is an online literary journal published by the English Department at the University of Southern California. We showcase both traditional and innovative works. They are firmly of the West Coast, but also national, international. They mean to look out expansively from this place rather than to gaze narrowly back at it, to express a West Coast aesthetic, a West Coast sensibility, and direct that lens onto the world.

Their intention is to be an artist’s journal—a place where poets and essayists and fiction writers and multimedia creators can all bring work that doesn’t fit inside boxes, that pushes boundaries, that speaks directly to some essential question or concern. A place where artists can experiment, or choose, willfully, not to experiment. A place where they can publish defining work alongside other artists pursuing the same.

Founded: 2020
Genres Published: Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Hybrid, Multimedia
Subgenres: Short Stories, Flash Fiction, Critical Essays, Memoir, Reportage, Travel Writing, Conversations, Diary
Representative Authors: Bridgette Bianca, Alex Espinoza, Jesenia Chávez, Hari Kunzru and Lynell George
Published: Semiannual
Website: https://airlightmagazine.org/

Altadena Poetry Review

About: Altadena Poetry Review is an annual print anthology that showcases poetry from a diverse range of voices, particularly from the Altadena, Pasadena, and greater Los Angeles area. It is affiliated with the Altadena Library District and was born out of a local poetry reading series called Poetry & Cookies. Over time, it grew into a formal publication under the Library District’s Poet Laureate program.

The Review publishes work from both established and emerging poets, including local writers, past Poets Laureate, and nationally recognized contributors. Its mission emphasizes inclusivity, celebrating underrepresented voices across age, cultural background, and life experience. Beyond publishing, the Review fosters community through readings, workshops, and public events, making it a cornerstone of Altadena’s literary scene.

Founded: 2015
Genres Published: Poetry
Representative Authors: James Coats, Luivette Resto, Pam Ward, Gerda Govine Ituarte and Tom Laichas.
Published: Annually
Website: https://altadenapoetryreview.com/

Angel City Review

About: Angel City Review is a literary journal that is committed to bringing the cutting edge in fiction and poetry to a modern audience. They aim to present a diverse range of both writers and genres that run the gamut from experimental narratives to grittier fiction with a literary air. They are neither afraid of, nor do we stick to, any particular style of writing. Every issue will feature a couple of more established writers; however Their main goal is to provide an outlet for new and emerging authors with an emphasis on writers based in Los Angeles. The majority of the pages will be filled with work by authors who may be new to you and quite possibly are appearing in print for the first time.

Founded: 2014
Genres Published: Fiction, Nonfiction and Poetry
Subgenres: Flash Fiction
Representative Authors: Iris De Anda, F. Douglas Brown and Dan Fante.
Published: Quarterly
Website: http://www.angelcityreview.com/

Exposition Review

About: Exposition Review is an independent, multi-genre literary journal that publishes narratives by new, emerging, and established writers in the genres of fiction, flash fiction, nonfiction, poetry, scripts for stage & screen, film, experimental narratives, visual art, and comics.

Exposition Review is also dedicated to creating opportunities for writers and artists to share their voices through our annual issue, Flash 405 contests, and #ExpoPresents events, which include staged readings, panels, and our signature micro-workshops in locations throughout Southern California (and beyond). We develop new projects and events to benefit the Los Angeles literary community and also publish the podcast Transposition and the Expo Blog.

Founded: 2016
Genres Published: Poetry, Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, scrips, visual art and comics
Subgenres: Flash Fiction, experimental narratives
Representative Authors: William Deverell, Sonia Greenfield, Claudia Rankine, Aimee Bender, Lynda V.E. Crawford, Georgia San Li, Dare Williams, Amanda Fletcher.
Website: https://expositionreview.com/

Faultline

About: Started by founding editor Alyn Warren, Faultline is UC Irvine’s Pushcart prize-winning journal. Housed in UC Irvine’s Department of English and produced by the graduate students of the Programs in Writing, Faultline features the work of emerging and established writers from the U.S. and abroad. The journal publishes new poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, translations, and art in an annual spring issue.

Founded: 1992
Genres Published: Poetry, Fiction, Creative No fiction
Subgenres: Autobiography/Memoir, Cross-genre, Humor, Narrative Nonfiction, Literary Fiction
Representative Authors: Michelle Latilolais, Kazim Ali, David Hernandez, Adam Johnson, David Shields, Tony Barnstone, William Giraldi, Geoffrey Wolff, C.K. Williams, Steve Almond, Ander Monson.
Website: http://faultline.sites.uci.edu/

Hinchas de Poesía

About: Hinchas de Poesía is a digital codex of contemporary Pan-American writing. It publishes fiction, poetry, and prose of authors from América; therefore, if you are from America, and write poetry, fiction, or criticism on elements of the transcontinental diaspora of América, then we invite you to submit your work. In terms of taste and content Hinchas de Poesía believes the content to be the medium. To that end, we publish innovative, experimental work of a devastating caliber, regardless of format or dialect.

Founded: 2009
Genres Published: Poetry, Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Book Reviews, Translation, Artwork
Representative Authors: Luivette Resto, Ptricia Engle, Jessica Ceballos, Cynthia Hogue, Luis Rodriguez, José-Luis Orozco, Thelma T. Reyna, Kurt Mueller, Daniel Hedges
Published: Three times a year (March/April; June/July and November/December)
Formats: Web literary magazine
Website: http://www.hinchasdepoesia.com/wp/

Lit Angels

About: An online literary journal of carefully curated lyrical & witty, light & dark, magical & gritty, dreamy & informative writing—to inspire to delight, connect—to make you laugh and think. It’s edited by Francesca Lia Block and Linda Davis.

Founded: N/A
Genres Published: Fiction, Nonfiction and Poetry
Subgenres: Short Fiction, Novel Excerpts and Essays
Representative Authors: Anna Dorn, Carol Potter and Sarah Sunfire
Published: Once a month
Website: http://www.francescaliablock.com/subscribe

LiveWire

About: LiveWire is a literary arts journal, a publication of the Humanities Division at Fullerton College. Their motto is “a voice for everyone,” and their mission is to create a magazine that truly reflects this, as they continue to provide a space for intersectional voices to be heard and celebrated. The journal’s goal is to create publish a magazine that reflects our society while also increasing engagement with creative writing and the artistic community in and around the Fullerton College campus.

Founded: c. 2014
Genres Published: Poetry, creative nonfiction, fiction, critical essays and art.
Representative Authors: Andréz Sanchez, Olivia Lee, Duha Maher Nabulsi, Jeremy Hsiao, Ravina Wadhwani and Sophie Rivera.
Published: Annually
Website: http://www.lwjournal.fullcoll.edu

Los Angeles Review

About: The Los Angeles Review, published by Red Hen Press, is the voice of Los Angeles, and the voice of the nation. With its multitude of cultures, Los Angeles roils at the center of the cauldron of divergent literature emerging from the West Coast. Perhaps from this place something can emerge that speaks to the writer or singer or dancer or wild person in all of us, something disturbing, something alive, something of the possibility of what it could be to be human in the 21st century. They invite both published and emerging writers to submit their work to our editors.

Founded: 2003
Genres Published: Poetry, Fiction, Creative Nonfiction
Representative Authors: Michael Czyzniejewski, Alberto Rios, Terrance Hayes, Lydia Davis, Dana Gioia, Steve Almond, Lucia Perillo, Tess Gallagher, Brian Doyle, Barry Lopez, Wanda Coleman, Judy Grahn, David Wagoner, Natalie Goldberg, Brenda Miller.
Published: Semi-annually
Website: https://losangelesreview.org/

Los Angeles Review of Books

About:  The Los Angeles Review of Books is a nonprofit, multimedia literary and cultural arts magazine that combines the great American tradition of the serious book review with the evolving technologies of the Web. We are a community of writers, critics, journalists, artists, filmmakers, and scholars dedicated to promoting and disseminating the best that is thought and written, with an enduring commitment to the intellectual rigor, the incisiveness, and the power of the written word.

Founded: 2011
Genres Published: Book Reviews, Essays, Journalism, Editorials.
Representative Authors: John Rechy, Mike Davis, T.C. Boyle, Janet Fitch, Diana Wagman, Chris Abani, Yiyun Li, Jane Smiley, and Jonathan Lethem.
Published: Daily
Website: http://lareviewofbooks.org/

Los Angeles Review of Books Quarterly Journal

About: The LARB Quarterly Journal is a testament to the fact that print is still thriving as readers continue to have a profound appetite for curated, edited, smart and fun opinion, written by the best writers and thinkers of our time. We’ve carefully selected these articles, poems, interviews and essays—all written exclusively for this publication—for readers of just about any interest.

Founded: 2013
Genres Published: Articles, Poems, Interviews, Essays.
Subgenres: Experimental
Representative Authors: Amy Gerstler, Tom Bissell, Alex Espinosa, Douglas Kearney, Kim Barns, Susan Straight, Laila Lalami, Francesca Lia Block, Daniel Olivas and Francine J. Harris.
Published: Quarterly
Website: https://lareviewofbooks.org/editions/qj/

Lunch Ticket

About: Lunch Ticket is Antioch University MFA program’s student and alumni-run literary magazine. Established in 2012, the name Lunch Ticket pays homage to Antioch University’s focus on issues that affect the working class and underserved communities. Lunch Ticket publishes weekly blog posts and columns, including Amuse-Bouche and Midnight Snack, and bi-annual issues featuring poetry, creative nonfiction, fiction, flash prose, literary translation, writing for young people, visual art, and feature interviews.

They publish work that upholds the vision and values of the Antioch MFA program. They aim to center writers and artists who have been marginalized and underrepresented, or historically misrepresented, and encourage submissions that engage with issues of racial, social, economic, gender, and environmental justice. Their teams read and look for work that plays with form and strives for a more just world.

Founded: 2012
Genres Published: Poetry, Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, author interviews
Representative Authors: Katie Manning, Anna Wang, Paige Lewis, María José Giménez, Yxta Maya Murray, Derrick C. Brown, Danez Smith and Rebecca Burke.
Published: Semi-annually
Formats: Web literary magazine
Website: http://www.lunchticket.org

MORIA

About: MORIA is a national literary magazine with an all-student editorial board, based at Woodbury University in the hills just north of downtown Los Angeles. We accept poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction from emerging and established writers in the United States and across the world. The undergraduates who serve as editors and managers of the magazine participate in an official course on campus, during which they learn the fundamentals of producing an online literary journal with a professional focus. We publish twice-a-year, in late spring and in late fall.

Founded: 2017
Genres Published: Poetry, Short Fiction and Essays
Representative Authors: Brendan Constantine, Suzanne Lummis, Désirée Zamorano, Lynne Thompson and Karen An-hwei Lee.
Published: Bi-Annually
Formats: Web literary magazine
Website: https://www.moriaonline.com/

The Northridge Review

About: The Northridge Review is a literary & arts journal of the present, produced by students in the creative writing program at California State University, Northridge. Founded as a campus publication of student work, The Northridge Review publishes prose, poetry, drama, art, and hybrid texts from across all disciplines that test the boundaries of form, content, and genre by exploring the current literary and cultural climate in thoughtful and challenging ways. NOTE: Publishes only the work of students, staff, and alumni of CSUN alongside work from the greater Los Angeles area.

Founded: 1962
Genres Published: Prose, Poetry, Drama, Art, Hybrid Text.
Representative Authors: James Jenson, Alex Trinidad, Jen McCellan, Jeremy R. Quintero, Asia Williams.
Published: Annually
Website: https://www.csun.edu/humanities/english/northridge-review

Pomona Valley Review

About: PVR is an online, annual liberal arts journal which publishes short fiction, poetry, and art on a selective basis by new and established authors. All unsolicited manuscripts are considered equally for publication, and new, original, and provocative work which challenges traditional literary paradigms is desired. Subscription to their online publication is free, as they are a nonprofit organization. Electronic submissions are accepted for the convenience of you and their editors. PVR hopes you enjoy our art and prose and help build the community by submitting your own.

Founded: 2002
Genres Published: Poetry, Prose.
Representative Authors: J.D. Asher, Alex Brondarbit, Jeff Carr, Laila Shikak, Jill Jacobs, Lana Bella, Kevin  Brown.
Published: Annually
Website: https://www.pomonavalleyreview.com/

Prism Review

About: Since 2008, Prism Review has annually published contemporary poetry and fiction from both national and international authors, choosing the best 20 or so pieces from the thousand-plus submissions we read each year. We also sponsor prizes in fiction and poetry judged by highly respected contemporary writers. Unlike many journals, our staff (save for a faculty advisor/editor) is entirely made up of undergraduate Creative Writing students here at the University of La Verne — please be impressed by their hard work and excellent taste in literature. Alongside literary works, Prism Review also publishes interviews and reviews with emerging contemporary authors. We’ve interviewed notable poets and fiction writers, including Michelle Detorie, Josh Kryah, Nathan Hoks, Craig Santos Perez, Lucy Corin, Josh Emmons, and Michael Jaime-Becerra.

Founded: 2008
Genres Published: Poetry, Short Fiction, Art.
Representative Authors: Michelle Detorie, Guadalupe Robles, Michael Jaime-Becerra, Rich Ives, Dan Moreau, Lisa Markowitz, Brandon Som.
Published: Annually
Website: https://artsci.laverne.edu/creative-writing/prism-review/

Rattle

About: Rattle’s mission is to promote the practice of poetry. Their goal is to promote a community of active poets. Every poem they publish starts in their “slush pile,” and has to rise through the same process of careful consideration. If they like your poem better than the Poet Laureate’s, they”ll publish yours. That’s what makes Rattle so readable. Each issue is roughly one hundred pages.

Founded: 1995
Genres Published: Poetry
Representative Authors: Suzanne Lummis, David Hernandez, Wanda Coleman, Christopher Buckley, Lucille Clifton, Patricia Smith, Terrance Hayes, Ron Koertge.
Published: Quarterly
Website: http://www.rattle.com/poetry/

RESURRECTION mag

About: L.Á. poet Ingrid M. Calderón-Collins runs a literary magazine called “RESURRECTION mag” where she encourages poets and photographers to show the world their broken and their healed. They don’t want to write an extensive description about their “expectations” or “desired aesthetic,” because they think it limits the space in which an artist creates when things are spelled out.

Founded: 2020
Genres Published: Poetry and Photography
Representative Authors: Karo Ska, Jen Hitchcock, Naomi E. Cornejo, Manuel Chavarria, Mauricio Moreno and Monique Quintana.
Published: N/A
Website: https://resurrectionmag.com/

Riprap Journal

About: Rip Rap is a literary journal designed and produced annually by students in the Master of Fine Arts, Creative Writing program at California State University Long Beach (CSULB). Rip Rap highlights new and emerging writers from across the country as well as enlightening interviews of award winning, published writers who are featured in the CSULB English Department’s Visiting Writers Series.

Founded: 1951
Genres Reviewed: Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Poetry, Artwork
Representative Authors: Gerald Locklin, Suzanne Lummis, Bill Mohr, Rafael Zepeda, Theresa Baxter and Lauren Green.
Published: Annually
Website: http://www.rattle.com/poetry/

Santa Ana River Review

About: The UC Riverside MFA Program launched their literary magazine, Crate , as a print journal in 2005. The name was chosen as a nod to the orange groves that are plentiful in the area as well as around campus and the crates the oranges are shipped in, but by 2012 the magazine had moved online, and by 2015, the significance behind the name was a mystery to everyone except for long-time faculty member Susan Straight.

Founded: 2005
Genres Published: Poetry, Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Visual Art
Subgenres: Short Story, Noevl Excerpt, Essay, Narrative Non Fiction
Representative Authors: Lyn Stevens, Brian Sonia-Wallace, Fatima Siraj, Monique Quintana, Duane Locke, Kara Wang, Andre Yang.
Published: Biannually
Website: https://sarreview.ucr.edu

Santa Monica Review

About: Founded by Jim Krusoe, Santa Monica Review is a nationally distributed literary arts journal sponsored by Santa Monica College. The journal focuses on Southern California and Pacific Rim writers, both emerging and well known.

Founded: 1988
Genres Published: Fiction, Creative Nonfiction
Representative Authors: Jim Krusoe, Diane Lefer, Gary Amdahl, Janice Shapiro, David L. Ulin, Victoria Patterson, Ron Carlson, Judith Freeman.
Published: Semi-annually
Website: https://www.smc.edu/sm-review/index.html

sin cesar

About: sin cesar (formerly Dryland) is an independent print literary journal from South Central Los Angeles established in 2015. We seek to publish the best in Black and Brown poetry, fiction, and non-fiction from established, emerging, and never-before-published writers around the world.

sin cesar started in 2015 on the internet. They went into print in 2016 (Issue 6) under Ponte Las Pilas Press. They are an independent literary journal (not a nonprofit) and plan to stay that way.

Founded: 2015
Genres Published: Poetry, Fiction, Creative Nonfiction
Subgenres: Flash Fiction, Essay, Narrative Nonfiction
Representative Authors: Nikolia Garcia, Vickie Vértiz, Luviette Resto, Ingrid Calderón-Collins, Erika Ayón, Tanya Ko Hong, Billy Burgos.
Website: https://drylandla.wordpress.com/

Spectrum

About: Spectrum is a poetry journal associated with Saturday Afternoon Poetry, a poetry event series that holds a different poetry event each Saturday in Pasadena, California. The journal primarily publishes local L.A. poets, but are open to publishing poets from around the world. Spectrum also occasionally publishes separate special issues.

Founded: N/A
Genres Published: Poetry
Representative Authors: Jackie Chou, Beverley M. Collins, Seven Dhar, Thelma T. Reyna, Don Kingfisher Campbell, Khadija Anderson and Jack G. bowman.
Published: Quarterly
Website: http://spectrumpublishing.blogspot.com/

Spillway

About: Spillway is an annual publication of Tebot Bach, presenting poetry, reviews and articles. Published each summer, the magazine presents emerging and established poets of regional, national and international interest. Poems from Spillway have been featured on Poetry Daily and Verse Daily and in recent years poems published in the maggazine have been awarded Pushcart Prizes. The current editors are Ventura County poets Marsha de la O and Phil Taggart.

Founded: 1993
Genres Published: Poetry, Reviews and Articles.
Representative Authors: David St. John, Marsha de la O, Ángel Garcia, Chad Sweeney, Ilya Kaminsky, Kwame Dawes, Amy Uyematsu, Lynn Thompson and David Campos.
Published: Annually
Website: http://www.spillway.org/index.html

Statement Magazine

About: Statement Magazine is California State University, Los Angeles’s student-run journal of literature and art. Students gain valuable professional and educational experience by assuming responsibility for all aspects of producing this magazine and learning many new skills. Major national and international writers and artists appear in its pages alongside talented creative students, many of whom have gone on to become highly respected figures themselves.

Founded: 1950
Genres Published: Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Poetry
Representative Authors: Rita Dove, Eloise Klein Healy, Wanda Coleman, Charles Bukowski, Luis Rodriguez, Carolyn See and Sesshu Foster.
Published: Annual
Website: http://www.calstatela.edu/statementonline