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SHAWNA KENNEY & DITO MONTIEL |
Saturday, September 6 at 5:00 p.m.
Life in LA LA
Montiel and Kenney celebrate the release of respective books about life in Los Angeles.
 Kenney's coffeetable book Imposters (Mark Batty Publisher) exposes the underbelly of Hollywood Boulevard's celebrity impersonators, while Montiel's novel, Eddie Krumble is the Clapper (Da Capo Press), follows a professional paid audience member and friends through their money-scamming lives.
Kenney is the author of the Firecracker Alternative Award-winning, internationally published memoir I Was a Teenage Dominatrix, penned the "punk LA" chapter of the Underground Guide to Los Angeles and appears in Etiquette for Outlaws , Let Fury Have the Hour: The Punk Rock Politics of Joe Strummer , and Putting Your Passion Into Print.
Author, screenwriter, director and musician Montiel came into the public eye after the breakup of his hardcore punk band Major Conflict and later when Geffen Records signed his newly formed outfit Gutterboy to a $1 million record deal - an unheard of sum at the time. The band was dropped after its debut and was dubbed one of the most "successful" unsuccessful bands in rock history.
His memoir, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, detailed his life growing during the rise of the hardcore punk scene. Its filmic version (starring Robert Downey Jr., Dianne Wiest and Shia LaBeouf) earned Montiel the Sundance Director's Award. Montiel released the self-titled album Dito Montiel through Rhino Records. He is filming a movie, Fighting.
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IRIS BERRY, PLEASANT GEHMAN,
S.A. GRIFFIN |
Sunday, September 7 at 5:00 p.m.
To celebrate the publication of her work in the anthology Sirens: Five Femme Fatale Poets, Iris Berry will read from her selections and sign the book. Long-time collaborators and partners-in-crime Gehman and Griffin will join her.
Definitely a femme fatale and something of an LA literary legend, Iris Berry's written work has previously been widely anthologized as well as published in her well-received book, Two Blocks East of Vine (Incommunicado Press), and can be heard on her two spoken word CD's: "Life on the Edge in Stilettos" and "Collect Calls".
Along with Gehman, Berry co-founded the groundbreaking Los Angeles rock-n-roll spoken word troupe, The Ringling Sisters, and co-edited the latest edition of The Underground Guide To Los Angeles.
In 2006, at a ceremony held at Skylight Books, all three authors received awards from The City of Los Angeles for their continuing contributions to the artistic community. This event is the first time they have read together since then, and it's sure to be an uproarious summer evening of irreverent poetry, prose and literary mayhem. |
MILO MARTIN and the Utopian Nihilists |
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Saturday, September 13 at 7:30 p.m.
Poems for the Utopian Nihilist (Echo Park Press)
Skylight Books presents a new collection of poetry and art by Los Angeles melancholy poet Milo Martin, who will be joined by the Utopian Nihilists, a veritable all-star cast of spoken word poets and writers emanating from the Utopian Nihilist literary movement of the first part of the 21st Century.
The evening will include readings and performances by spastic spoken word artist and fiction writer Rich Ferguson (new CD Where I Come From), notorious performance poet and art critic Jerry the Priest, best-selling blunt cadence author Brad Listi (Attention.Deficit.Disorder, Simon & Schuster), Pushcart prize nominee and short story writer Mary Otis (Yes, Yes Cherries, Tin House Press), hyper-intense neo-Elizabethean drive-by poet Chris Tannahill, the sweetly-sardonic stylings of poetess Hannah Wehr and Venetian acoordion diva Mrs. Hobbs.
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SANDRA TSING LOH |
 Tuesday, September 16 at 7:00 p.m.
Mother on Fire: A True Motherf%#$@ Story About Parenting! (Random House)Join us for a special Los Feliz Mom Club's MOMS Night Out with Sandra Tsing Loh and the Burning Moms (including author Erika Schickel)!
(note: event begins at 7pm, rather than our more usual 7:30)
Are you an LA mom FREAKING OUT about where to send your kids to school (La Canada, Portland, Mars)? Good news: Sandra Tsing Loh has ALREADY FREAKED OUT FOR YOU (she wrote the book about LA school freakouts, the brand new "Mother on Fire"). She and her "Martinis and Magnets" Burning Moms will be joining the Los Feliz Moms to laugh, cry, share, commiserate, and oh-so-candidly answer all your burning questions. With amusing LA school-themed raffle prizes, it's Back to School with a twist!
(Of course, you don't have to be a mom to participate in and appreciate the fun of this event.
(photo: Tatjana Loh) |
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RANDA JARRAR |
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Wednesday, September 17 at 7:30 p.m.
A Map of Home (Other Press) An irreverent yet poignant tale about emigration, sexual awakening, and about Arab culture as we don't know it. "Jarrar's sparkling debut about an audacious Muslim girl growing up in Kuwait, Egypt and Texas is intimate, perceptive and very, very funny. ... Jarrar explores familiar adolescent ground-stifling parental expectations, precarious friendships, sensuality and first love-but her exhilarating voice and flawless timing make this a standout." --Publishers Weekly: (Starred Review) "Jazzy, and vastly intelligent and fun. Jarrar is a wonderworker with delectable details and sweet swerves of surprise." --Naomi Shihab Nye Jarrar is an award-winning writer and translator, and contributes to the feminist quarterly Make/Shift. She grew up in Kuwait and moved to the U.S. after the first Gulf War |
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JIM DAWSON and
CORY & SARAH STARGEL
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Saturday, September 20 at 5:00 p.m.
Los Angeles' Angel's Flight (by Dawson) and
Early Los Angeles County Attractions (by the Stargels)
(both by Arcadia Publishing)
 Hear about fascinating aspects of L.A. history from the authors of two of the latest books from our popular Arcadia Publishing Los Angeles history collections.  |
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THOMAS FRANK |
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Monday, September 22 at 7:30 p.m.
The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule (Metropolitan Books)
 We are always happy to welcome back the ever-fascinating Frank, author of What's the Matter with Kansas? and One Market Under God, and founding editor of The Baffler. He is a contributing editor at Harper's, and is The Wall Street Journal's newest weekly columnist.
"Thomas Frank is back with another hunk of dynamite. The Wrecking Crew should monopolize political conversation this year."
-Salon.com
"In Thomas Frank, the American left has found its own Juvenal."
-The New York Times Book Review
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DAPHNE BEAL |
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Thursday, September 25 at 7:30 p.m.
In the Land of No Right Angles (Random House)
This first novel by Beal is "a meditation on what it means to be a traveler not only of the world, but of one's own ever-changing, inner topography. Daphne Beal artfully balances clarity and chaos, and explores how even the thinnest line of human connection ... can alter a person for the good. Her debut is a subtly resonant masterpiece."
- Heidi Julavits.
Daphne Beal's writing has appeared in Vogue, McSweeney's, Open City, and The London Review of Books. She was on the editorial staff of The New Yorker and educated at Brown and New York University, where she was a New York Times fellow. Her work has been anthologized in State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America, The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers, and The KGB Reader. Originally from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, she now lives in New York City with her husband, Sean Wilsey, and their two children.
Photo: Kevin Sturman |
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SKYLIGHT SALON |
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 Yearning for witty repartee and intellectual stimulation? How about wine and hors d'oeuvres? Come join us for our new monthly series, Skylight Salon, where our staff shares their faves from small presses and independent publishers. A modern-day mixer for the literary minded. This month, members of our staff share info with you on these indy presses:
PM Press, founded in 2007 as an independent publisher, seeks to create radical and stimulating fiction and non-fiction books, pamphlets, t-shirts, visual and audio materials to entertain, educate and inspire you.
Soft Skull Press is..."One of the most visible and respected alternative houses in the US...like Grove Press in the 1950's and 1960's." -Quill & Quire
Hotel St. George Press is committed to producing books resistant to the predictable trends of genre, style and structure endemic to corporate publishing. We create bound narrative objects - unique, slender, palpable, playful - that wed the formal novelty of children's books to the content of sophisticated mature fiction.. | |
authors, publishers, long-time and newer customers and neighbors -- to tip champagne as City Councilmember Tom LaBonge cut the ribbon and officially opened the new store. (
