BookSwell

We examine our surroundings and find joy in searching the city with Lynell George and Marisela Norte.Do we take note of our surroundings as they shape-shift around us? How do we remember places that vanish? How do we preserve memories as fragile as morning fog?Artists and writers explore concepts of places, how they’re made, and how we understand, remember, and memorialize them. Lynell George is a journalist and essayist based in Los Angeles, who tells the city’s story one sentence at a time. She will be in discussion with Marisela Norte, an American writer, poet, and artist living in Los Angeles and known for poetry that explores the unseen city. Together, they will explore hidden corners of Los Angeles and the poetry of the city in images and text.BookSwell will organize a photography contest based on prompts provided by the authors.WeHo Reads is a literary series presented by the City of West Hollywood. More information and events at www.weho.org/wehoreads. BookSwell, a literary events and media company dedicated to lifting up writers from historically excluded communities, is producing the WeHo Reads 2022 season. Additional support is provided by UCLA Extension Writers’ Program as well as media partnerships with Bookshop.org, Book Soup, Read More ...

We look to anointed poets laureate for evidence of joy and creativity for lessons on forging paths out of darkness.In 2020, the Academy of American Poets awarded over $1 million to 23 poets laureate as part of a year-long Fellowship to support their creative and organizing work. One of these awards went to our West Hollywood City Poet Laureate Brian Sonia-Wallace who also serves as this event’s host. This reading brings together a group of these Fellows from across the country in the aftermath of their Fellowships to share what they did, read their writing, and reflect on the state of poetry across the United States. Readers include Semaj Brown, Poet Laureate of Flint, MI; Magdalena Gomez, Poet Laureate of Springfield, MA; Chastity Gunn, Poet Laureate of Elgin, IL; Luisa Igloria, Poet Laureate of Virginia; Georgina Marie, Poet Laureate of Lake County, CA; and Lloyd Schwartz, Poet Laureate of Somerville, MA. WeHo Reads is a literary series presented by the City of West Hollywood. More information and events at www.weho.org/wehoreads. BookSwell, a literary events and media company dedicated to lifting up writers from historically excluded communities, is producing the WeHo Reads 2022 season. Additional support is provided by UCLA Extension Read More ...

Our journey’s last step leads us toward light with bridgette bianca, Cassandra Lane, and traci kato-kiriyama and close with Shonda BuchananThe culminating event in the Road to Joy series will bring together poets, writers, and artists who live and create at the intersection of joy and hope and reckoning with pain. bridgette bianca is a poet and educator from South Central Los Angeles. Her debut book of poetry, be/trouble (Writ Large Press, 2020), is a powerful love letter to oft-overlooked Los Angeles, one that offers as much danger as it does glamour and as much grit as beauty. traci kato-kiriyama is a multi-disciplinary artist, writer/author, actor, arts educator & community organizer. Her recently published book from Writ Large Press, Navigating With(out) Instruments, is a collection of poetics, micro essays, and notes to self (and other)—a journey of several years, navigating through death moments, past/present tensions of war and violence, trauma and ideation, excavation and memory. Cassandra Lane is a writer and editor based in Los Angeles. Her first book, WE ARE BRIDGES: A Memoir (Feminist Press, April 2021), weaves personal and historical geographies, lineages, upbringings, and upheavals into a complete tapestry, validating her glorious existence as a Black mother.A moment Read More ...