 | | Pic 1: Amy Tan performs with her author-supergroup, the Rock Bottom Remainders. Pic 2: Poet Kim Addonizio Pic 3: Iris Chang, RIP. Pic 4: First Lit Crawl out front of a vacuum repair store. Pic 5: Bright lights, big crowd for Porchlight Storytelling. |
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| In 2003 and 2004, Litquake grew beyond its original one-day bounds and singular venue. Now a whole week in October and all over the city, we looked for more ways to do a book festival the San Francisco-way. Cue the first Lit Crawl in '04, an immediate, oddball success. We didn't know how the Mission or literary community would take to its then pretty unconventional concept. No books for sale. Everything for free. Local presses, writing groups, mags, zines—everything in bars, alleys, furniture stores, laundromats, adult toy boutiques. It strays far from the typical book festival setup—nothing corpo, no conference center with rows of exhibitor booths under fluorescent lights, no stanchioned lines of fans waiting 45 minutes to get a book signed. Just local voices for local people, the truest celebration of what this community has to give. Long live the Crawl! |
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"Malls" An Experiential Reading Event
Wednesday June 5 · 7pm
Clio's · 353 Grand Ave, Oakland, CA 94610
Secret Nook presents an exploration of malls through prose, poetry, and a lightweight lesson from an expert. Enjoy an evening filled with literature and sensory experiences at a beloved bar and bookstore. FREE
Secret Nook is an experiential reading series based in Oakland. Each event is a happening that explores one theme from many perspectives. Follow @secret.nook on Instagram for more updates! |
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SOROCHE Live at The Brava
Thursday June 6, 2024 · 7pm
The Brava Theater · 2781 24th St., San Francisco
co-presented by Center for the Art of Translation/Two Lines Press
Two Lines Press and Cuentero Productions present Soroche, a haunting one-night-only multimedia performance. Adapted from the short story by award-winning Ecuadorian writer Mónica Ojeda published in Through the Night Like a Snake: Latin American Horror Stories by Two Lines Press, Soroche depicts the effects of a leaked sex tape, filtered through the dizzying lens of altitude sickness. The cinematic sound design, created by Cuentero Productions to accompany the performance, immerses the audience in the suffocating, malignant air of the mountains while giving voice to Mónica Ojeda’s harrowing observations of abject humiliation and self-loathing. The performance will be followed by a conversation between translators Sarah Booker and Noelle de la Paz and Sarah Coolidge, editor of Through the Night Like a Snake. $10-25 |
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SongWriter Live with Susan Orlean and Diana Gameros
Thursday June 13 · 7pm
The Commons · 2601 Mariposa St San Francisco, CA 94110
co-presented by KQED
Litquake and KQED Live present a night with SongWriter, a podcast that turns stories into songs (featured guests have included Questlove, Joyce Carol Oates, David Gilmour of Pink Floyd, Roxane Gay, and Craig Finn of The Hold Steady).
In this special live recording event, bestselling author Susan Orlean (The Orchid Thief, The Library Book) will share a story from her recent collection On Animals, and local songwriter Diana Gameros will play a brand new song written in response. SongWriter’s creator Ben Arthur will host, and engage the artists in a conversation with UC Berkeley researcher Laura Simone Lewis on animal intelligence. $29 |
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How They Did It: Biographical Fiction
Sunday June 23 · 3pm
Page Street Co-Writing · 2508 San Pablo Ave Berkeley, CA 94702
co-presented by LitCamp
Novelist Louisa Treger once called biographical fiction "the lie through which truth can emerge." In the third of our "How They Did It" series, we'll hear from four talented novelists who have blended fact with their fiction, with dazzling results. Novelist Jasmin Darznik, who has written biographical fiction about Iranian poet Forugh Farrokhzad and photographer Dorothea Lange, will moderate a wide-ranging conversation with novelists Karen Joy Fowler (author of the Booker longlisted Booth), Dawn Tripp (author of national bestseller Georgia and her latest novel, Jackie), and Gail Tsukiyama (author of Bright Star, about the Hollywood trailblazer Anna May Wong). $25
PS. We are also hosting a free Write Together with Page Street Co-Writing and Lit Camp on 6/8! |
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 | | 25 Years of Litquake! We never imagined in 1999 when Litquake kicked off its first one-day festival in Golden Gate Park that we’d be here 25 years later… bigger, better, stronger, more diverse, reaching readers and writers from kindergarten through elders. |
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