Monday Michael Pollan and Barry Glassner discuss In Defense of Food 7pm @ Central Library Cindy Pierce and Edie Thys Morgan presents Finding the Doorbell 7pm @ Book Soup Tuesday Traci Slatton presents Immortal 6:30pm @ Metropolis Books Joe McGinniss and special guest Bret Easton Ellis present The Delivery Man 7pm @ Book Soup Terri Cheney discusses and signs Manic: A Memoir 7pm @ Vroman's Gary Goldberg presents Sit, Ubu, Sit 7pm @ Dutton's......

To no one's surprise 30 Days of Night topped the box office this weekend, though its 16 million dollar take hardly qualifies it as a hit. Year-over-year, it is the fifth down weekend in a row and relief doesn't appear to be in sight for a few more weeks when American Gangster and Bee Movie should pull some asses into seats. Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married? held up fairly well in its......

Monday Porochista Khakpour presents Sons and Other Flammable Objects 7pm @ Dutton's Kenneth Turan presents Never Coming to a Theater Near You 7pm @ Studio City Branch Library Tuesday Susan Faludi presents The Terror Dream: Fear and Fantasy in Post-9/11 America 7pm @ Central Library Max Brooks presents World War Z 7pm @ Book Soup Walter Mosley presents Blonde Faith 7:30pm @ Skirball Cultural Center President Vicente Fox discusses and signs Revolution of Hope......

E-40 @ Vault 350 Reagan Youth @ The Knitting Factory Deep Purple, Blue Oyster Cult @ Pacific Amphitheatre Poison, Ratt @ Verizon MF Doom @ El Rey Squeeze @ Grove of Anaheim Burning Spear, Sly & Robbie, The Taxi Gang and Wailing Souls Reunion @ Hollywood Bowl Mike Stinson, Jake La Botz, Sarah Stanley, Mike Freas @ The Echo (free) The Short Necked Drafts, Apocalipstick, End, Alter Reality, Girls Night In @ The Whisky......

While rightly lauded for originating The Office, I think Extras is Ricky Gervais' true masterpiece. I mean, how can you possibly top Harry Potter flicking a rubber into Dame Diana Rigg's hair? I'll tell you how--have David Bowie improvise this song for Gervais' hapless Andy Millman. Unfortunately (really unfortunately), Gervais decided against another season of the show, but Season 2 is now available on DVD. Buy it. Watch it. Live it. What else is......

Monday Barbara Taylor Bradford discusses and signs The Ravenscar Dynasty, 7pm @ Vroman's Frank Warren of postsecret.com fame speaks, 7pm @ Borders Books in Torrance Tuesday Vendela Vida presents Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name, 7pm @ Book Soup Anthony Swofford (award-winning author of Jarhead) presents Exit A: A Novel, 7pm @ Vroman's Patricia Marx signs Him Her Him Again the End of Him, 7pm @ Dutton’s Brentwood Portia Iversen signs Strange Son,......

Saturday, May 21st • 8:00 pm : Selected Shorts: The Love Story Weekend--Marital Matters at the Getty Center • 11:00 am : ArtsDay panels at UCLA Extension • 4:00 pm : LACC Creative Writing Content Winners read works • 7:30 pm : Alicia Erian reads her book "Towelhead" • 7:30 pm : lecture on "Artist & the City as Social Imagination" at Villa Aurora •8:00 pm: Cinespia presents "The Bad and the Beautiful" at......

According to Los Angeles Times stringer, Nick P. Divito, the faux hawk hairstyle is dead. The trend must be six feet under if the Times finally writes about it. LAist has noticed a newer, more alarming male hairstyle on the streets of LA: the ponytail. On jaunts around town, we've seen various handsome (mainly Hispanic) men sporting long or longish locks pulled back in a messy pony tail or fastened with a clip, looking......