A puppet show without Kermit: Concrete Folk Variations at The Manual Archives / Photo by Susan Simpson MEET THE PO-PO The public’s invited to meet the police and talk about safety issues at a neighborhood meeting between the Atwater Village Neighborhood Council, the Glassell Park Safety Committee and LAPD. Senior Lead Officer for Atwater Village Gina Chovan, gang detectives and City Attorney Donna Wong will be in attendance. 4 pm // Glassell Park Community......

Get Your Lit On: The Week in Bookish LA includes some outstanding readings this week from some fine, fine writers including Maggie Nelson, Anne Enright, Colm Toibin, Toby Barlow, Amy Hempel, Peter Carey, John Rechy, Martha Grimes and Russell Banks....

Monday No bookish events on Mr. King's Day. Tuesday John Densmore of The Doors, Jim Henke and John McDermott present The Jim Morrison Scrapbook and Jimi Hendrix: An Illustrated Experience 7pm @ Book Soup Wednesday Sudhir Venkatesh presents Gang Leader for a Day 7pm @ Vroman's E. Duke Vincent presents Black Widow 7pm @ Book Soup Robert Novak presentsThe Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington 7pm @ Glendale Public Library Thursday Steve......

Some things just naturally go together. Take, for instance, caffeine and the written word. So the inclusion of coffee shops in libraries makes perfect sense. The Santa Monica Public Library opened in January 2006. The Library surrounds an idyllic Southern California modern open-air courtyard where you will find the coffee shop, The Bookmark Café. At the time the library was being planned, the public was surveyed on a number of issues, and the response was......

Before everyone was bitten by the "green" bug, there were those in LA (or who visited) who had a vision for sustainability. Paul Glover was one of them. After creating the local currency that is Ithaca Hours, Paul opined about a way to bring ultra-urban Los Angeles into a sustainability community - all based on closing some alleys. After closing alleys, Glover lays out six more steps for reducing the carbon footprint and building a......

Oh L.A. and your crazy kooky vagrants! Please meet Crazy Doll Lady (as we are calling her), pictured in the photo above. She and her scary puppet friends hang out around Sunset and Vine every day, and wait outside the Hollywood Public Library every morning for food handouts. Say hi to her if you see her...or drive by real real fast like I do! Even if the Globes are cancelled, Academy Awards organizers are......

ART: Downtown’s Art Walk happens the second Thursday of each month. The Art walk is a monthly, self-guided tour of the art exhibition venues in Downtown Los Angeles, which includes commercial art galleries, public museums, and nonprofit arts venues. Museum of Contemporary Art on Grand Ave (MOCA), Los Angeles Public Library Grey Goose, LA Artcore Center are just some of the places on the Walk. 12-9 pm // Downtown Art Walk // Downtown Los......

The cold weather - and holiday festivities - descended upon Gothamist. The Rockefeller Christmas tree was lit, Broadway stagehand finally ended their strike, and NASCAR decided to run their victory lap through Times Square. There were disturbing photographs revealing the working conditions in which many city manholes are produced and ninjas were also a hot topic, either robbing homes or entering into alibis. But the city was really rocked by how Rudy Giuliani's visits......

Monday Paul Krugman discusses The Conscience of a Liberal 7pm @ Central Library Randy Cepuch signs A Weekend With Warren Buffett 4pm @ Dutton's Jenna Bush presents Ana's Story 7pm @ Pasadena Public Library Jason Goodwin discusses and signs The Snake Stone 7pm @ Vroman's Tuesday Wole Soyninka discusses his work with Mona Simpson 7pm @ Hammer Museum Eduardo Machado & Michael Domitrovich present Tastes Like Cuba 7pm @ Book Soup Maira Kalman discusses &......

Monday Bjorn Lomborg presents Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming 7pm @ Central Library Terry Pratchett presents Making Money 7pm @ Borders, Torrance Randall Robinson presents An Unbroken Agony 7pm @ EsoWon Books Tuesday Carol Muske-Dukes presents Channeling Mark Twain 7pm @ Vroman's Cathy Malkasian presents Percy Gloom 7pm @ Book Soup Gilbert Hernandez presents Chance in Hell 7pm @ Book Soup Leslie Garis signs House of Happy Endings 7pm @......

Monday Mark Danielewski presents Only Revolutions 7pm @ Vroman's Ellen Sandler presents The TV Writer's Workbook 7pm @ Borders, Sherman Oaks Nell Freudenberger & Jennifer Gilmore discuss their work with Bernadette Murphy 7pm @ Central Library Sy Safransky discusses his work and The Sun 7:30pm @ Beverly Hills Public Library Tuesday James Ellroy discusses his work 7pm @ Central Library Diana Gabaldon presents Lord John & the Brotherhood of the Blade 7pm @ Vroman's......

Monday Jackie Collins presents Drop Dead Beautiful 7pm @ Borders, Torrance Howard Frank Mosher presents On Kingdom Mountain 7pm @ Vroman's Dana Bedford Hilmer and contributors present Blindsided by a Diaper 7pm @ Dutton's Tuesday Sisters in Crime Los Angeles present LAndmarked for Murder 6:30pm @ Los Feliz Public Library Fayla Reiss presents Knitovation 6:30pm @ Encino-Tarzana Public Library Amy Cohen presents The Late Bloomer's Revolution 7pm @ Book Soup Floyd Landis presents Positively......

Via MetroRiderLA, the Southern California Transit Advocates (SO.CA.TA) is holding their second community outreach meeting on the proposed extension of the Purple Line in the Wilshire corridor. "This will provide a venue for interested corridor residents to learn about the status of the proposal and their role in its progress. Information will also be provided on how residents can engage in effective advocacy by contacting elected officials." Tuesday July 17, 6:00 - 8:00 p.m. |......

Monday Bridget Kinsella Visiting Life: Women Doing Time on The Outside 7pm @ Book Soup Trevor Corson discusses and signs The Zen of Fish 7pm @ Vroman's Tuesday Viken Berberian presents Das Kapital: A Novel of Love and Money Markets 7pm @ Book Soup Bridget Kinsella presents Visiting Life: Women Doing Time on the Outside 12pm @ Vroman's Joseph Marshall presents The Day the World Ended at Little Bighorn 7pm @ Vroman's Eric Lichtenfeld......

Monday Diane Lefer discusses and signs California Transit 7pm @ Vroman's Chuck Barris presents The Big Question 7pm @ Book Soup Chris Abani & Al Young read their work 7:30pm @ Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater Tuesday Jonathan Cohn discusses Sick: The Untold Story of America's Healthcare Crisis 5pm @ Center for Healthy Communities, Yosemite Hall Reyna Grande presents Across a Hundred Mountains 7pm @ Book Soup Nicole Mones signs The Last Chinese Chef 7pm......

There's so much going on across the Ist-a-Verse that it's almost impossible to keep track these days. Fortunately, we do it so you don't have to! Londonist took a walk through Oliver Twist's London, thanks to a gorgeous map layer for Google Earth. They also caught up with modern-day fictional London, with the Fantastic Four and 28 Weeks Later. It was a week of insanity over at DCist. They started the week off with......

Monday Barney Hoskyns presents Hotel California 7pm @ Book Soup Christopher Nyerges discusses How To Survive Anywhere 7pm @ Vroman’s Robert Crais signs The Watchman 7pm @ Borders Torrance Dennis Cooper in discussion with the writers of Userlands 7:30pm @ Skylight Books Tuesday Chad Kultgen presents Average American Male 7pm @ Book Soup Jane Smiley discusses Ten Days in the Hills 7pm @ Vroman’s Allison L. Bailey, Frances A. Butler, Margaret Heritage, and Norma......

One year ago today, we wrote this: Not to fear L.A., male erotic dancing is a booming industry. According to Overture (a Yahoo! Company), there were 18,195 searches for “los angeles male stripper,” or any variation thereof, in the month of January 2006. And that doesn’t include Google statistics. Apparently male dancing in Los Angeles takes priority over The Dodgers, jobs, hospitals, attorneys, real estate and regular strippers. If you need one, Bachelorette.com has......

As we’ve pointed out, it is awards season in Los Angeles in more ways than one. While the Academy Award debating will rage on for weeks, bookish types can ante up their betting losses or collect their winnings now – some awards have already been given. Los Angeles resident Susan Patron has won the 2007 John Newbery Medal for the most outstanding contribution to children’s literature for her young adult novel The Higher Power......

Monday Robert Fagan discusses The Notebooks of Robert Frost 7pm @ Vroman’s Rebecca Liebermann signs We Are Still Here 7pm @ Dutton’s Brentwood Josh Peter discusses Fried Twinkies, Buckle Bunnies & Bull Riders 7pm @ Studio City Branch Library Tuesday David Lynch presents Catching the Big Fish 7pm @ Borders in Westwood Martin Amis discusses House of Meetings 7pm @ Central Library Robert Stone & John Densmore in conversation about Remembering the Sixties 7:30pm......

You have four more hours to get yourself downtown to take a peek at what some of LA's best art galleries are currently offering. On the second Thursday of every month from noon to 9pm, museums, galleries, and nonprofit art venues participate in the Downtown Art Walk, staying open late for those who might not get a chance to stop by during the weekdays. What better way to take the edge off the workweek......

Google has unveiled a new Web site dedicated to literacy. It's an online resource for teachers, literacy organizations and anyone else who might be interested in finding books online, promoting literacy and education at all age levels. Titled The Literacy Project, the site was set up through an agreement with UNESCO’s Institute for Lifelong Learning and LitCam, the Frankfurt Book Fair literacy campaign. The site provides users access to literacy resources from around the......

When LAist thinks of John Lithgow and food, some kind of a shiny extra-terrestrial pear pops into our head. We suggest you put that image out of your mind, however, if you're so inclined to see the former "3rd Rock from the Sun" star read aloud short-stories — about food — at this weekend's Food Fictions! at the Getty Center (Friday- Sunday, May 19-21). He's one of several actors who will be orating culinary-inspired......

This is a newsstand in Burbank in the early 1940s, and the photo was taken by, of all people, Ansel Adams. Due to the meticulous research of Gerard Van der Leun, with (thankfully) time on his hands, we now know that Ansel Adams was on assignment in LA for Fortune Magazine. Van der Leun has gathered the photos, and all that he knows about them, in this flickr set. If you recognize a streetcorner,......

MSN has a new article on ways you can go broke in real estate: for example, if the neighborhood changes for the worse instead of better, if a tenant moves out, or if your interest rates balloon. The Southern California real estate market has slowed down a little bit, but it's still tempting to feel that it might be easy to make money in real estate here. It's also good to remember that it......

We aren't churchgoers or religious, really, but we think if there is a hell, that's exactly where the man is going who shot several rounds into a Riverside home on Christmas, killing an 11-year old boy. In less serious news, no one was hurt when a big rig flipped over at the 5 freeway transition to the 10 east last night. In trying to get the truck off the road, though, 80,000 pounds of......

Unless otherwise noted, all shows are free of charge. SATURDAY, 10/22 Cross Hart Jazz Experience take the stage at the Skirball's Café Z. The show starts at 12pm. For info, call (310) 440-4500. The Janaki String Trio perform a preview concert at Trinity Lutheran Church at 2pm. Call (310) 937-7275. Rosalinde Gilbert Concert features the The Capitol Ensemble as a part of LACMA's Sunday Live series. The concert begins at 6pm in LACMA's Leo......

Unless otherwise noted, all performances are free. SATURDAY, 9/24 DJs Michael Stock and Benjamin White of Part Time Punks continue their two month residency at MOCA. The show starts at 6pm and it's free with general museum admission. Call (213) 621-1734. JB and The Rebellion's play at One Colorado in Old Pasadena, from 9pm to midnight. Call (626) 564-1066. SUNDAY, 9/25 Pianist Sara Naomi Sumitani performs at the Beverly Hills Public Library at 2pm.......

The Fairfax Branch of the Los Angeles Public Library opened this morning. Located at 161 S. Gardner Street, just north of 3rd, the new branch boasts lots of parking, beautiful dark wood furniture, a phalanx of computers and a very large floor plan. It has one of the biggest footprints of the regional branches, with a central section full of tables, chairs and room for study groups. More space doesn't necessarily mean more books......

LAist loves books aplenty, and we also love free things. Combine these two loves and you get the Los Angeles Public Library; build a central branch the size of a mall, and you have geek heaven. But the free books to borrow service has a pricetag--like so many wonderful things--and LAPL's Library Store has a way for us to pitch in this month (aside from paying those overdue fees we know we have stored......