Pasadena Conservatory of Music presents Musical Storytime: The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams
2025-10-11 11:30 - 12:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
The Pasadena Conservatory of Music will be putting on a special musical storytime with featured book: The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams. Caregivers and children aged 3-9 will enjoy story, craft activities, creative movement and a mini-concert!

Vroman's Bookstore: Stoker Award-winning author Pedro Iniguez in conversation with screenwriter Peter Atkins (Hellraiser) on horror in children’s literature (reading and signing)
2025-10-11 15:00 - 16:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Join screenwriting legend Peter Atkins (Hellraiser) in an in-depth conversation with Stoker Award-winning writer Pedro Iniguez, chronicling his journey writing science-fiction and horror, to children’s literature, including his first children’s picture book, The Fib. This event is open to all ages with a reading and signing of The Fib.
About The Fib: The line between imagination and lie blur in The Fib by Bram Stoker Award-winner Pedro Iniguez.
When Pepe struggles to find something exciting for show and tell, he spins a little lie about a magical creature with horns like a ram, claws like a bear, wings like a bat, eyes like an owl, and a tail like a lion. But, Pepe and his class soon discover that this harmless fib takes on a life of its own– literally– growing into a giant, uncontrollable monster that threatens to eat the entire school.
As chaos ensues, Pepe learns a valuable lesson: even the smallest fib can spiral out of control, but the truth holds the power to set things right. The Fib is a timeless story that weaves magic and morality into a powerful message about honesty, responsibility and the power of creativity.

Pedro Iniguez is a Mexican-American Bram Stoker Award-winning speculative fiction writer from Los Angeles. The Fib is his first picture book and he is the author of Mexicans on the Moon: Speculative Poetry from a Possible Future and the comic book Catrina’s Caravan, among several others. Apart from conducting writing workshops and speaking at several colleges, he has also been a sensitivity reader and has ghostwritten for award-winning apps and online clients. When he’s not reading, writing, daydreaming, or cooking, he likes to paint beside his Chihuahua, Cookie, and his turtle, Squirt.

Vroman's Bookstore: Barbara Roberts discusses & signs The Metamorphosis of Bunny Baxter
2025-10-12 14:00 - 15:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Bunny Baxter thinks nothing could be worse than starting seventh grade at a school where she knows no one. But after her first day, she realizes things can actually get much worse.
If Bunny Baxter were an insect, she’d have so many ways to slip through seventh grade unnoticed. But she’s tall instead of tiny, has flaming red Medusa hair instead of camouflage, and she suffers from social anxiety, which makes it hard to be part of a swarm. Worst of all, she’s been redistricted to a new middle school away from her best friend who she could always hide behind when her anxiety got the best of her.
The first day at E.D. Britt Middle School does not go well. Bunny trips on the steps, falls into the cutest boy in the school, and causes a kid domino pile-up. At lunch, she unintentionally causes an uproar in the cafeteria, which lands her and another girl in the principal’s office. Bunny decides there is only one option: to get expelled so she can transfer to the school her best friend attends.
She soon discovers that it isn’t that hard to get in trouble—don’t turn in your homework, walk around the track instead of run in P.E., pretend you deliberately hit someone with a badminton birdie. What isn’t so easy for Bunny is realizing she now has a reputation as a troublemaker. And even more confusing, when it looks like her plan to get expelled might work, she’s no longer sure what to do.
The Metamorphosis of Bunny Baxter is a heartfelt coming of age story about an insect-loving girl who is learning to grow into herself—quirks and all.

Vroman's Bookstore: Nalini Jones discusses & signs The Unbroken Coast
2025-10-15 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A stunning debut novel set in and around a Mumbai fishing village that follows the friendship between a young girl struggling to find her place in the world, and an aging historian reckoning with his past.
​On the night his granddaughter is born in America, Professor Francis Almeida rides a bicycle through his quiet Catholic neighborhood in a suburb of Mumbai. It is 1978. He has recently retired, his grown children are scattered across the globe, and for the first time in decades, he is not sure what he should do next. A few streets from his home, in the heart of a Koli fishing village, he encounters a young mother praying for her baby daughter, ill with dengue fever, at the shrine of Our Lady of Navigators. He hopes the child will live.
Nearly a decade later, Francis meets the child again. She is Celia, daughter of a fisherman who is running from a debt collector. When an accident brings their families together, both Celia and Francis find themselves with unexpected new allies.
Spanning the turbulent years when Bombay became Mumbai, at time when environmental and economic pressures are just beginning to change the fortunes of indigenous fisherfolk, The Unbroken Coast is a lyrical novel that explores memory, faith, storytelling, and the nature of home.

Vroman's Bookstore: Judith Orloff reads from & signs The Highly Sensitive Rabbit
2025-10-18 11:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
High in the Sonoran Desert, where crickets chirp and cactus grow, lives a tiny cottontail rabbit named Aurora. Aurora is very sensitive to the beauties of nature and to the feelings of everyone around her. She likes to spend time alone, and she worries a lot. Aurora’s brothers and sister tell her she is “too sensitive” and often leave her out of their rough-and-tumble play.
When a flash flood destroys her family’s burrow, Aurora must learn to face her sensitive nature head-on. She meets a spiny lizard, spotted skunk, cactus wren, and javelina, all of whom have lessons to teach her about kindness and self-care. Will Aurora learn to embrace her nature and thrive as a highly sensitive rabbit?
Based on Dr. Judith Orloff’s teachings about living an empowered life as an empath, this beautifully illustrated story teaches us to live with beauty, sensitivity, and joy.

Vroman's Bookstore: Teachers' Night Out! 2025
2025-10-18 16:00 - 18:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Vroman’s Bookstore invites educators to its annual Teacher’s Night Out, an evening dedicated to celebrating the incredible teachers and librarians who shape the community. Guests can enjoy snacks, beverages, and a variety of giveaways, including books and classroom goodies.
Throughout the evening, Vroman’s knowledgeable staff will be available to recommend new titles for classroom discussions and libraries, as well as share exclusive services available to educators. A publisher-sponsored table will feature curated reading lists and classroom recommendations.
Attendees are encouraged to browse the featured selections, connect with fellow educators, and enjoy light refreshments. Each guest will also receive a 20% off coupon for personal shopping that evening.
As a special highlight, Vroman’s Bookstore will honor 2024–2025 Teacher of the Year, Star Gomez, and Pasadena High School with an award presentation at 4:00 p.m. on the Vroman’s outdoor stage.

Vroman's Bookstore: Luisa Navarro presents & signs Mexico's Day of the Dead: A Celebration of Life Through Stories and Photos
2025-10-19 11:00 - 12:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A lush exploration of the vibrant and important traditions of Día de Muertos, Mexico’s holiday for celebrating passed loved ones.
Whether you are new to the holiday and celebrating for the first time, looking to process a recent loss, or just interested in this authentic Mexican cultural tradition, Mexico’s Day of the Dead paints a vibrant picture of one of the country’s most storied and sacred holidays.
With photographer Christine Chitnis by her side, author Luisa Navarro documents the most breathtaking displays, as well as the artisans and people who keep the traditions alive. She delves into the origins of the holiday, its rich iconography, and modern-day customs. Thoughtful essays on the evolution of Día de Muertos are coupled with practical guides for celebrating it yourself, as Luisa shares her tips for cultivating your own Day of the Dead traditions. Turn to Mexico’s Day of the Dead for approachable DIY projects. Build your own altar. Make your own sugar skulls. Create papel picado and bake your own delicious pan de muerto at home.
This landmark book brings Day of the Dead to life with transportive photography, high-end finishes, and eye-catching stained edges.

Vroman's Bookstore: Antoinette Portis reads from & signs To Activate Space Portal, Lift Here
2025-10-19 11:00 - 12:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
This book is an interstellar portal, and the aliens inside want to get to know you!
Before you lift the cover, be sure you’re ready to meet Zrk and Blrg. They’re not so different from you–but to them, you’re the alien!
After their initial shock at seeing you through the portal, they’re eager to see what kind of teeth you have, compare home planets, and maybe team up for a prank. You met as aliens, but by the time the portal closes, maybe you’ll be friends.
To Activate Space Portal, Lift Here is an interactive treat sure to delight young galactic explorers. Antoinette Portis’s bright lines and bold colors pair perfectly with humor that also offers a subtle message of acceptance. Whether for bedtime or circle time, this is a portal you’ll want to open!

Vroman's Bookstore: Yaron Weitzman discusses & signs A Hollywood Ending: The Dreams and Drama of the Lebron Lakers
2025-10-20 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
NBA journalist Yaron Weitzman lays out the high stakes drama happening inside the Lakers’ organization at a crucial juncture in their history, as they try to juggle the warring priorities between Lebron James and the Buss family.
When LeBron James signed with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2018, the match looked like one made in heaven. Here was a living legend, the preeminent athlete of his generation, joining forces with one of the most iconic teams in all of sports. The Lakers, in the midst of their worst stretch in franchise history and reeling from the death of their legendary owner Dr. Jerry Buss, needed a savior. LeBron, fresh off ending Cleveland’s 50-year title drought, needed a new challenge to help further burnish his legacy. The script wrote itself.
A little over two years later, LeBron and Dr. Buss’ daughter, Jeanie, were standing shoulder to shoulder, hoisting the NBA finals trophy into the air. Having won their record-tying 17th NBA title, the Lakers had reclaimed their accustomed perch on top of the basketball world and seemed destined to dominate the NBA for years to come.
Traditionally, the Lakers’ didn’t celebrate championships, they celebrated dynasties. But this was a different Lakers’ organization, one beset by infighting. A single title wouldn’t be enough to cement Lebron James status as a Lakers’ legend or help him surpass the ghost of Michael Jordan. Both parties needed sustained success, but for that to happen they needed to be on the same page. Sadly, the 2020 title would represent the pinnacle of their pairing, and the beginning of a precipitous decline.
Drawing from over 250 interviews, Yaron Weitzman takes readers on a riveting, behind the scenes journey of this fraught partnership. From the Succession-like power struggle between the Buss children, to the rise of LeBron’s landscape-altering talent agency and its attempts to assert its own power within the Lakers’ walls, to the evolution of LeBron’s priorities and political voice, “A Hollywood Ending” is the definitive story of an American icon’s final years on stage, one portraying him, a fabled NBA franchise, and the world of modern professional sports in a light never seen before.

Vroman's Bookstore: TICKETED - Olivie Blake, in conversation with Chuck Tingle, discusses & signs Girl Dinner
2025-10-21 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Atlas Six, Girl Dinner is a darkly fun novel about power, lust, and eating your fill, as wealthy moms and sorority girls practice a sinister new wellness trend . . .
Good girls deserve a treat.
Every member of The House, the most exclusive sorority on campus, and all its alumni, are beautiful, high-achieving, and universally respected.
After a freshman year she would rather forget, sophomore Nina Kaur knows being one of the chosen few accepted into The House is the first step in her path to the brightest possible future. Once she’s taken into their fold, the House will surely ease her fears of failure and protect her from those who see a young woman on her own as easy prey.
Meanwhile, adjunct professor Dr. Sloane Hartley is struggling to return to work after accepting a demotion to support her partner’s new position at the cutthroat University. After 18 months at home with her newborn daughter, Sloane’s clothes don’t fit right, her girl-dad husband isn’t as present as he thinks he is, and even the few hours a day she’s apart from her child fill her psyche with paralyzing ennui. When invited to be The House’s academic liaison, Sloane enviously drinks in the way the alumnae seem to have it all, achieving a level of collective perfection that Sloane so desperately craves.
As Nina and Sloane each get drawn deeper into the arcane rituals of the sisterhood, they learn that living well comes with bloody costs. And when they are finally invited to the table, they will have to decide just how much they can stomach in the name of solidarity
BIOS:
OLIVIE BLAKE is the New York Times bestselling author of The Atlas Six, Alone with You in the Ether, One for My Enemy, Masters of Death, Januaries, and Gifted & Talented. As Alexene Farol Follmuth, she is also the author of the young adult rom-coms Twelfth Knight and My Mechanical Romance. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and son.
CHUCK TINGLE is the USA Today bestselling author of Camp Damascus and Straight. He is a mysterious force of energy behind sunglasses and a pink mask. He is also an anonymous author of romance, horror, and fantasy. Chuck was born in Home of Truth, Utah, and lives in Los Angeles, California. Chuck writes to prove love is real, because love is the most important tool we have when resisting the endless cosmic void. Not everything people say about Chuck is true, but the important parts are.

Wellness in the Park: Brick City Boxing LA
2025-10-23 17:30 - 18:30 | Playhouse Village Park, 701 Union St, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
🥊 Wellness in the Park wraps up the season with a knockout finale led by Brick City Boxing LA! Get ready to sweat, punch, and power through an outdoor boxing workout designed for all levels. Don’t miss your last chance to move with us this fall.
Please Note: Due to shorter days Wellness in the Park will be at 5:30PM. Be sure to RSVP at Link in Bio or visit playhousevillage/wellness
This session is part of Wellness in the Park, a free outdoor series presented by Playhouse Village Foundation designed to get people outside, moving, and connected. Enjoy free outdoor classes with local Playhouse Village studios and gyms presented by Playhouse Village Foundation.

Pasadena Playhouse: ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
2025-10-23 19:00 | Pasadena Playhouse, 39 S. El Molino Avenue, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
All Julia Masli wants to do is solve people’s problems and win the Nobel Peace Prize, but this plan keeps going wrong as she continually wins prizes for comedy. In her wildly unpredictable solo show ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, the award-winning performer turns the audience’s problems into surreal, side-splitting theater. No script, no safety net, just one woman on a mission to help. After sensational runs in Edinburgh, Melbourne, New York, and D.C., Julia is on her way to Pasadena to solve all our problems.

Vroman's Bookstore: Liz Parker, discusses & signs Witches of Honeysuckle House
2025-10-24 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Haunted by a curse that kills someone close to their family every thirteen years, two sisters must come together to break the spell and save that which they hold most dear.
This enchanting novel explores the fraught lines between family and the secrets they keep, perfect for fans of Ava Morgyn and Heather Webber.
Florence and Evie Caldwell have long disagreed on how to break their family’s curse, and tension has been high since their mother’s death thirteen years ago. Honeysuckle House, the family estate where every Caldwell has lived, now only houses one of the sisters. Evie has crafted it into an enchanted bed and breakfast while Florence runs a magical bookstore in town, refusing to even set foot inside Honeysuckle House.
But when the house starts behaving dangerously and catches fire, Florence and Evie must set aside their differences and dig into past generations of their family and the town’s history before the curse claims someone they love.
Witches of Honeysuckle House is an exploration of sisterhood, family, and the places we call home, perfect for readers who love the darker aspects of Weyward and the sister dynamics of The Crescent Moon Tearoom.

Archetype Yoga: Monthly Book Club
2025-10-25 11:30 - 12:30 | Archetypa Yoga, 638 e colorado ave, pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
At Archetype Yoga, students are encouraged to evolve beyond the mat through a monthly book club that focuses on one thoughtfully selected title each month. The group gathers regularly to discover, gain insights, and learn together with a shared emphasis on wellness and movement.
Participants are invited to take part in this engaging community experience and receive studio discounts as a reward for their reading journey.
For the latest book pick, visit Instagram @archetypeyoga or email hello@archetype.yoga for more information.

Vroman’s & Lil’ Libros Present: Maritere R. Bellas, reading & signing Tío Ricky Doesn't Speak English / Tío Ricky No Habla Inglés: A Bilingual English-Spanish Picture Book
2025-10-25 13:00 - 14:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Knock, knock! Tío Ricky is in town and he needs his nephew Enrique’s help! He doesn’t speak any English, so his nephew has to translate for him at the store, the post office, and the bank. But speaking Spanish feels like such a chore…until Enrique finds himself in a situation where his bilingual skills become life-saving. Enrique soon discovers that speaking two languages isn’t just helpful–it’s powerful, and it can strengthen family ties in ways he never imagined. It’s a heartwarming story in English and Spanish that shows you don’t need a superhero cape to be a hero!

Pasadena Playhouse: ha ha ha ha ha ha ha (Childcare Matinee)
2025-10-25 14:00 | Pasadena Playhouse, 39 S. El Molino Avenue, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States

FUMC: Trunk-or Treat
2025-10-25 18:00 - 20:00 | First United Methodist Church, 500 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Bring your friends and family to our annual Trunk-or-Treat in our church parking lot! There will be games, crafts, and trick-or-treating for children ages 12 and under, but we welcome people of all ages to come enjoy the food and fun. We encourage everyone to wear costumes (Nothing scary and no masks, please!).
The parking lot will be full of decorated car trunks. Children will be able to trick-or-treat at each one. There will be prizes for the most creative trunks! This event is FREE (no need to RSVP) We hope to see you and all of our Pasadena neighbors there!

Bark in the Park: Howl-O-Ween Costume Contest & Parade
2025-10-26 11:00 - 14:00 | Playhouse Village Park, 701 Union St, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Everyone’s favorite Halloween-themed Dog “Pawty” Returns to Playhouse Village Park on Sunday,
October 26 from 11AM to 2PM.
Playhouse Village invites dogs and their owners to celebrate Halloween and have a howling good time at the annual Bark in the Park: Howl-o-ween on Sunday, October 27 from 11 am to 2 pm at Playhouse Village Park. This free spooktacular event presented by Playhouse Village Foundation features a costume parade and contests with prizes, treat stations & pup bites, photo-ops, pet caricatures, and more fun activities for dogs and humans.
Dogs can show off their best scary, adorable, and creative Halloween costumes at the Bark in the Park Howl-o-ween Costume Contest, with prizes awarded for Best Small Dog Costume, Best Big Dog Costume, and Best Group Costume, which is open to entries with multiple dogs or a human and dog combination. For additional information on the Bark in the Park: Howl-o-ween celebration, contact Playhouse Village Association at 626.744.0340.

Archetype Yoga: Cosmic Sound Bath
2025-10-26 19:30 - 21:30 | Archetypa Yoga, 638 e colorado ave, pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Members are FREE | Non-Members $35📚 Bring a journal, pen, and a mug!
An evening to journey inward through vibration, intuition and connection. Join Starla for a Sound bath, breath work and tea.
In this workshop, expect to:
🔥🐍 Step into Scorpio season with us, and embrace themes of shedding and transformation.
Join @starlafrequency for a Cosmic Sound + Breath Journey to shed what’s old and root new intentions.
Stir up what’s stuck with breath work, then melt into a crystal bowl Sound Bath to calm the nervous system, renew your creative spark, and find equilibrium in relationships. Plus: the event will feature a custom scent blend woven through + journaling to leave the evening with 1–2 grounded intentions.
Come as you are—no experience needed.

Vroman's Bookstore: Thomas Schlesser discusses & signs Mona’s Eyes
2025-10-27 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
THE SENSATIONAL #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER THAT HAS TAKEN THE WORLD BY STORM
Ten-year-old Mona and her beloved grandfather have only fifty-two Wednesdays to visit fifty-two works of art and commit to memory “all that is beautiful in the world” before Mona loses her sight forever.
While the doctors can find no explanation for Mona’s brief episode of blindness, they agree that the threat of permanent vision loss cannot be ruled out. The girl’s grandfather, Henry, may not be able to stop his granddaughter from losing her sight, but he can fill the encroaching darkness with beauty.
Every Wednesday for a year, the pair abscond together and visit a single masterpiece in one of Paris’s renowned museums. From Botticelli to Basquiat, Mona learns how each artist’s work shaped the world around them. In turn, the young girl’s world is changed forever by the power of their art. Under the kind and careful tutelage of her grandfather, Mona learns the true meaning of generosity, melancholy, love, loss, and revolution. Her perspective will never be the same — nor will the reader’s.
Mona’s Eyes is a heartfelt, enlightening journey across five centuries of Western art history. With the emotional impact of The Elegance of the Hedgehog and the readability of The Little Paris Bookshop, Thomas Schlesser’s sensational debut novel is at once a moving book about the beauty of life and a deeply touching story about the special bond between a girl and her grandfather.
Discover all 52 masterpieces inside the fold-out dustjacket.

Vroman's Bookstore: Eli Frankel discusses & signs Sisters in Death: The Black Dahlia, the Prairie Heiress, and Their Hunter
2025-10-28 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Who killed the Black Dahlia? In this eye-opening shocker, an award-winning producer, true-crime researcher, and Hollywood insider finally solves the greatest – and most gruesome – murder mystery of the twentieth century just before its 80th anniversary.
In January 1947, the bisected body of Elizabeth Short, completely drained of blood, was discovered in an undeveloped lot in Los Angeles. Its gruesome mutilations led to a firestorm of publicity, city-wide panic, and an unprecedented number of investigative paths led by the LAPD–all dead ends. The Black Dahlia murder remained an unsolved mystery for over seventy years.
Six years earlier and sixteen hundred miles away, another woman’s life had ended in a similarly horrific manner. Leila Welsh was an ambitious, educated, popular, and socially connected beauty. Though raised modestly on a prairie farm, she was heiress to her Kansas City family’s status and wealth. On a winter morning in 1941, Leila’s butchered body was found in her bedroom bearing the marks of unspeakable trauma.
One victim faded into obscurity. The other became notorious. Both had in common a killer whose sadistic mind was a labyrinth of dark secrets.
Eli Frankel reveals for the first time a key fact about the Black Dahlia crime scene, never before shared with the public, that leads inexorably to the stunning identification of a criminal who was at the same time amateurish and fiendish, skilled and lucky, sophisticated and brutish. Drawing on newly discovered documents, law enforcement files, interviews with the last surviving participants, the victims’ own letters, trial transcripts, military records, and more, this epic true-crime saga puts together the missing pieces of a legendary puzzle.
In Sisters in Death, the Black Dahlia cold case is finally closed.

Vroman's Bookstore: Ticketed - Andrew Morton discusses & signs Winston and the Windsors: How Churchill Shaped a Royal Dynasty
2025-10-29 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
From an early age, Winston Churchill was convinced that he was a man of destiny. Today, it seems his premonition was correct; few figures in British history have been so deeply and consequently involved with the British family as Churchill. While many people in positions of power have advised kings and queens during their reign, Churchill is unique in his role: helping to shape not only a reign, but an entire royal dynasty.
In Winston and the Windsors, one of the world’s best-known biographers and a leading authority on celebrity Andrew Morton presents a meticulously researched joint biography of Winston Churchill and the House of Windsor. Throughout the course of his career and life, Churchill’s relationship with the Windsor’s fluctuated wildly. At times, he was the royal family’s trusted confidante. At others, he was their leading antagonist. In exploring the complex relationship between the two, Morton argues that – whether the attitudes of the royal family were warm or icy towards Churchill – their relationship is central to the twentieth-century history of the British monarchy.
From the Churchill family’s complex relationship with the crown; to Winston’s initially begrudging but ultimately fruitful partnership with George VI; to his enduring fondness for Queen Elizabeth II, this fascinating narrative biography sheds a new light on the ways the crown not only shaped Winston Churchill’s career – but the ways in which Churchill shepherded the monarchy into the modern era.
This is an in-store ticketed event with two ticket options.- General Admission + 1 copy of Winston and the Windsors– 2 General Admissions + 1 copy of Winston and the Windsors

Young Readers' Halloween at Vroman's Boo-kstore!
2025-10-31 16:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Join us on Friday, October 31st for Halloween at Vroman’s Boo-kstore!
We will have a special Halloween themed storytime with Mr. Steve and Halloween activities starting at 4pm.
After storytime, make your way through Vroman’s for trick-or-treating! We will have designated spots all around the Boo-kstore where young ghouls and goblins can happily haunt for goodies!
Costumes are highly encouraged!

Vroman's Bookstore: Pasadena Conservatory of Music presents Musical Storytime: Over the River and Through the Wood by Lydia Maria Child
2025-11-01 11:30 - 12:30 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
The Pasadena Conservatory of Music will be putting on a special musical storytime with featured book: Over the River and Through the Wood by Lydia Maria Child. Caregivers and children aged 3-9 will enjoy story, craft activities, creative movement and a mini-concert!

Vroman's On Screen - Howard Berger discusses & signs Making Monsters: Inside Stories from the Creators of Hollywood's Most Iconic Creatures
2025-11-01 16:00 - 18:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Explore behind the scenes of the greatest monster movies ever made!
What makes a great movie monster? Academy Award-winning make-up effects artist Howard Berger and acclaimed journalist Marshall Julius have spoken to dozens of film industry legends to find out.
A celebration of monsters, monster movies and monster movie makers, Making Monsters delivers an illuminating, entertaining and accessible oral history of the genre, gathering an enviable array of A-list talent from make-up and digital effects legends (Tom Savini, Phil Tippett) to directors (John Carpenter, Ti West), actors (Simon Pegg, Barbara Crampton), composers (Michael Giacchino) and writers (Russell T Davies).
Packed with hundreds of images, from film stills to personal, behind-the-scenes pictures from dozens of interview subjects – many never before published – Making Monsters is a treasure trove of monstrous creations, and the stories behind them, that is sure to make fans jump, scream and howl with delight.

Vroman’s On Screen is an ongoing event series highlighting books & authors that explore the elements of Film and Television from actors & directors to artists behind the camera to media studies & criticism.

Tepito Coffee + Vroman’s Bookstore Present: Rings of Dissent: Boxing and Performances of Rebellion
2025-11-02 11:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Tepito Coffee + Vroman’s Bookstore Present: Rings of Dissent: Boxing and Performances of Rebellion, a special conversation moderated by Mike de la Rocha, featuring Rudy Mondragón, Gaye Theresa Johnson & Priscilla Leiva

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Professional boxers practice their trade within an ostensibly apolitical arena. In reality, however, the fighters work inside a capitalistic and neoliberal sports culture that they both challenge and uphold. This collection delves into professional boxing’s capacity for brilliance, contradiction, resistance, and complicity. Scholars, activists, and artists explore the boxing ring as a site for understanding original and diverse ideas about the performance of race, citizenship, gender, power, and dissent. Essays and interviews draw attention to the cultural politics and performances of marginalized boxers while revealing the structures of power and practices of agency at work around Black, Brown, and queer bodies. As the contributors establish boxing’s central place in communities of color, they open exciting new avenues for studying race, immigration, gender, and capital. Multifaceted and innovative, Rings of Dissent uncovers fascinating corners of the boxing world as it illuminates what the sport tells us about America.

Vroman's Bookstore: Caroline L. Perry & Sydney Hanson read from & sign I Am Not Happy!
2025-11-02 14:00 - 15:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
In the vein of Grumpy Monkey and Unicorns Are the Worst!, this hilarious picture book introduces the adorable quokka, who–despite his ever-present smile–is definitely not as happy as he looks!
With its bright eyes, puffy cheeks, and beaming smile, the quokka is clearly the happiest animal on earth. Or is it? This quokka is here to tell you…he is not happy! At least not all the time. Just like everyone else, he can be sulky, or sorry, or sad; but you’d never know from the look on his face! So, what’s a moody marsupial to do when he’s being misunderstood? Teach every other animal from kangaroos to koalas not to judge a critter by its cover!

Vroman's Bookstore: Garrett Hongo and Robin Coste Lewis read from & sign their new books Ocean of Clouds: Poems and Archive of Desire: A Poem in Four Parts for C. P. Cavafy
2025-11-02 16:00 - 17:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
About Ocean of Clouds:
In his fourth book of poems, award-winning poet Garrett Hongo sees coastlines and waters, skylines and ancestral lines for what they inspire and teach.
In a surpassingly beautiful collection of poems, with his characteristic long-lined, rolling music, Hongo is alert to the possibilities of individual moments of perception and grace in the landscapes of his life, whether waiting for a ferry in Balboa after a writing workshop (“An oil slick from a yacht . . . / Spread rainbows on the water, an aleph / curving toward us”) or hanging out and playing LPs with the late, great poet Michael Harper, or watching his daughter in the sun with a halo of messy twelve-year-old’s hair, or listening to the sea, which speaks to him in so many places: at the Wai’ōpae Tidepools, at Cassis, at Divi Bay in Saint Martin, where, he tells us, “I thought of writing to the soul of Nâzim Hikmet, / saying loving a woman was like writing a book– / . . . it is love’s body on which you write a page of kisses . . .”
These poems of cloudy moons and sandstone cliffsides, the black glass of lava shattered into sands, waves surging, and stories of a poet’s gratitude for the journey he has made, come together to make a paean against forgetting.
About Archive of Desire:
The National Book Award, PEN/Voelcker Award, and NAACP Image Award winner returns with another inventive and boundary-breaking book: a sensual journey ignited in the archives of iconic queer Alexandrian poet C. P. Cavafy.
In her first book, Robin Coste Lewis’s poems exploded the imagery of the Black female figure from antiquity through the present day. Her second book was an expansive hybrid photographic and poetic study of human migration and the human family. Now she delivers a “poem in four parts,” which originated as a musical, visual, and lyrical collaboration with the composer Vijay Iyer, cellist Jeffrey Zeigler, and visual artist Julie Mehretu, with Lewis on the microphone offering a live reading of this sequence. Ignited by their encounters with Cavafy’s archive, in the heart of Athens, the multimedia quartet exalted the liminal spaces where desire and diaspora meet–where art often asserts itself most forcefully. In this volume, Lewis brings this performance to life on the page, where the poem weaves in and out of Cavafy’s bedrooms, notebooks, and the suppressed erotic excavation underpinning all of his work. Lewis converses directly with Mr. Cavafy: “often you / reminded us that // the only true / barbarians are the ones / raging in silence inside // of our own / minds.” But she also brings equal parts of herself to this study of artistry and sensuality, as in the short, tender section entitled “Cavafy in Compton/Closet Anthem: Self-Portrait at Sixteen, 1979.”
As in all Lewis’s works, here she reaches across centuries to express what is timeless and not bound by our current moment or our single selves: the discipline and glory of art, the give-and-take of love, the kiss that lives in the moment, and the unfolding journey of being human, whose contours become clear only with the passage of time, the igniting of memory, and the words we find to describe the journey.

Vroman's Bookstore: TICKETED - Mac Barnett & Shawn Harris Present: The First Cat in Space and the Baby Pirate's Revenge: A Graphic Novel
2025-11-03 18:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
In the fourth installment of Mac Barnett and Shawn Harris’s New York Times-bestselling series our heroes–First Cat, LOZ 4000, and the Moon Queen– encounter Captain Babybeard and his crew of swashbuckling pirates.

Vroman's Bookstore: Julia Ioffee discusses & signs Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, from Revolution to Autocracy
2025-11-04 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD
Acclaimed journalist Julia Ioffe tells the story of modern Russia through the history of its women, from revolution to utopia to autocracy.
In 1990, seven-year-old Julia Ioffe and her family fled the Soviet Union. Nearly twenty years later, Ioffe returned to Moscow—only to discover just how much Russian society had changed while she had been living in America. The Soviet women she had known growing up—doctors, engineers, scientists—seemed to have been replaced by women desperate to marry rich and become stay-at-home moms. How had Russia gone from portraying itself as the vanguard of world feminism to becoming a bastion of conservative Christian values?
In Motherland, Ioffe turns modern Russian history on its head, telling it exclusively through the stories of its women. From her own physician great-grandmothers to Lenin’s lover, a feminist revolutionary; from the hundreds of thousands of Soviet girls who fought in World War II to the millions of single mothers who rebuilt and repopulated a devastated country; from the members of Pussy Riot to Yulia Navalnaya, the wife of opposition leader Alexey Navalny, Ioffe chronicles one of the most audacious social experiments in history and documents how it failed the very women it was meant to liberate—and how that failure paved the way for the revanche of Vladimir Putin.
Part memoir, part journalistic exploration, part history, Motherland paints a portrait of modern Russia through the women who shaped it. With deep emotion, Ioffe reveals what it means to live through the cataclysms of revolution, war, idealism, and heartbreak—and how the story of Russia today is inextricably tied to the sacrifices of its women.
