Vroman's Bookstore: Margaret Chandra Kerrison, in conversation with Todd Martens, discusses The Art of Immersive Storytelling
2025-03-05 19:00 - 20:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Level up your storytelling with award-winning experience designer, world builder, and former Disney Imagineer.
Immersive experiences and interactive exhibits are popping up all over the world, telling stories that engage our imaginations and sense of play like never before.
Exploring the parallels between video games and the world’s most exciting, innovative spaces, this sequel to the groundbreaking Immersive Storytelling for Real and Imagined Worlds explains how the same techniques that pull players into games for hours at a time can be employed to draw participants into immersive experiences. Join Margaret Kerrison as she guides our next generation of immersive storytellers on a deep dive into the creative possibilities of this new realm of storytelling.
Todd Martens is a features columnist at the Los Angeles Times who writes about theme parks and West Coast Experiences, among other topics. Martens joined the Los Angeles Times in 2007 and has covered a mix of interactive entertainment as its game critic and pop music as a reporter and editor.

Vroman's Bookstore: Tim Z. Hernandez discusses They Call You Back
2025-03-06 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A haunting, an obsession, a calling: Tim Z. Hernandez has been searching for people his whole life. Now, in this highly anticipated memoir, he takes us along on an investigative odyssey through personal and collective history to uncover the surprising conjunctions that bind our stories together.
Hernandez’s mission to find the families of the twenty-eight Mexicans who were killed in the 1948 plane wreck at Los Gatos Canyon formed the basis for his acclaimed documentary novel All They Will Call You, which the San Francisco Chronicle dubbed “a stunning piece of investigative journalism,” and the New York Times hailed as “painstaking detective work by a writer who is the descendant of farmworkers.”
In this riveting new work, Hernandez continues his search for the plane crash victims while also turning the lens on himself and his ancestral past, revealing the tumultuous and deeply intimate experiences that have fueled his investigations—a lifelong journey haunted by memory, addiction, generational trauma, and the spirit world.
They Call You Back is the true chronicle of one man’s obsession to restore dignity to an undignified chapter in America’s past, while at the same time making a case for why we must heal our personal wounds if we are ever to heal our political ones.

Vroman's Bookstore: Surekha Davies, in conversation with Megan Kate Nelson, discuss Humans: A Monstrous History
2025-03-07 08:00 - 17:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A history of how humans have created monsters out of one another—from our deepest fears—and what these monsters tell us about humanity’s present and future.
Monsters are central to how we think about the human condition. Join award-winning historian of science Dr. Surekha Davies as she reveals how people have defined the human about everything from apes to zombies, and how they invented race, gender, and nations along the way. With rich, evocative storytelling that braids together ancient gods and generative AI, Frankenstein’s monster and E.T., Humans: A Monstrous History shows how monster-making is about control: it defines who gets to count as normal.
In an age when corporations increasingly see people as obstacles to profits, this book traces the long, volatile history of monster-making and charts a better path for the future. The result is a profound, effervescent, empowering retelling of the history of the world for anyone who wants to reverse rising inequality and polarization. This is not a history of monsters, but a history through monsters.

Vroman's Bookstore: Angie Kang discusses Our Lake
2025-03-08 11:00 - 12:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A tender and vulnerable exploration of love and loss that follows two boys as they take their first trip back to the lake without their father, from debut author-illustrator Angie Kang.
Today, Brother is taking me up to swim in the lake like Father used to.
I want to thank him for bringing us here, but I can’t find the words.
Instead, I loop my arms around his torso, and he does the same back.
Here, in our lake, the water holds us close.
On a sweltering hot day, a little boy mirrors his brother as he takes off his shirt, stretches, and walks toward the edge of the tall rock, ready to dive into the cool lake waters glistening below. Only this time, Father is not here. And the water looks so far away. How can he take the plunge?
With a gorgeous, deft touch in her exquisitely soft illustrations and words, Angie Kang conveys vulnerability, longing, and connection as these two boys hear Father’s laugh and see his memory all around them, uniting them in a bittersweet moment.

Vroman's Bookstore: Kim Fay, in conversation with J. Ryan Stradal, discusses Kate & Frida: A Novel of Friendship, Food, and Books
2025-03-11 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
From the author of instant national bestseller Love & Saffron, this bright and comforting novel follows the surprising friendship between two young women in 1990s Seattle and Paris, illuminating the power of books to change our lives.
Sometimes a book can change your life…
Twentysomething Frida Rodriguez arrives in Paris in 1991, relishing the city’s butter-soaked cuisine and seeking her future as a war correspondent. But then she writes to a bookshop in Seattle, and receives more than just the book she requests. A friendship begins that will redefine the person she wants to become.
Seattle bookseller Kate Fair is transformed by Frida’s free spirit, spurred to believe in herself as a writer, to kiss her handsome coworker, and to find beauty even in loss. Through the most tumultuous years of their young lives—personally and globally—Kate and Frida sustain and nourish each other as they learn the necessity of embracing joy, especially through our darkest hours.
This mouthwatering oasis of a novel is a love letter to bookshops and booksellers, to the passion we bring to life in our twenties, and to the last precious years before the internet changed everything.

Music at Noon: Andrew Bacjoe Egbuchiem, countertenor
2025-03-12 12:10 - 12:40 | Pasadena Presbyterian Church Musical Events, 585 East Colorado Boulevard, Pasadena, California, 91101
Pasadena Presbyterian Church presents Music at Noon a free lunchtime concert spotlighting local artists this week enjoy Andrew Bacjoe Egbuchiem. Can’t make it in person check out their YouTube channel for new virtual concerts every week.

Vroman’s presents Joel Stern presenting "In the Easter Egg Workshop" Papercraft Workshop
2025-03-12 16:00 - 17:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Join origami artist and author Joel Stern for a creative craft workshop on March 12th, from 4-5pm! Watch as Easter pop-ups and origami creatures come to life through the magic of paper folding.
Joel is the author of the newly published In the Easter Egg Workshop: A Pop-Up Adventure, as well as many other papercraft books. His art has been featured in movies, commercials, and on television. Visit his website here.
Please RSVP at rsvp@vromansbookstore.com with the subject “Stern Workshop”

Pasadena Heritage: Irish Tales By The Fire
2025-03-13 18:00 - 19:00 | Blinn House, 160 N. Oakland Ave., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Padraic P. Keohane, storyteller, author, and teacher, shares tales of wit, wonder, and wisdom, captivating audiences for nearly 50 years.

Vroman’s Ed – Romance Writing Class with Amy Spalding (8 weeks)
2025-03-13 18:30 - 19:30 | Atrium Building, 709 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Please note, this class has been moved from January 9th. (Please note: this 8 week class will be held on Thursdays, 6:30-8:30pm – *3/13, 3/20, 3/27, 4/3, 4/10, 4/17, 4/24 and 5/1)
Have you always wanted to write your own HEA (that’s a happily-ever-after)? This class is for anyone interested in writing a romance novel—or who’s started one but feels like they need some help getting to that happy ending! In this 8-week course, bestselling author Amy Spalding will teach you the fundamentals of romance novels.
From Meet Cute to HEA: Writing the Modern Romance Novel will focus on structure, with specialized lectures each week to learn more about each beat, from the setup to the meet-cute, all the way through to that glorious HEA. Topics covered will include genre conventions (yes, like tropes!), dialogue/banter, building tension (sexual and otherwise!), inclusivity/diversity in storytelling, common pitfalls, and more.
Classes will be mostly lecture/discussion, with time set aside each week for writing exercises and brainstorming. The goal is for each writer to leave class with a full outline of their romance novel, as well as some example scenes and exercises they may be able to use in the manuscript as well.
Students will also leave class with resources: each week’s presentation will be sent out to all students, as well as additional links for further examples/education.
Amy Spalding is the author of several adult and YA novels, including the bestselling romance For Her Consideration, We Used to Be Friends, and YA romance The Summer of Jordi Perez (and the Best Burger in Los Angeles), which was named the best book of 2018 by NPR, the Boston Globe, Kirkus Reviews, and more. She is a recipient of the 2023 Human Rights Campaign Visibility Award for the authentic, funny, and diverse representation of the LGBTQ+ community in her books.
Amy grew up in St. Louis and now lives in Los Angeles. She has a B.A. in Advertising & Marketing Communications from Webster University and an M.A. in Media Studies from The New School. Amy studied long form improv at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre.
*This class will be held on the following dates – 1/9, 1/16, 1/23, 1/30, 2/6, 2/13, 2/20, and 3/6 (with no class on 2/27) and will take place in the Vroman’s Meeting Room located next door to Vroman’s Main Store in the Atrium at 709 E. Colorado Blvd. Suite 120.
(Please register by the end of day 1/8/25)
Questions? Email@vromansbookstore.com or call (626)449-5320

Vroman's Bookstore: Mallory O’Meara discusses Daughter of Daring: The Trick-Riding, Train-Leaping, Road-Racing Life of Helen Gibson, Hollywood's First Stuntwoman
2025-03-13 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
From LA Times bestselling author Mallory O’Meara, the story of America’s first professional stuntwoman, Helen Gibson, who rose to fame during a time when women ruled Hollywood.
Helen Gibson was a woman willing to do anything to give audiences a thrill. Advertised as “The Most Daring Actress in Pictures,” Helen emerged in the early days of the twentieth-century silent film scene as a rodeo rider, background actor, stunt double, and eventually one of the era’s biggest action stars. Her exploits on motorcycles, train cars, and horseback were as dangerous as they were glamorous, featured in hundreds of films and serials–yet her legacy was quickly overshadowed by the increasingly hypermasculine and male-dominated evolution of cinema in the decades that would follow her.
Award-winning author Mallory O’Meara presents her life and career in exhilarating detail, including:

Helen’s rise to fame in The Hazards of Helen, the longest-running serial in history
How Helen became the first-ever stuntwoman in American film
The pivotal role of Helen’s contemporaries–including female directors, stars, and stunt women who shaped the making of cinema as we know it.

Through the page-turning story of Helen’s pioneering legacy, Mallory O’Meara gives readers a glimpse of the Golden Age of Hollywood that could have been: an industry where women call the shots.

Blaze Pizza: Pi Day!
2025-03-14 08:00 - 22:00 | Blaze Pizza, 667 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Blaze Pizza is celebrating Pi Day! Enjoy pizzas for just $3.14 each. Head to Blaze Pizza and make Pi Day delicious!

ArtNight Pasadena
2025-03-14 18:00 - 22:00 | USC Pacific Asia Museum, 46 North Los Robles Avenue, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
ArtNight Pasadena is an ongoing partnership among many cultural institutions and the Cultural Affairs Division of the City of Pasadena. Enjoy an evening of art, music, and entertainment as Pasadena’s most prominent arts and cultural institutions offer free admission for the evening. Be sure to check out USC Pacific Asia Museum’s exhibit Cai Guo-Qiang: A Material Odyssey.

Vroman's Bookstore: Rima Fakih Slaiby & Theresa AlHayek read from Brave Buzzy Bee
2025-03-15 11:00 - 12:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
From Miss USA 2010, Rima Fakih Slaiby, and debut author Theresa AlHayek comes a story about a brave little bee who never gives up.
Buzzy Bee is excited to participate in the Colony’s upcoming race. There’s just one problem: he isn’t very fast! But Buzzy is not a quitter, so he practices tirelessly to get better and better. But on the day of the race, things don’t exactly go as expected. Can Buzzy save the day and win the race?
Told in beautiful bouncing rhyme with gorgeous illustrations by Angela Li, Brave Buzzy Bee provides a lesson for young readers about the true meaning of bravery, featuring a character that audiences can’t help but fall in love with.

FUMC: Third@First: St. Patrick’s Day Concert
2025-03-15 16:00 - 17:00 | First United Methodist Church, 500 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
First United Methodist Church’s Third@First concert series presents a special program of Irish music in celebration of St. Patrick’s Day. Enjoy a lively performance by the Irish band Sligo Rags and don’t forget to wear your favorite green attire!

Pasadena Complete Streets Coalition: Let's Go Visit the Neighbors!
2025-03-16 10:00 - 13:00 | Playhouse Village Park, 701 Union St, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
The Pasadena Complete Streets Coalition proudly announces their first ride of the year! Riders will journey to the neighboring city of San Marino, exploring its historic sites. The excursion will include a stop at the Huntington Library’s coffee shop/cafeteria area, where coffee and food items will be available for purchase at two locations. This cycling adventure will cover approximately 12 miles with an elevation gain of 500 feet.

T. Boyles Tavern: St Patricks Day
2025-03-17 12:00 | T. Boyle’s Tavern, 37 N Catalina Ave, Pasadena, CA, 91106, Select a Country:
T. Boyle’s Tavern is serving up a special St. Patrick’s Day menu featuring a corned beef and cabbage plate with red potatoes, corned beef sandwiches, Reuben sandwiches, and their signature Irish Nachos—crispy potato chips topped with beer cheese and corned beef. Don’t miss out on these festive flavors!

Vroman's Bookstore (Ticketed): Torrey Peters discusses Stag Dance
2025-03-18 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
This is an in-store ticketed event with two ticket options:

General Admission to the event + 1 copy of Stag Dance which will be handed out at check-in
General Admission to the event

In this collection of one novel and three stories, bestselling author Torrey Peters’ keen eye for the rough edges of community and desire push the limits of trans writing.
In Stag Dance, the titular novel, a group of restless lumberjacks working in an illegal winter logging outfit plan a dance that some of them will volunteer to attend as women. When the broadest, strongest, plainest of the axmen announces his intention to dance as a woman, he finds himself caught in a strange rivalry with a pretty young jack, provoking a cascade of obsession, jealousy, and betrayal that will culminate on the big night in an astonishing vision of gender and transition.
Three startling stories surround Stag Dance: “Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones” imagines a gender apocalypse brought about by an unstable ex-girlfriend. In “The Chaser,” a secret romance between roommates at a Quaker boarding school brings out intrigue and cruelty. In the last story, “The Masker,” a party weekend on the Las Vegas strip turns dark when a young crossdresser must choose between two guides: a handsome mystery man who objectifies her in thrilling ways, or a cynical veteran trans woman offering unglamorous sisterhood.
Acidly funny and breathtaking in its scope, with the inventive audacity of George Saunders or Jennifer Egan, Stag Dance provokes, unsettles, and delights.

Music at Noon: Iris Malkin, mezzo-soprano
2025-03-19 12:10 - 12:40 | Pasadena Presbyterian Church Musical Events, 585 East Colorado Boulevard, Pasadena, California, 91101
Pasadena Presbyterian Church presents Music at Noon a free lunchtime concert spotlighting local artists this week enjoy Iris Malkin. Can’t make it in person check out their YouTube channel for new virtual concerts every week.

Vroman's Bookstore: Jennifer Chen, in conversation with Edward Underhill, discusses Hangry Hearts
2025-03-19 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Love, family, and food collide in this sparkling Romeo and Juliet-inspired romance.
Julie Wu and Randall Hur used to be best friends. Now they only see each other on Saturdays at the Pasadena Farmers Market where their once close families are long-standing rivals.
When Julie and Randall are paired with ultra-rich London Kim for a community-service school project, they are forced to work together for the first time in years. It quickly becomes obvious that London has a major crush on Julie. But Julie can’t stop thinking about Randall. And Randall can’t stop thinking about how London is thinking about Julie. Soon, prompted by a little jealousy and years of missing each other, school project meetings turn into pseudo dates at their favorite Taiwanese breakfast shop and then secret kisses at the beach—far from the watchful eyes of their families.
Just as they’re finally feeling brave enough to tell their grandmas, the two matriarchs rehash their old fight and Julie and Randall get caught in the middle and Julie’s brother finds out they are dating. Their families are heartbroken.
But it’s the Year of the Dragon, an auspicious time to resolve disagreements and start anew, and Randall isn’t going down without fighting for what—and who—they love. Could the Lunar New Year provide not only a second chance for Randall and Julie, but for their families as well?
Jennifer Chen’s Hangry Hearts is a funny, big-hearted romance about friendship, family, and first love—and being brave enough to have it all.

Vroman's Bookstore: Scaachi Koul, in conversation with Franchesca Ramsey, discusses & signs Sucker Punch: Essays
2025-03-21 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
The long-awaited follow-up from one of the most original and hilarious voices writing today.
Scaachi Koul’s first book was a collection of raw, perceptive, and hilarious essays reckoning with the issues of race, body image, love, friendship, and growing up the daughter of immigrants. When the time came to start writing her next book, Scaachi assumed she’d be updating her story with essays about her elaborate four-day wedding, settling down to domestic bliss, and continuing her never-ending arguments with her parents. Instead, the Covid-19 pandemic hit, Scaachi’s marriage fell apart, she lost her job, and her mother was diagnosed with cancer.
Sucker Punch is about what happens when the life you thought you’d be living radically changes course, everything you thought you knew about the world and yourself has tilted on its axis, and you have to start forging a new path forward. Scaachi employs her biting wit to interrogate her previous belief that fighting is the most effective tool for progress. She examines the fights she’s had–with her parents, her ex-husband, her friends, online strangers, and herself–all in an attempt to understand when a fight is worth having, and when it’s better to walk away.

Boston Court: Giggle, Giggle, Quack with the Helix Collective
2025-03-22 11:00 | Boston Court Pasadena, 70 N. Mentor Ave., Pasadena, CA, 91206, United States
Helix Collective’s delightful live musical story time event for ages 3-7 features Giggle, Giggle, Quack (the second book in the Click Clack Moo series by Doreen Cronin with illustrations by Betsy Lewin). The book is set to original music by Helix Collective resident composer, Phil Popham, and narrated by Broadway and T.V. actress Rena Strober. Come meet musicians, explore instruments, and hear Giggle, Giggle, Quack come to life!

Vroman's Bookstore: Matthew Burgess and Doug Salati present Words with Wings and Magic Things and Marla Frazee presents How Elegant the Elephant: Poems about Animals and Insects
2025-03-22 11:00 - 12:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Matthew Burgess and Doug Salati present Words with Wings and Magic Things
From award-winning author Matthew Burgess and Caldecott Medalist Doug Salati comes a spellbinding collection of poems for young readers that celebrates the power of words to awaken the imagination and alchemize the everyday. A gorgeous gift book for fans of Shel Silverstein with seven die-cut spreads throughout.
Beyond the doorway of the first page of this collection awaits a dragon piñata, an alligator on the A train, a hungry yeti, an ice cream dream, jetpack sneakers, midnight firelight, a gray day, a plump tomato, a serious question and so much more. Whether you’re feeling blue, lemon yellow or Day-Glo green, this inviting and magical book of poems takes young readers on an uplifting journey through everyday moments, moods and experiences, transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary. With enchanting illustrations throughout and seven die-cut portals that open into the realms of Welcome, Wonder, Wild, Weee!, Whoops & Wallops, Windows and Whispers & Well Wishes, Words With Wings and Magic Things explores how words can awaken us to a world of wonder and possibility. Step inside . . . and take flight!

Marla Frazee presents How Elegant the Elephant: Poems about Animals and Insects
A rollicking collection of poems about the enchanting world of animals and insects, from former children’s poet laureate and New York Times bestselling author Mary Ann Hoberman and Caldecott Honoree illustrator Marla Frazee.
So many kinds of animals
So many shapes and sizes
So many funny spots and dots
So many strange disguises
With her signature wordplay and wit, former children’s poet laureate Mary Ann Hoberman celebrates the magnificence, ingenuity, and quirky qualities of creatures big and small. This thoughtfully crafted collection features sixty of Mary Ann’s personal favorite poems curated from her sixty-five-year body of work, as well as eight new poems.
From a fine fat pig and backward running porcupines to a beastly card game and a yoga class for agile animals, this memorable menagerie is cunningly brought to life by three-time Caldecott Honoree Marla Frazee, in an imaginary world where the characters meet and tell an entertaining tale all their own.
A tour de force collection of poems and pictures by two legendary talents, this book creates a world that readers will never want to leave.

Vroman's Fiction Reading Group
2025-03-25 08:00 - 17:00 | CA
Description
INCLUDES A NEW INTRODUCTION BY PATRICK ROTHFUSS
Experience one of the most enduring classics of the twentieth century and the book that The Atlantic has called “one of the best fantasy novels ever.”
The unicorn lived in a lilac wood, and she lived all alone…
…so she ventured out from the safety of the enchanted forest on a quest for others of her kind. Joined along the way by the bumbling magician Schmendrick and the indomitable Molly Grue, the unicorn learns all about the joys and sorrows of life and love before meeting her destiny in the castle of a despondent monarch—and confronting the creature that would drive her kind to extinction….
In The Last Unicorn, renowned and beloved novelist Peter S. Beagle spins a poignant tale of love, loss, and wonder that has resonated with millions of readers around the world.
“Peter S. Beagle illuminates with his own particular magic.”—Ursula K. Le Guin
About the Author
Peter S. Beagle was born in 1939 and raised in the Bronx, just a few blocks from Woodlawn Cemetery, the inspiration for his first novel, A Fine and Private Place. Today, thanks to classic works such as The Last Unicorn, Tamsin and The Innkeeper’s Song, along with his forthcoming novel I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons, he is acknowledged as America’s greatest living fantasy author; and his dazzling abilities with language, characters, and magical storytelling have earned him many millions of fans around the world.
In addition to stories and novels Beagle has written numerous teleplays and screenplays, including the animated versions of The Lord of the Rings and The Last Unicorn, plus the fan-favorite “Sarek” episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. His nonfiction book I See By My Outfit, which recounts a 1963 journey across America on motor scooter, is considered a classic of American travel writing; and he is also a gifted poet, lyricist, and singer/songwriter.

Vroman's Bookstore: Richard Bienstock and Tom Beaujour discuss Lollapalooza: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock's Wildest Festival
2025-03-25 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
In Lollapalooza: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock’s Wildest Festival, New York Times bestselling authors Richard Bienstock and Tom Beaujour tell the no-holds-barred history of the iconic music festival. Through hundreds of new interviews with artists, tour founders, festival organizers, promoters, publicists, sideshow freaks, stage crews, record label execs, reporters, roadies and more, Lollapalooza chronicles the tour’s pioneering 1991-1997 run, and, in the process, alternative rock’s rise – as well as the reverberations that led to a massive shift in the music industry and the culture at large.
Lollapalooza features original interviews with some of the biggest names in music, including Perry Farrell and Jane’s Addiction, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Nine Inch Nails, Sonic Youth, Tool, Smashing Pumpkins, Ice-T, Rage Against the Machine, Green Day, Patti Smith, Alice in Chains, Metallica and many more.
Conceived by Farrell as a farewell tour for Jane’s Addiction, Lollapalooza’s inaugural outing across the U.S. in the summer of 1991 helped to coalesce an ideology and aesthetic that not only washed over popular music but seeped into fashion, film, television, literature, food, politics and more. Throughout the decade, Lollapalooza offered a vast and diverse ensemble of bands, breaking barriers of genre and uniting alternative rock, heavy metal, punk, hip-hop, industrial, goth, avant-garde, spoken word, electronic dance music, and other styles under one big tent, and setting the template for the modern American music festival and the scores of other contemporary destination fests that are now an integral part of how audiences experience live music.
Unorthodox not just in music, Lollapalooza also spotlighted visual arts, nonprofit organizations, political outfits, and even the occasional freak show, offering a tantalizing cocktail of culture, art, and activism that, taken together, defined the alternative mindset that dominated the 1990s. Echoes of its impact reverberate strongly today – cemented by annual sell-outs at destination events worldwide, an estimated 400,000 attendees at the flagship Chicago fest each summer, and a spot among the world’s largest and longest-running music festivals.
A nostalgic look back at 1990s music and culture, Lollapalooza traces the festival’s groundbreaking origins, following the tour as it progresses through the decade and documenting the action onstage, backstage, and behind-the-scenes in detailed, uncensored, and sometimes shocking first-person accounts. This is the story of Lollapalooza and the 1990s alternative rock revolution.

SCCM: Story & Craft
2025-03-26 10:30 - 23:00 | Southern California Children’s Museum, 459 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA, 91011, United States
At Southern California Children’s Museum, Story & Craft brings stories to life through arts, crafts, and interactive play! Designed for toddlers to kindergarteners, this weekly program introduces children to diverse authors, illustrators, cultures, and characters through storytelling, music, and hands-on creativity. Cultural lessons are woven in, celebrating heritage months and awareness days in a fun and engaging way.

Vroman's Bookstore: Silvia Park, in conversation with Jonny Sun, discusses Luminous
2025-03-26 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Prescient yet timeless, perfect for fans of Klara and the Sun and We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, this highly anticipated, sweeping debut set in a unified Korea tells the story of three estranged siblings—two human, one robot—as they collide against the backdrop of a murder investigation to settle old scores and make sense of their shattered childhood.
“I once had a family. At least, the earliest version of me had a family.”
In a reunified Korea of the near future, the sun beats down on a junkyard filled with abandoned robots, broken down for parts. Eleven-year-old Ruijie sifts through the scraps, searching for a piece that might support her failing body. There among the piles of trash, something catches her eye: a robot boy—so lifelike and strange, unlike anything she’s ever seen before.
Siblings Jun and Morgan haven’t spoken for years. When they were children, their brother Yoyo disappeared suddenly, leaving behind only distant memories of his laughter and near-human warmth. Yoyo—an early prototype of a humanoid robot designed by their father—was always bound for something darker and more complex. Now Morgan makes robots for a living and is on the verge of losing control of her most important creation. Jun is a detective with the Robot Crimes Unit whose investigation is digging up truths that want to stay buried. And whether they like it or not, Ruijie’s discovery will thrust their family back together in ways they could have never imagined.
At once a thrilling work of speculative fiction and a poignant exploration of what it really means to be human, Luminous is an unforgettably brilliant debut.

Vroman's Bookstore: Brian Castleberry and Laura Warrell discuss The Californians
2025-03-28 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
It’s 2024, and Tobey Harlan—college dropout, temporary waiter, recently dumped—steals from the wall of his father’s house three paintings by the venerated and controversial artist Di Stiegl. Tobey’s just lost everything he owns to a Northern California wildfire, and if he can sell the paintings (albeit in a shady way to a notorious tech bro) he can start life anew in a place no one will ever find him, perhaps even Oregon.
A hundred years before, Klaus Aaronsohn—German-Jewish immigrant, resident of the Lower East Side—inveigled his way into a film studio in Astoria, Queens. In love with silent cinema, Klaus will restyle himself Klaus von Stiegl, a mysterious aristocratic German film director. In true Hollywood fashion, he will court fame, fortune, romance, and betrayal, and end his career directing Brackett: a radical, notorious 60s-era detective show.
Weaving between Tobey and Klaus is the story of Diane “Di” Stiegl: Klaus’s granddaughter, raised in Palm Springs, who claws out a career as an artist in gritty 1980s NYC. As America yields the presidency to a Hollywood cowboy, as Diane’s grifter father and free-spirited mother circle in and out of her life, Diane will reflect America’s most urgent and hypocritical years back to itself, uneasily finding critical adoration as well as great fame and wealth.
A dazzling novel for readers of Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter and The Candy House by Jennifer Egan, The Californians is an ambitious and sweeping journey across a century. Nuanced and textured, gloriously funny, a critical portrait of the collective American consciousness that has brought us to today, it showcases Brian Castleberry as an inventive, stylish storyteller and a sharp observer of the human condition.

Vroman's Bookstore: Gabriela Orozco Belt, in conversation with Mirelle Ortega, discusses I Am, Yo Soy
2025-03-29 11:00 - 12:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
From the author of Only for a Little While comes a lyrical bilingual picture book about the beauty of being part of two cultures.
I’m from here y soy de allá.
With lyrical text in English and Spanish, this vibrant picture book is a celebration of Hispanic American identity—showcasing the beauty of being part of two cultures. Author Gabriela Orozco Belt and Pura Belpré Award Honor Book illustrator Mirelle Ortega honor all the big and small ways that embracing both heritages are the key to being exactly who you’re meant to be.
Gabriela Orozco Belt is a Costa Rican American writer who knows about family, change, and love. She has a large, loving family, and while she moved often as a child, she now calls the Mojave Desert home. Gabriela is a school librarian and Only for a Little While is her debut picture book. You can visit Gabriela at gabrielabelt.com.
Mirelle Ortega is an award-winning Mexican artist and writer for kidlit and animation based in Los Angeles, California. She is the author-illustrator of River of Mariposas and Magic: Once Upon a Faraway Land, for which she received a 2023 Pura Belpré Award Illustration Honor and an International Latino Book Award bronze medal.

Vroman's Bookstore: Ron Currie discusses The Savage, Noble Death of Babs Dionne
2025-03-31 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A mythic, propulsive novel about the tangled fates of a matriarchal crime family in Maine.
Your ancestors breathe through you. Sometimes, they call for vengeance.
Babs Dionne, proud Franco-American, doting grandmother, and vicious crime matriarch, rules her small town of Waterville, Maine, with an iron fist. She controls the flow of drugs into Little Canada with the help of her loyal lieutenants, girlfriends since they were teenagers, and her eldest daughter, Lori, a Marine vet struggling with addiction.
When a drug kingpin discovers that his numbers are down in the upper northeast, he sends a malevolent force, known only as The Man, to investigate. At the same time, Babs’s youngest daughter, Sis, has gone missing, which doesn’t seem at all like a coincidence. In twenty-four hours, Sis will be found dead, and the whole town will seek shelter from Babs’s wrath.
The Savage, Noble Death of Babs Dionne is a crime saga like no other, with a ferocious matriarch at its bruised, beating heart. With sharp wit and profound empathy, award-winning author Ron Currie, delivers an unforgettable novel exploring love, retribution, and the ancestral roots that both nurture and trap us.

Vroman's Bookstore: Nia Imara discusses & signs Painting the Cosmos: How Art and Science Intersect to Reveal the Secrets of the Universe
2025-04-02 19:00 - 20:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A stunning portrait of our vast, dynamic, and mysterious universe . . . as seen through the lenses of astronomy and art
What is our place in the universe? Where do art and science overlap? How can we use these disciplines to better understand the universe, and how do they help us shape our reality? In Painting the Cosmos, astrophysicist and visual artist Nia Imara combines these perspectives to comprehensively illustrate the history of the universe and our position in it.
In this eye-opening and accessible book, Imara asks pivotal questions and explores humanity’s ever-evolving view of nature. Richly illustrated with spectacular full-color images of our universe and beautiful work from creators around the world–particularly the often-neglected work of women and Black artists–this one-of-a-kind book unites the realms of art, science, and culture to create a dynamic portrait of the cosmos.
From the Big Bang to life on other planets– while also explaining the most exciting recent developments in astronomy– with Imara’s guiding expertise, readers will explore:
The limits of objectivity in understanding reality The role of harmony and rhythm in the universe and art How light functions as a storyteller How scientists and artists help us “see” the invisible–from black holes to marginalized experiences The possibility of life beyond our solar system, and how we define intelligence
Painting the Cosmos will captivate and inspire you to see the world around you in a brand new, fascinating light where space and art are beautifully intertwined.
