Playhouse Village Association

Vroman’s Special Storytime featuring Christopher Rivas discussing You’re A Good Swimmer by Christopher Rivas and illustrated by Ariel Boroff
2024-08-10 11:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Dive into the journey of life with You’re A Good Swimmer, a captivating picture book that answers the age-old question: Where do babies come from?
Readers will quickly discover it’s not just about the birds and the bees; it’s a celebration of the astounding journey that each person takes toward their first breath.
This picture book will bring families together, engaging readers across ages as it explores the miracle of life alongside the complexity of reproduction, birth, and biology. The story reminds us that the journey to our existence is nothing short of a miracle.
With timeless and inspiring artwork alongside straightforward and lively text, You’re A Good Swimmer emphasizes that taking our very first breath is the grand prize of the greatest race of all.
This STEM book is suitable for children aged five and up, and goes beyond the simple and well-represented “Mommy + Daddy = You” narrative. Instead, it explores the miraculous nature of birth, focusing on inclusive imagery and language without restricting these experiences to specific gender identities or narratives.
You’re A Good Swimmer invites readers to celebrate the wonder of life itself, promoting a deeper understanding of our shared human experience and the beauty of diversity.

Vroman's Bookstore: Summer Music Series featuring Megan Shung & Friends Co-Sponsored by The Pasadena Conservatory of Music
2024-08-10 17:00 - 18:00 | Vroman’s Stage, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, Select a Country:
Join us outside on the Vroman’s Paseo from 5-6PM as we feature the music of Megan Shung & Friends, a jazz and classical violin ensemble.
The Megan Shung Quartet will take you on an unforgettable musical journey. Inspired by folk, jazz, and their own compositions, this dynamic ensemble defies genre conventions and inspires listeners with its unique and warm sound. The group is led by Megan Shung on violin, with Marlon Martinez on bass, Zach Reaves on cello, Ryan Whyman on keyboard, and Forrest Robinson on percussion.

Vroman's Bookstore: Alejandra Campoverdi, in conversation with Al Madrigal, discusses First Gen
2024-08-11 14:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Co-sponsored by Tepito Coffee
Alejandra Campoverdi has been a child on welfare, a White House aide to President Obama, a Harvard graduate, a gang member’s girlfriend, and a candidate for U.S. Congress. She’s ridden on Air Force One and in G-rides. Living a life of contradictory extremes often comes with the territory when you’re a “First and Only.” It also comes at a price.
With candor and heart, Alejandra retraces her trajectory as a Mexican American woman raised by an immigrant single mother in Los Angeles. Foregoing the tidy bullet points of her resume and instead shining a light on the spaces between them, what emerges is a powerful testimony that shatters the one-dimensional glossy narrative we are often sold of what it takes to achieve the American Dream. In this timely and revealing reflection, Alejandra draws from her own experiences to name and frame the challenges First and Onlys often face, illuminating a road to truth, healing, and change in the process.
Part memoir, part manifesto, FIRST GEN is a story of generational inheritance, aspiration, and the true meaning of belonging—a gripping journey to “reclaim the parts of ourselves we sacrificed in order to survive.”
Tepito Coffee is committed to providing hope, training, and employment for formerly incarcerated individuals while also building bridges between México and the U.S., one origin, one person, one coffee at a time.
Our story is rooted in Mexican culture giving back to our communities by building direct-to-farmer supply chains that seek to improve farmer livelihoods, empower communities across the U.S. and México, while providing the most memorable coffee experience imaginable.

SCCM: Obon Week: Mindful Monday, (Make your own miniature Torii)
2024-08-12 10:30 - 14:00 | Southern California Children’s Museum, 459 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA, 91011, United States
Playhouse Village invites you to join in the inaugural Obon Week, celebrating the traditional Japanese holiday of honoring loved ones. From August 12 – 17, visitors can enjoy activities such as making miniature Torii, exploring a koi fish sensory bin, creating yukata puppets, and crafting floating lanterns. Special guests include performers from Makoto Taiko, author Sunny Seki, and illustrator Shiho Pate. All activities are included with museum admission. Don’t miss this unique cultural experience!
Monday, August 12, 2024, Mindful Mondays | 10:30AM and 2:00PM
Make your own miniature Torii

SCCM: Obon Week: Tuesday, (Engage in koi fish sensory play)
2024-08-13 10:30 - 14:00 | Southern California Children’s Museum, 459 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA, 91011, United States
Playhouse Village invites you to join in the inaugural Obon Week, celebrating the traditional Japanese holiday of honoring loved ones. From August 12 – 17, visitors can enjoy activities such as making miniature Torii, exploring a koi fish sensory bin, creating yukata puppets, and crafting floating lanterns. Special guests include performers from Makoto Taiko, author Sunny Seki, and illustrator Shiho Pate. All activities are included with museum admission. Don’t miss this unique cultural experience!
Tuesday, August 13, 2024 Messy Play | 10:30AM and 2:00PM

Engage in koi fish sensory play

Vroman's Bookstore: Ellen Byron, in conversation with Naomi Hirahara, discusses A Very Woodsy Murder
2024-08-13 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Down-on-her-luck sitcom writer Dee Stern is flipping the script. Twice divorced and wasting her talents on an obnoxious kids’ show, the lifelong Angeleno embraces the urge to jump in her car and keep driving. It’s a road trip with no destination—until she pulls into a mid-century motel filled with cobwebs and retro charm. Nestled in the shadow of a national park, it’s a time capsule of a place that, like her, could use some work. So, in the most impulsive move of her life, Dee teams up with a best friend, Jeff Cornetta—who happens to be her first ex-husband—to transform the aging ranch into the Golden Motel-of-the-Mountains, a hiker’s oasis on the edge of the wilderness . . .
But Dee and Jeff soon realize there couldn’t be two people more unprepared for the hospitality business. There’s also the panic-inducing reality of prowling bears and a general store as the only shopping spot for miles. Living and working in the middle of nowhere takes some getting used to—especially when a disrespectful guest ends up murdered! Now, with the motel duo topping the suspect list, Dee must steer clear of a meddling park ranger, face her past in show biz, and determine if the killer is a local or tourist. Because as she quickly finds out, there are many things worse than a one-star review.
Ellen Byron is the Agatha and Lefty Award-winning, USA Today bestselling author of the Golden Motel Mysteries, the Vintage Cookbook series, and the Cajun Country Mysteries, as well as the Catering Hall Mysteries written under the name Maria DiRico. She is also an award-winning playwright and non-award-winning writer of TV hits like Wings, Just Shoot Me, and The Fairly OddParents, but considers her most impressive achievement working as a cater-waiter for Martha Stewart. A native New Yorker, Ellen is a graduate of Tulane University and lives in the Los Angeles area with her husband, daughter, and a rotating crew of rescue pups. Visit her at ellenbyron.com.
Naomi Hirahara is an Edgar Award-winning author of multiple traditional mystery series and noir short stories. Her Mas Arai mysteries, which have been published in Japanese, Korean and French, feature a Los Angeles gardener and Hiroshima survivor who solves crimes. Her first historical mystery, Clark and Division, which won a Mary Higgins Clark Award, follows a Japanese American family’s move to Chicago in 1944 after being released from a California wartime detention center. A former journalist with The Rafu Shimpo newspaper, Naomi has also written numerous non-fiction history books and curated exhibitions. She has also written a middle-grade novel, 1001 Cranes. Her follow-up to Clark and Division, Evergreen, was released in August 2023 and was on the USA Today bestseller list for two weeks.

Landmark Theatres Pasadena: Retro Replay: Lock, Stock & Two Barrels
2024-08-13 19:00 | Landmark Theatre, 673 E Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Check out Retro Replay at Landmark Theatres Pasadena! Enjoy classics from ’99: The Year That Changed Movies, including The Matrix, Eyes Wide Shut, Lock, Stock, Two Barrels, and Three Kings for just $ 5.

SCCM: Obon Week: Wednesday, (Storytime featuring Suki’s Kimono and then learn how to make yukata puppets)
2024-08-14 10:30 - 14:00 | Southern California Children’s Museum, 459 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA, 91011, United States
Playhouse Village invites you to join in the inaugural Obon Week, celebrating the traditional Japanese holiday of honoring loved ones. From August 12 – 17, visitors can enjoy activities such as making miniature Torii, exploring a koi fish sensory bin, creating yukata puppets, and crafting floating lanterns. Special guests include performers from Makoto Taiko, author Sunny Seki, and illustrator Shiho Pate. All activities are included with museum admission. Don’t miss this unique cultural experience!
Wednesday, August 14, 2024, | 10:30AM and 2:00PM
Storytime featuring Suki’s Kimono and then learn how to make yukata puppets

Vroman's Bookstore: Daniel A. Olivas, in conversation with Stephanie Yu, discusses My Chicano Heart
2024-08-14 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
My Chicano Heart is a collection of author Daniel A. Olivas’s favorite previously published tales about love, along with five new stories, that explore the complex, mysterious, and occasionally absurd machinations of people who simply want to be appreciated and treasured. Readers will encounter characters who scheme, search, and flail in settings that are sometimes fantastical and other times mundane: a man who literally gives his heart to his wife who keeps it beating safely in a wooden box; a woman who takes a long-planned trip through New Mexico but, mysteriously, without the company of her true love; a lonely man who gains a remarkably compatible roommate who may or may not be real—just to name a few of the memorable and often haunting characters who fill these pages. Olivas’s richly realized stories are frequently infused with his trademark humor, and readers will delight in—and commiserate with—his lovestruck characters.
Each story is drawn from Olivas’s nearly twenty-five years of experience writing fiction deeply steeped in Chicano and Mexican culture. Some of the stories are fanciful and full of magic, while others are more realistic, and still others border on noir. All touch upon that most ephemeral and confounding of human emotions: love in all its wondrous forms.

Vroman's Bookstore: Hala Khouri, Tessa Hicks Peterson, Nkem Ndefo, and Valerie Thomas discuss Practicing Liberation
2024-08-15 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Practicing Liberation reorients collective justice work toward a model that transforms the effects of injustice, harm, and oppressive systems into resilience, joy, and community care. Through frameworks like trauma-informed methodology, transformative movement organizing, engaged Buddhism, and healing justice, editors Hala Khouri and Tessa Hicks Peterson show readers how to:

-Embody healing, wellness, and beloved community
-Guard against replicating systems of harm
-Disrupt racist, classist, anti-queer, and anti-trans behavior and systems
-Celebrate creativity and radical imagination in movement work
-Center healing from intergenerational trauma, white supremacy culture, and extractive capitalism
-Honor that self-care is a necessity—not a luxury—that strengthens our collectives

Featuring essays from editors Hala Khouri and Tessa Hicks Peterson and contributors like Kazu Haga, Taj James, Nkem Ndefo, Jacoby Ballard, Sará King, Kerri Kelly, and more, Practicing Liberation can be used on its own or alongside The Practicing Liberation Workbook to help readers orient toward embodied leadership, interconnected collectives, and a bold vision for transformation—the vital tools we need for collective wellbeing, healing, and long-term social change.

Vroman's Bookstore: IN-STORE TICKETED: Maria Bamford and Scott Marvel Cassidy sign Hogbook and Lazer Eyes
2024-08-16 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Fans of Maria Bamford’s acclaimed quasi-autobiographical Lady Dynamite! Netflix series already know of her romance with LA painter Scott Marvel Cassidy, as well as her droll pug sidekicks Blueberry and Bert.Now the story has been recounted in the graphic novella Hogbook and Lazer Eyes, written by Bamford/Cassidy, drawn by Cassidy, and all told by the rescue dogs they’ve adopted.
For those unfamiliar with the story, newly single fortysomethings Maria Bamford and Scott Cassidy each signed up on the dating site O.K. Cupid, under the respective usernames “Hogbook” and “Lazer Eyes.” They went on a date, and then another, and soon, despite a history of Bipolar II disorder and unhealthy relationships for each of them, they fall in love and are married in 2015. We view all of this through the prism of their pug housemates, including Blueberry and Bert (who has an unnatural obsession with Michael Flatley of “Riverdance” fame), and the elderly bonded pair Betty and Arnold (who recount their star turn as interplanetary canine scientists in the second season of Lady Dynamite).
Cassidy’s fine art training translates with ease into graphic storytelling, with a naturalistic illustrative style that is a pitch-perfect match Bamford’s comic timing, making Hogbook and Lazer Eyes a beautifully illustrated love story, told by some incredibly charming pugs.

USC PAM: Workshop@PAM: Object Stories: A Writing Workshop with Narrated Objects inspired by Searching for Home: Stories of Displacement and Survival
2024-08-17 10:30 - 12:30 | USC Pacific Asia Museum, 46 North Los Robles Avenue, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Explore the power of objects. Objects, like people, can tell you where they come from, can evoke emotion, and tell stories of love, loss, displacement, struggle, and so much more.
Join Andrea Richards from the creative collective Narrated Objects as she guides participants through writing and meditation exercises aimed at unlocking the storytelling potential within our cherished possessions. Participants are encouraged to bring an object of personal significance, one that holds a special attachment.
Refreshments provided.
Rsvp Required
More about the exhibition:
In Humaira Abid’s exquisitely haunting exhibition Searching for Home, the artist’s sculpted wooden creations invoke the troubling specter of the global refugee crisis and its trails of ruined lives. Inspired by real accounts of displaced people- all personally researched and documented by Abid- the exhibition hints at untold tragedies surrounding the collateral victims of persecution, political conflicts, ethnic cleansing, and natural disasters, a disproportionate number of whom are women and girls. Through her chosen medium of wood, Abid unleashes the innate properties of the material to suggest the ineffable weight and gravity of this continuing humanitarian crisis.
This program is free with the cost of admission (Admission to the museum is $15 and can be paid upon arrival at our Visitor Services Desk. More information about our admission rates can be found here)

Vroman's Summer Reading Program - Hero's Return
2024-08-17 11:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
HERO’S RETURN
Join us in the event space at 11am for a battle with the FINAL BOSS: Mr. Steve, in a video game and adventure-themed storytime. And be sure to stop by the Kid’s Info Desk with your QUEST LOG anytime from 11am-2pm to COLLECT YOUR LOOT: cold snacks, $5 Vroman’s gift cards, and more!

Vroman's Bookstore: Abigail Hing Wen, in conversation with Marie Lu, discusses Kisses, Codes, and Conspiracies
2024-08-17 14:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Tan Lee finds himself embroiled in an unusual love triangle, all while trying to defuse a heist, unravel a conspiracy, and navigate the most complicated babysitting assignment ever in this YA novel by New York Times and Indie bestselling author Abigail Hing Wen.
After a magical kiss at Prom, best friends Tan Lee and Winter Woo agree to cool it off, a plan that goes awry when their parents jointly head off to Hawaii and leave Tan and Winter to babysit Tan’s sister Sana together. If that isn’t complicated enough, Tan’s ex-girlfriend from Shanghai arrives on his doorstep with money stolen from her billionaire father and thugs on her heels.
Tan soon finds himself on the run through the San Francisco Bay Area, trying to out-maneuver international hackers and protect his friends, family, and sister—and his own heart.

Marie Lu is the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of the Legend series, The Young Elites trilogy, the Warcross series, the Skyhunter series, Batman: Nightwalker, and The Kingdom of Back. She graduated from the University of Southern California and jumped into the video game industry, where she worked as an artist. A full-time writer, she spends her spare hours reading, drawing, playing games, and getting stuck in traffic. She lives in the traffic-jam capital, Los Angeles, with her illustrator/author husband, Primo Gallanosa, and their son.

Renew Performance Center: Love The Skin Your In!
2024-08-18 10:00 - 14:00 | Renew Performance Center, 600 E Colorado Blvd Suite 110, Pasadena, CA, 91101
Welcome to Love The Skin Your In! event at Renew Performance Center. Get ready to embrace and celebrate your unique beauty with a day filled with self-care, positivity, and empowerment. Join us for a fun and inspiring time where you can learn new skincare tips, enjoy pampering treatments like lymphatic Drainage, Massage, and Red Light Therapy, and connect with like-minded individuals. Let’s come together to appreciate and love the skin we’re in. See you there! Special Guest Jmeeks will be doing 30-minute sessions of his Signature Facial for $80, You don’t want to miss it!44Tipper_1

Vroman's Bookstore: Gina Chen, Shelly Page, Justine Pucella Winans, and Alex Brown, discuss The House Where Death Lives: An Anthology
2024-08-18 14:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A dance to the death. A girl who’s just as monstrous as H.H. Holmes. A hallway that’s constantly changing―and hungry. All of these stories exist in the same place―within the frame of a particular house that isn’t bound by the laws of time and space.
Following in the footsteps of dark/horror-filled YA anthologies like His Hideous Heart and Slasher Girls and Monster Boys, and Netflix’s groundbreaking adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House, this YA speculative fiction anthology explores how the permanence of a home can become a space of transition and change for both the inhabitants and the creatures who haunt them.
Each story in the anthology will focus on a different room in the house and feature unique takes on monsters from a wide array of cultural traditions. Whether it’s a demonic Trickster, a water-loving Rusalka, or a horrifying, baby-imitating Tiyanak, there’s bound to be something sinister lurking in the shadows.

Archetype Yoga: Full Moon Soundbath (August)
2024-08-18 19:30 - 20:30 | Archetypa Yoga, 638 e colorado ave, pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Got a conundrum or need some direction? We’ll use the Lunar Energy of the Full Moon to guide us. In this workshop expect to:
🛁 Relax your nervous system in a therapeutic Sound bath.
🔮 See what the cards say in your Tarot Reading.
☕️ Pick one of our Loose Leaf Teas to enjoy.
📚 Bring a journal, pen, and a mug!

Landmark Theatres Pasadena: Retro Replay: Three Kings
2024-08-20 19:00 | Landmark Theatre, 673 E Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States

Pasadena Playhouse: Cyrano De Bergerac
2024-08-20 20:00 | CA
One of the greatest plays ever written is radically reborn in this critically acclaimed adaptation. Modern poetry and sizzling rhythm collide in a scorching love triangle when Cyrano discovers the love of his life has eyes for another man. Immerse yourself in the romantic adventure of this timeless and heartrending love story.

Vroman's Bookstore: Albert M. Camarillo discusses Compton in My Soul: A Life in Pursuit of Racial Equality
2024-08-21 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
When Al Camarillo grew up in Compton, California, racial segregation was the rule. His relatives were among the first Mexican immigrants to settle there–in the only neighborhood where Mexicans were allowed to live. The city’s majority was then White, and Compton would shift to a predominantly Black community over Al’s youth. Compton in My Soul weaves Al’s personal story with histories of this now-infamous place and illuminates a changing US society–the progress and backslides over half a century for racial equality and educational opportunity.
Entering UCLA in the mid-1960s, Camarillo was among the first students of color, one of only forty-four Mexican Americans on a campus of thousands. He became the first Mexican American in the country to earn a PhD in Chicano/Mexican American history and established himself as a preeminent US historian with a prestigious appointment at Stanford University. In this candid and warm-hearted memoir, Camarillo offers his career as a vehicle for tracing the evolution of ethnic studies, reflecting on intergenerational struggles to achieve racial equality from the perspective at once of a participant and a historian.
Camarillo’s story is a quintessential American chronicle and speaks to the best and worst of who we are as a people and as a nation. He unmasks fundamental contradictions in American life–racial injustice and interracial cooperation, inequality and equal opportunity, racial strife and racial harmony. Even as legacies of inequality still haunt American society, Camarillo writes with a message of hope for a better, more inclusive America–and the aspiration that his life’s journey can inspire others as they start down their own path.

Movies in the Park: The Sixth Sense (1999, PG-13)
2024-08-23 19:00 - 22:00 | Playhouse Village Park, 701 Union St, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Playhouse Village continues the summer season with Movies in the Park presented by Landmark Theatres Pasadena and Playhouse Village Foundation. The Retro Replay edition of the free outdoor community movie screenings will feature iconic films from ’99: The Year That Changed Hollywood on select Friday evenings in August at the lawn of Playhouse Village Park. Seating on the lawn opens at 7:00 pm with a 90’s photo op, crafts, movie trivia and more! Each show will begin after sunset, at approximately 8:00 pm. Bring blankets or lawn chairs and a picnic from your favorite local Playhouse Village restaurant to enjoy with family and friends prior to the film.
The first 50 people to sign up for our email list at each screening, will receive a Buy One, Get One FREE Movie Ticket offer from Landmark Theatres. See you there!
Playhouse Village Park is located at 701 E Union St.

Vroman's Bookstore: Antoinette Portis discusses Not-a-Box City
2024-08-24 11:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Don’t miss the long-awaited companion to Not a Box, winner of a Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor Award. This picture book with its visual humor and simple dialogue is great for fans of Mo Willems and Crockett Johnson.
Bunny wants to build a cardboard city.
Bunny stacks one cardboard box on top of another and another.
Bunny doesn’t want any help. Bunny doesn’t need any help, either.
But what’s a cardboard city without friends?
Written and illustrated with the same delightful simplicity that made Not a Box such a hit, the playtime possibilities of a stack of boxes and friendship will inspire and excite any child who has ever journeyed into the world of make-believe.

Landmark Theatres Pasadena: Retro Replay: Eyes Wide Shut
2024-08-27 19:00 | Landmark Theatre, 673 E Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States

Vroman's Bookstore: Craig Rosebraugh discusses Burning Rage of a Dying Planet: The FBI vs. the Earth Liberation Front
2024-08-30 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
A harrowing, captivating firsthand history of the rise of the radical environmental movement the Earth Liberation Front (ELF). Since 1997, the ELF has inflicted over $100 million in damages on entities they believe to be causing environmental destruction, mostly through brazen arson attacks on timber companies, ski resorts, and car dealerships.
Former ELF spokesperson Craig Rosebraugh charts the history and ideology of the ELF and explores its tactics, successes, and limitations. Rosebraugh examines the question of whether or not violence is justifiable, along with the short- and long-term political benefits and drawbacks of using violence. He also offers a primer on the tactics of state repression and strategies the US government uses to destroy activist movements.
Whatever your view of direct action or violence, Burning Rage of a Dying Planet is an illuminating read for anyone seeking to understand radical environmental movements and the government’s response to them.

Vroman's Bookstore: Summer Music Series featuring PCM Jazz Faculty + Friends Co-Sponsored by The Pasadena Conservatory of Music
2024-08-31 17:00 | Vroman’s Stage, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, Select a Country:

Vroman's Bookstore: Local Author Day - Young Reader’s Edition
2024-09-01 12:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
“AhMa Loves You! is a heartwarming bilingual chapter book highlighting the special relationship between a grandma and grandchild and the cross-cultural differences in ways to show love. There’s no other book like it on the market! Highly recommended!”
-Katrina Liu, Author of I Love Boba!

Vroman's Bookstore: Local Author Day featuring m.a. Arana, Tom Jenkins, and Dennis C. Powell
2024-09-01 16:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
In Wing Stroke by m. a. Arana, we immerse ourselves in the gripping tale of revenge and change. This is more than a story of reclaiming a kingdom; it’s a desperate battle for recognition in a world that has yet to acknowledge its existence.
The Next Run: A UC Berkeley Student’s Rise to Major 60s Pot Smuggler by Tom Jenkins
The true story of a 60s Berkeley student who starts smuggling pot hidden in cars, graduates to planes, resorts to wading sacks through the Rio Grande, and ultimately finds himself heading the Colombian end of an operation using a twin-engine cargo plane to drop bales to waiting speedboats off the coast of Florida. At the same time, his Mexican contacts are sending him six-ton shipments transported in semis past a bribed customs officer.
Standing Over Home by Dennis C. Powell
Standing Over Home is written to help broken sons-young men who lacked the love and direction of a father figure-discover respect and learn missed lessons about love and protection that were never passed down to them during their formative years. Through the eyes of author Dennis Powell, division champion Dodger pitcher, Standing Over Home communicates metaphorically this picture of the importance of a father’s role to stand as protector and priest over his home and family.

Vroman’s Ed – Romance Writing Class with Amy Spalding (8 weeks)
2024-09-03 18:30 - 20:30 | Atrium Building, 709 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Vroman’s Ed – Romance Writing Class with Amy Spalding (8 weeks)
Wednesdays, 6:30pm – 8:30pm, starting on 9/4/24 (no class on 9/25 & 10/23)
$500.00 per person
From Meet Cute to HEA: Writing the Modern Romance Novel
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 a 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 longform improv at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre.
*This class will be held on the following dates – 9/4, 9/11, 9/18, 10/2, 10/9, 10/16, 10/30, and 11/6 (with no class on 9/25 & 10/23) 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 end of day 9/3/24)

Vroman's Bookstore: Eve Driver discusses What We Can’t Burn
2024-09-03 19:00 | Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
Eve was a fossil fuel divestment activist from Massachusetts who came to believe capitalism was at the root of the climate crisis. Tom was a clean energy entrepreneur from a rural village in Kenya who believed the activist approach was suspended from the real-world experiences of those facing the worst of the crisis’ effects. They met as juniors at Harvard, launching a journey in which their conflicting perspectives almost tore their unlikely friendship apart.
Raw, funny, and lyrical, What We Can’t Burn is a memoir in two voices about coming of age in a world confused and divided about how to save itself. Set in both Kenya and the United States, this timely story is a singular testament to the power of dialogue, humor, and friendship to help us find our place among the many currents of change-making that cut across the world today.

Pasadena Playhouse: Cyrano De Bergerac
2024-09-05 19:00 | Pasadena Playhouse, 39 S. El Molino Avenue, Pasadena, CA, 91101, United States
