A Writer's Guide to Los Angeles: Libraries, Bookstores, Writing Groups, and Presses

LAPL's Central Library has a Special Collections Room and subject departments that include Literature & Fiction and History & Genealogy. The glass-enclosed meeting rooms in Literature & Fiction, on Upper Level 3, are reserved in person with a library card, the same day or one day ahead, for two hours. It is open daily.

The Los Feliz branch is a few blocks from Skylight Books. Its calendar has included a creative writing workshop and a book club. It is closed Sundays.

Santa Monica's main library is on Santa Monica Boulevard downtown. The city's library system offers study and meeting rooms, and its Research & Local History collection includes digital collections and image archives.

UCLA keeps its rare books and manuscripts, along with archives and oral histories, one floor below the Young Research Library lobby. The library says everyone is welcome to research the collections. Read its reading-room FAQ before you go.

The Clark is one of UCLA's major libraries for rare books and manuscripts, strong in Oscar Wilde and the 1890s and in England from 1650 to 1830. Its basement Reading Room opens by appointment, Tuesday through Friday. Register for an Aeon account and request materials first.

The Writers Guild Foundation's library holds more than 50,000 produced film and television scripts. Each visitor books an appointment and shows ID. Scripts stay on site, and photocopies and photographs are not allowed.

Skylight Books stocks fiction and nonfiction, with an Arts Annex and a children's section. Authors read here most weeknights. It is open daily.

Chevalier's calls itself Los Angeles' oldest independent bookstore. It hosts author conversations and poetry readings, and its book clubs include a fiction club and a queer & ally club.

Vroman's, founded in 1894, describes itself as Southern California's oldest and largest independent bookstore. Robert Hoffman and his family own it now, after more than a century under the Sheldon family. Author events run several nights a week.

Hennessey + Ingalls has been family-owned since 1963 and calls itself the largest art, architecture, and design bookstore in the western United States. Look here for art history and photography.

Nikki High founded Octavia's Bookshelf in 2023 and named it for Octavia E. Butler. The Black-owned shop highlights books by BIPOC writers. It hosts community programs and book launches.

Other Books carries literature and art, and its shelves run to comics and zines. It hosts screenings and workshops and is closed Mondays.

Iliad sells only used books, more than 150,000 of them, and specializes in literature and the arts. It counts itself among Los Angeles' largest and oldest bookstores.

Children's Book World is a children's bookstore that also carries teen and adult titles. Picture-book and middle-grade writers can come for its weekend events, which include storytimes and the occasional book launch. It is open daily.

theOFFICE has run a workspace for writers and creatives in Santa Monica for more than 20 years. The main room stays quiet. Calls go to a soundproof phone booth, and conversation moves to the kitchen or out to the two patios. Day passes and monthly memberships are available. So is a free trial week.

Bru is on the same block as Skylight Books, and it invites guests to settle in for a while. It is open daily.

Go Get Em Tiger roasts its own coffee, and its Figueroa Street café has seating indoors and out with a full food and drink menu.

The Larchmont shop is the roaster's original, opened in 2013, and it serves breakfast and lunch. Chevalier's Books is a block away.

Musso & Frank has been open since 1919. Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett were regulars, as were William Faulkner and F. Scott Fitzgerald, and the young Charles Bukowski drank here. It serves dinner Tuesday through Sunday.

The Catalina books live jazz most nights, and shows come with a food minimum on top of the ticket. Musso & Frank is a short walk away.

Manuela is the restaurant inside the Hauser & Wirth gallery complex, named for Manuela Wirth. It serves dinner nightly and brunch on weekends. Hennessey + Ingalls is a few blocks away.

LULU is the restaurant at the Hammer Museum, which is free to visit. Reserve ahead for lunch or dinner. The museum is closed Mondays.

Beyond Baroque runs a weekly Wednesday Night Poetry Workshop and a Monday Night Fiction Workshop, both on Zoom with advance registration. It also holds readings and book launches. Its Scott Wannberg Bookstore and Poetry Lounge carries small press titles and local writers, and Beyond Baroque Books is its own imprint.

ALOUD began in 1992 as the Library Foundation's live author conversation series. It now presents several dozen programs a year, from panels to all-ages events at neighborhood libraries. Many are held in the Mark Taper Auditorium at the Central Library.

Skylight hosts author readings and conversations in the store, and it runs several book clubs, the Rabbit Hole Nonfiction Reading Club among them.

Vroman's holds a Local Author Day along with its readings and signings.

The Getty Research Institute's Residential Scholar Grants, offered since 1985, bring established researchers into an interdisciplinary cohort to work on art and its histories, with scholar housing provided. Recent PhDs can apply for Postdoctoral Fellowships. The Getty Villa hosts residencies too, so check which program is taking applications.

The Clark offers fellowships with UCLA's Center for 17th- & 18th-Century Studies. Its collections also cover Montana and the West and early modern European life and culture. Lectures and chamber music concerts fill out the calendar.

California Humanities is the state's affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. It funds public humanities programs through Connecting California grants and runs the California Documentary Project. Its Los Angeles office is on North Alameda Street; the other is in Oakland.

RAND is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization headquartered in Santa Monica. It publishes research reports and briefs on health care, national security, and other policy areas. The RAND School of Public Policy is part of it. Preparing a manuscript for RAND

Unnamed Press has published fiction, nonfiction, and poetry for a broad general audience since 2014. It also keeps the Smith & Taylor Classics reprint line and the Jack Liffey Mysteries series. The press is connected to the North Figueroa Bookshop and hosts events around Los Angeles. Preparing a manuscript for Unnamed Press

Red Hen calls itself LA's oldest nonprofit literary publisher. It publishes fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and memoir, and Tia Chucha Press is one of its imprints. Red Hen presents the Los Angeles Review's annual awards and runs book awards of its own, the Benjamin Saltman Poetry Award among them.

Angel City Press publishes books on the history and culture of Los Angeles under the stewardship of the Los Angeles Public Library. Many are books of photography or architecture, such as Art Deco Los Angeles.

The Hospice & Palliative Nurses Association's official journal publishes peer-reviewed clinical and research articles on end-of-life nursing, from symptom management to ethics. Editor-in-chief Betty R. Ferrell is Director of Nursing Research & Education at City of Hope in Duarte. Preparing an article for the Journal of Hospice and Palliative Nursing

The Review of Higher Education is the quarterly journal of the Association for the Study of Higher Education, published by Johns Hopkins University Press. It carries peer-reviewed empirical studies and scholarly essays on colleges and universities. Its editor, Royel M. Johnson, is at USC. Preparing an article for The Review of Higher Education

The California Arts Council's fellowship supports individual artists in any art form, at Emerging, Established, and Legacy levels. Artists apply through the regional organization that serves the county where they live; for Los Angeles County that has been Los Angeles Performance Practice.

The Commonwealth Club World Affairs of California honors books by authors living in California. Categories include Fiction and Poetry, with First Work of Fiction and Californiana among the others.

PEN America Los Angeles began Emerging Voices in 1996 to mentor early-career writers who have not yet published a book, with a focus on communities underrepresented in publishing. The fellowship is now virtual and open to U.S. residents. A separate week-long Emerging Voices Workshop, with its own application, meets in person in Los Angeles.

The mayor names a Los Angeles Poet Laureate, who works from within the Los Angeles Public Library. The laureate leads workshops and public readings in partnership with the library and the Department of Cultural Affairs.

This guide gathers grants and writing resources for UCLA students.

USC students have a guide of their own.

Loyola Marymount students can find grants and campus writing help here.

Pepperdine's page collects grants and writing resources for its students.

CSUN students will find grants and writing resources on this page.

The Cal State LA page covers grants and writing resources on that campus.

Azusa Pacific students can start here.

The International Printing Museum's Book Arts Institute teaches letterpress printing and bookbinding in classes from a half day to several days. The museum also hosts the annual Los Angeles Printers Fair. Visit on Saturdays, or Tuesday through Friday by reservation.

Nova Community Arts is a queer-owned community art center whose classes include risograph and bookmaking. It has also taught bookmaking workshops at the Los Angeles Public Library.