Tía Chucha Press and Kaya Press join forces at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books...and other close encounters with wonderful writers, presses and readers

On Saturday, I had the pleasure of joining Luis Rodriguez for a joint reading at the Kaya Press booth at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. Kaya Press, Tía Chucha Press and other wonderful independent presses and literary journals joined forces at the Smokin’ Hot Lit Loungeto bring two days of readings, workshops and game playing on the sunny USC campus.

Luis began with a rousing reading of several of his poems. If you haven’t heard him perform his poetry before, you must make certain to do so soon. After Luis, I read a few flash fiction pieces from one of my short-story collections, Devil Talk (Bilingual Press).

And here are a few photos of readers, writers, editors and publishers having fun with Kaya Press and Tía Chucha Press, et al.:

I also had a chance to visit a couple of panel discussions including “Nonfiction: A Singular Passion” which included bestselling authors Gustavo Arellano and Ricardo Cortés.

Late in the afternoon, I caught “Writing American Identity” moderated by Héctor Tobar with panelists Reyna Grande, David Treuer, Luis Rodriguez and Melinda Palacio. Michael Sedano (not pictured) prowled the room with his omnipresent camera.