Oakland Review of Books calendar of (not just) literary events, June 1–June 7
I was printing ORB flyers at Bather’s Library last Friday and the volunteers were using air brushes to make art for the upcoming monthly minimag. So many places you can write for! Submit your mini essays/recipes/reviews there, send your vibe reports to ORB, it’s a rich soup. Buttercup is officially 2026’s Best Dog of Oakland, but there's always next year. The Sausal Creek Ivy League have been hacking and making with the invasive vines draping Dimond Canyon, and they’re curating a community art show of ivy basketry at Dream Farm Commons this summer–get in touch to contribute. On plants! Not only can you cut them, you can grow them–the library suggests you have a hot marigold summer and grow your pretty orange pompom higher than the rest. One-off tickets for West Edge Opera’s 2026-7 season just went on sale, and look around, there’s probably a Shakespeare in a park happening near you this summer. The Caminata for immigrant rights starts a three day walk in Napa on Saturday June 6, gets to Albany on June 8th in order to walk to San Leandro, and then a car caravan will take everyone to Dublin, the site of the closed women’s prison that the feds want to reopen for immigrant detention. Join in where and when you can to say NO. Find BART zines in the Bushrod Flyer distribution boxes around North Oakland these days, Sam Sax is picking the poem-a-days for the whole month of June, and if you run into the polyamory tabling guy around Pride celebrations this month tell him we have missed him: last summer we found him at Pride, dog parks, a small town 4th of July parade, and a college campus or two–the Where's Waldo of ENM evangelizers, his steady presence soothes and comforts in turbulent times. —MS, XL, TC, AB
Tuesday, June 2
Vote, if that's your thing! This calendar entry should not be construed as the Oakland Autonomous Zone's endorsement of the existence of the United States Government in any fashion, but on the other hand doing-the-opposite-of-what-the-Empower-Oakland-Report-says-you-should-do is never a bad strategy, so, you know, be safe out there. [AlamedaCountyVoteCenters]
Cartoonist Dr. Alberto Ledesma Artist/Author Talk, 5pm, Central Library (Downtown Berkeley). Alberto Ledesma talks about his artwork about being an undocumented immigrant growing up in Oakland on display in the library and also in his forthcoming book, An Undocumented Psalm to Heal My American Heart. [BPL]
[West Bay Bonus Event] Digital Ghosts with Miguel Novelo, 6pm, Recology AIR's Environmental Learning Center (Bayshore). A hands-on workshop bringing art and waste together to attend to the afterlives of everyday devices. Bring your old and broken screens, monitors, tablets, and smartphones and notice their materiality in service of the virtual, learn about how we handle proliferating e-waste, and poetic afterlives of these portals we carry around. Make new things from your old things. [insta]
Crystal Wahpepah, 6pm, North Branch BPL (North Berkeley). Join Oakland's Crystal Wahpepah for a discussion of her new cookbook, A Feather and a Fork: 125 Intertribal Dishes from an Indigenous Food Warrior. A member of the Kickapoo and Sac and Fox tribes, the chef creates food at her Oakland restaurant and in this cookbook drawing from her urban Native experience of intertribal connection. And stories, lots of stories. [BPL]
The Black Studies Collective, 6pm, West Oakland Branch OPL (De Fremery). Get into this discussion group's second round and stick with it through October monthly on a Tuesday. The book this time is The Black Antifascist Tradition: Fighting Back from Anti-Lynching to Abolition by Drs Bill Mullen and Oakland-born scholar-activist Jeanelle K. Hope. [insta]
The Friendship Lab, 6:30pm, Local Economy (Rockridge). What rich lives can be ours when we don't isolate inside the nuclear family but rather allow for the spark of encounter and connection to develop, in Local Economy hostess Sarah Rich's words, into ongoing joyful, creative friendship and community. Led by Tony Shen, a former C Suite executive and improv guy turned friendship coach, which are quite the qualifications and job title. [luma]
[West Bay Bonus Event Numero Dos] Say Nephew with Brendan McHugh, 7pm, Green Apple Books on the Park (Outer Sunset). There's some good uncles out in the Avenues. Steven Pfau will be talking about Say Nephew: On Boyhood, Unclehood, and Queer Mentorship with bookslinger Brendan McHugh. A “delightfully campy inversion of autotheory,” says a blurb about this memoir-ish exploration of families and queerness. [insta]
Tragic Borders, 7pm, Clio’s Books (The Lake). Jeanne Carstensen and Lauren Markham on the migrant crisis that landed on Greek shores and its reverberating aftermath. I've been waiting to see when these two local writers who both investigated the surge of cross-Mediterranean asylum seekers landing in Greece and related tragic deaths would talk to each other. Today it's happening! Come for deep insider expertise on what's more of a pattern than a surprise, considering <waves hands at the world>. [eventbrite]
Also: Katie Kitamura in Conversation at Womb House Books - ONLINE at Zoom (The Internet) / TO THE MOON & BACK SCIENCE FICTION / FANTASY BOOK CLUB reads Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky at Books Inc. (Alameda)
Wednesday, June 3
Office of the Inspector General Community Presentation, 11am, North Oakland Senior Center (Bushrod). The Office of the Inspector General talks to the community about their work: police oversight in local government. The police watch us, so let's watch them. [City of Oakland]
Anita Gail Jones, 6pm, Montclair Branch OPL (The Hills). Local author Anita Gail Jones discusses her debut novel, The Peach Seed. Rooted in Georgia, where Jones was born and raised, this "layered saga of a Southern Black family" is "epic, enchanting" and blurbed by Margaret Wilkerson Sexton. [OPL]
Matt Fogelson Restrung: Fatherhood in a Different Key, 6:30pm, Rockridge Branch OPL (Lower Rockridge). Oakland author Matt Fogelson shares the playlist of his memoir about being a Gen X dad, talks grief, emotional distance, rock music, and telling the story of the self. For all the middle-aged sad guys with a guitar. [OPL]
Floating to Shore Poetry Open Mic, 7pm, Night Heron (Downtown). Hosted by Free the Poet! 5 minutes per writer, bring your poetry, stories, meditations, recipes, prayers, spells, memories. Slots for 12 people an hour, and 3 hours of performing: that's 36 surprises in a row. [insta]
Thomas W. Laqueur's The Dog’s Gaze, 7pm, Mrs. Dalloway's (Berkeley End of College Ave). A cultural historian got a six-figure advance for his book about dogs in art. Come see if it was worth the big bet. Thomas W. Laqueur is in conversation with writer Mark Danner: both of them have written many books; some allow dogs. [mrs dalloways]
Fan Faire West, 7pm, Clio’s Books (The Lake). Fanny Howe loved gossip, hung out with Warhol, and Kaveh Akbar called her “a titan.” Celebrate her final, posthumous work, This Poor Book (Graywolf), a long, fractured, palimpsestic poem, with poetry and reminiscences from West Bay novelist Daniel Handler; collagist, poet, writer Linda Norton, who has written poems using Katie Peterson's words; and said poet Katie Peterson, whom I finally met in person on Friday and we were so happy about it. Come find Marthine and other poets in the crowd. [eventbrite]
[West Bay Bonus Event] Magic Hour Reading for Allen Ginsberg's 100th Birthday, 8pm, Golden Sardine (North Beach). What is a magic hour reading? Is it like golden hour, but more twilit, getting darker? Kevin Dublin is hosting, readers and listeners will be HOWLing. [insta]
Also: PHIL CANALIN at Books Inc. Alameda (Former Peninsula) / The Berkeley Slam: New S*** Show at The Starry Plough Pub (Berkeley)
Thursday, June 4
[West Bay Bonus Event The First] Stop DMV Data Grab Rally, 8am, San Francisco DMV (The Panhandle). There's surveillance afoot, and we won't stand for it. California drivers will have their information shared at the demand of the Dept for Homeland Security and all kinds of vulnerabilities are arising. Read Khari Johnson at CalMatters for more about the risks of this shift to immigrants and other drivers, and then go protest in a deeply informed manner. [insta]
Art Build for the Caminata!, 5pm, Bridge Storage (Richmond). Build art together because the protest walk (see the intro to the calendar!) is also a parade with beauty and delight and humor and outrage to break up the long journey. [insta]
[West Bay Bonus Event The Second] A Dharma of Liberation: A Conversation with Dr. Rima Vesely-Flad, 6pm, CIIS (SoMa). One more time with Dr Vesely-Flad, who helps us to notice how creative fire, sensuality, and expressions of love can ignite and sustain revolutionary liberation, coming through the guidance of Audre Lorde, James Baldwin, and Buddhist practice. [insta]
The Waiting Room, 6:30pm, Oakstop, 1721 Broadway (Uptown). If you loved The Pitt, maybe you’ll like this—an immersive documentary of a day in the life of Oakland’s Highland Hospital, filmed over five months in 2010—but also, maybe, you’ll hate it, because this is the real thing, not scripted drama. I don’t know. I am kind of afraid to go see this, and I also really want to. No one goes to the ER if they don’t have to. [eventbrite]
[West Bay Bonus Event The Third] Kitchen Table Reading, 7pm, Medicine for Nightmares (The Mission). Poets and sweet treats, and there's food too. Gabriel Cortez (poet for the people, doing it for the culture), Lauren Ito (made of abalone, stardust, and water), and Eddie Kim (local politics reporter at the SF Gazetteer) are the readers, and Stay Sweet SF is the feeder. [insta]
[West Bay Bonus Event The Fourth, this is a lot] Julián Delgado Lopera with Honey Mahogany feat. Grace Towers, Kochina Rude, Ingrid Rojas Contreras, and Maryam Rostami, 7pm, The Lab (The Mission). Julián Delgado Lopera’s Bay Area return for the release of his novel Pretend You're Dead and I Carry You, conversation with Honey Mahogany, with performances from Grace Towers and Kochina Rude, and readings from Ingrid Rojas Contreras and Maryam Rostami. Pretend You’re Dead and I Carry You takes us to underground queer Colombia, and all kinds of folks have said a lot of nice things about the book already. [Green Apple Books]
Alive/Not Alive, 7pm, Clio's Books (The Lake). In Lauren C. Johnson's debut novel The West Façade a statue gets real riled up and fired up and desired up and comes to life. In Ilana DeBare's novel of existential horror Shaken Loose, the protagonist has to escape literal hell, which it turns out is not other people, after all. Talk with both novelists about the fantastic, the feminine, and whatever other Fs you choose to give. [insta]
Jewish Currents Issue Launch, 7pm, Eli's Mile High Club (Longfellow). Jewish Currents publishes a lot of great stuff, and they’ll be launching their new issue here in Oakland at Eli's Mile High Club. Party, drinks, entry is free for subscribers or people with $10 to spare. [Jewish Currents]
Bob le flambeur, 7pm, BAMPFA (Downtown Berkeley). Great heist movie, great last line. Jean-Pierre Melville made some cool films, but none was as blithe and breezy as this one, from 1956, a love letter to low lifes done up in that America-through-a-glass-Frenchily style that would become a signature of the Nouvelle Vague. Every "one last job" movie out of Hollywood over the past few decades has at least a touch of Bob le flambeur to it. [BAMPFA]
Elizabeth Preston's The Creatures’ Guide to Caring, 7pm, Mrs. Dalloway's (Elmwood). I learned about this book about animal parenting through the best dadding I've seen in a while: Elizabeth Preston's writer father on bluesky making sure his daughter's book gets the attention it deserves. Now go hear from her and Ed Yong about how orcas, spiders, and other creatures care for their young offline too, and how humans evolved to do this collectively (grandmas, uncles, and friends: we need them all). [mrs dalloways]
Friday, June 5
Friday Nights at OMCA with Oakland Rising, 5pm, OMCA campus (The Lake-ish). Still mad that I missed Nonstop Bhangra last week; this week it’ll be Oakland’s own supergroup of new talent, and a good time will be had by all. [OMCA]
Lit Nights at Cafe Xochi, 6pm, Cafe Xochi (East Lake). Poetry and prose at the best garden cafe that is not for dogs even though it's called Xochi the Dog Cafe (Xochi is the dog; the cafe is not for dogs, not even Xochi). Readers are Michael Dean Gallagher (writer of "California Gothic prose poetry"), Clara Sperow (“claire says the first graders already knew the creeks are underground. / jasper catches a lizard just to catch, just to hold in his mouth. just to hold in his / mouth.”), Katrina Benedicto, Tadeh Kennedy who hopes to see the inside of a volcano one day, and Melchor Sahagun from Stockton bringing his raps to the mic. [insta]
An Evening with Daniel Lavery, 6pm, Local Economy (Rockridge). It's Local Economy’s How To Not Be a Shitty Friend Week! Hear from Oakland-based novelist Daniel Lavery on his newest novel Meeting New People about an aging, sharp-tongued woman who keeps alienating her closest friends and is questing for a fresh BFF. A painful topic, metabolized into jokes that make the cringe tolerable thanks to Lavery's peppery wit and style. [luma]
Poetry!, 6pm, Tamarack (Downtown). Say the organizers, and I concur: “Come feel that summer feeling or else.” Readers are Elias Kleinbock, Regina Napolitano (Bather's Thursday poetry cohort coordinator, occasional chorister), and Ray Levy Uyeda, who loves a lyric in a paragraph and writes beautiful, insistent collages, like this excerpt from “Justice Is a Theological Position” in Sundog Lit: “pause for sun and blue. the blankets of mustard and poppy that arrive with spring in california. not that i’d praise colonial borders. i need each flower to tell me who she is. she likes me // she likes me not. imagining the future as a place you have to look up into.” [insta]
Susie Nadler's Lies We Tell About the Stars, 6:30pm, Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore (Elmwood). In the near future, the West Bay has collapsed once again because the San Andreas did its thing, and death abounded (though it's never the earthquake that kills you, it's that human infrastructure can't quite handle geologic-scale drama). So, now there's a YA book that for some important reason (plot) has the protag leaving California for Florida and maybe Mars? Nadler is a school librarian, so she knows what teens want—adventure and an escape hatch. Still, Florida? [mrs dalloways]
Two Prosecutors, 7pm, BAMPFA (Downtown Berkeley). A 2025 film about Stalinist purges in 1937, but a real “this is also about Putin’s Russia” wink wink movie. “Slow, extended scenes from single camera positions mimics the zombie existence of the Soviet state and allows a terrible anxiety to accumulate,” says the Guardian review. Sounds fun! [BAMPFA]
Oakland Youth Poet Laureate Performances and 2026 Announcement, 7pm, Oakstop Broadway (Downtown). The Oakland Youth Poet Laureate position is now 15 years old, making it old enough to write poems for the city itself! Come one and all to hear the finalists and crowned winner say their piece. [OPL]
Also: Shotgun Spotlight: Regina Morones at Ashby Studios (South Berkeley) / Lakeside Chat # 67 with Adrian Cotter "Crowkland and San FRavencisco" at Zoom (Online)
Saturday, June 6
East Bay Public Gardens Open House, 10am, Gardens (Around Oakland). Go to Friends of Sausal Creek Native Plant Demonstration Garden in Dimond Park, or join the UC Master Gardeners of Alameda County at the Lake Merritt Trials and Demonstration Garden, or West Oakland Farm Park to learn how to water lightly and grow well. More spots in the East Bay on the nice map by the engineers who bring water in and take your shit out. [East Bay Municipal Utility District]
Bay Nature Hike: Butterflies of Mount Diablo with Liam O’Brien, 11am, Mitchell Canyon Visitor Center (Hot Side of the Hills). Butterfly guy Liam O’Brien shows you jewels on the wing in a gentle midday hike in a shady canyon on Mount Diablo. Butterflies love the scent-swirling towers of pink flowers on buckeye trees, especially the big beautiful Two-tailed Tiger Swallowtail, and Liam has a million amazing stories to share to help you get to know these bugs better. Bring lunch, water, and all your caterpillar questions. [Bay Nature]
Collaborative Comics Workshop, 1pm, BAMPFA (Downtown Berkeley). Collaborative comics workshop hosted by multimedia artist and photographer Karo Yagjian and independent comic Artist, Scott Longo (Sonatina Comics). [BAMPFA]
[West Bay Bonus Event Of Literal and Figurative Intersections] At the Intersection of Valencia & Sandino Plaza: A Walking Tour, 1pm, 16th Street & Rondel Place (The Gayest Parts of the Mission). A walking tour on the history of lesbian Valencia Street and its intersections with the Nicaraguan Revolution, led by artist and poet Tatiana Luboviski-Acosta. [luma]
Ancestors Taught Me: The Great Camouflage, 1:30pm, The Sanctuary (Mosswoodish). Drop in to this poetry/writing workshop series in the Black radical tradition held on first Saturdays. This season, all the thinking and writing is inspired by Suzanne Césaire, a writer of the négritude movement, Martinican surrealist, and anti-imperialist. Always historize, always ancestralize. [google doc]
Yemeni Coffee at OPL, 2pm, Piedmont Avenue Branch OPL (The Street Not the Ethnic Enclave). Read the article we published, then stop in and chat with Yasir, owner of Mohka House. Drinks provided! [OPL]
Poetry! Jan Steckel, 2pm, Claremont Branch (Upper Berkeley). Jan Steckel will read her poetry then sit for an interview with host Glenn Ingersoll. [BPL]
Ghazal Poetry Writing Workshop, 2pm, Local Economy (Rockridge). If you like a villanelle, you’ll love a ghazal (pronounce it "HUZZ-ull" with intense throatiness on that H). Iranian-American poet Farnaz Fatemi‘s workshop teaches the form's history in Arab and Persian poetry, then turns to the contemporary use of its strong rhymes and ending repetitions, and you’ll get some practice writing your own. Be guided as well by Agha Shahid Ali, the gay Kashmiri poet of exile whose blend of the modern and the ancient results in the best ghazals I've read (Opening lines of his “Tonight” which gives me chills every time I read it: “Where are you now? Who lies beneath your spell tonight? / Whom else from rapture’s road will you expel tonight?”). Comes with snacks, and ticket proceeds go directly to the Iranian Red Crescent. [luma]
Defiant to the Last with Emiko Omori and Satsuki Ina, 2:30pm, Central Library (Downtown Berkeley). A documentary exploring the chilling history of the Tule Lake Segregation Center and putting a timely, corrective spotlight on the dissident Japanese Americans who were demonized and punished for speaking out against the false wartime incarceration. Afterwords, Emiko will be in conversation with Satsuki Ina, the busiest 82 year old in town. [BPL]
Meet Fritz Pointer, 3pm, African American Museum and Library at Oakland (Downtown). Professor Fritz Pointer will be at AAML to chat about being a scholar, educator, poet, and older brother of the Pointer Sisters. [OPL]
BART Prom, 6pm, Rockridge Station parking lot (Oakland). The theme is “Enchantment Under the C Line,” as the parking lot becomes an all-ages 1980s-themed celebration with an under-the-sea twist, which is why they’re struggling for that “C” pun, I guess. If this party is aimed at you--you know who you are--then it’s aimed at you and you should go. [BART]
[West Bay Bonus Event the Boots & Boostiest] Monica Canilao Guardhouse Opening, 6pm, Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture Entrance (The Marina). Oakland-based artist Monica Canilao's sculptural work with textiles and costumes can be seen in I Love Boosters and also in a tiny room in the West Bay where you peer in through the windows. [eventbrite]
Elevator to the Gallows, 6:30pm, BAMPFA (Downtown Berkeley). Louis Malle's feature debut, a thriller involving some extremely French stuff with an ex-paratrooper and his lover and their plot to murder her industrialist husband, all of which fell out of my head within an hour of the credits rolling, if I'm being honest. Elevator to the Gallows (1958) is maybe better known now for its moody score by Miles Davis and the breakout performance from Jeanne Moreau, and the two have more in common as artists than you might think. "Both were convinced that less is more, and that to pack a wallop one must distill and allude rather than overwhelm," Joshua Siegel once wrote. "Moreau's cadences are inimitable—the modulations of her voice and in her movements are precise, and she is always careful to remain ahead of the beat or to lag behind it to keep things off balance. Like Miles Davis, Moreau uses silence and space to build tension by emptying her face of expression." [BAMPFA]
Cole Nicole LeFavour's In the Arms of Mountains, 7pm, Mrs. Dalloway's (Elmwood). On queerness and the country: you can drive a truck, be gay and nonbinary, and still get elected to state office in rural Idaho. The rural west is a complicated place, full of complicated people who can still be neighbors, says LeFavour, who is in conversation with a nice lefty Berkeley lady who married an Oakland police officer and now lives in a house of contradictions with “assorted firearms,” which I hope are locked up in safes at the very fucking least. [mrs dalloways]
[West Bay Bonus Event the Campiest] Clue: The Movie, 7:30pm, Curran Theatre (Union Sq). “Communism was just a red herring!” Clue, indisputably the best movie based on a board game ever made (sorry, Battleship), recently celebrated its fortieth anniversary. This is already enough to convince me to rewatch it, but this screening stands out because Lesley Ann Warren (who played Miss Scarlett) and Tim Curry (who played that really Tim Curry-ish character) will be attending. You can spot them in the hallway, with the revolver. [Ambassador Theatre Group]
The Alchemy Open Mic, 8pm, The Alan Blueford Center for Justice (Downtown). Open mic for poetry, songs, and talents of all kinds hosted by the Wonder Twins: Collin and Reggie Edmonds. Writing workshop at 7pm before the mic opens up for performances. [eventbrite]
Also: That Art Party: Cafecito and Crafts Club at café con cariño (Old Oakland) / The Films of David Lynch at Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center (North Bay) / Deviance Debut: Kinky Queer Art Exhibition at Paradox (West Bay) / MELISSA CLARK: FORCE OF NATURE at Books Inc. Alameda (Formerly a Peninsula) / Sashiko Decorative Mending at Temescal Branch OPL (The Neighborhood That Used to be a Sweathouse)
Sunday, June 7
Exquisites Bay Reading, 11am, Bancroft Community Garden (Poets Corner). The secret to Bay Area poetry is that poets must compete with the abundant natural beauty of our surroundings for our attention, forcing them to step up their game. The organizers of this new queer poetry reading series clearly have faith that local poets are up to the task, with a brunchy start time and a lush garden venue. Their inaugural lineup is similarly promising: Leslie Lancaster Allison, Eric Sneathen, Jing Moskowitz, and Zithlaly Betancourt! Plus, this installment includes guest host Francis Weiss Rabkin, a playwright and screenwriter who recently worked on that episode of Dickinson where Emily Dickinson organizes a family sing-a-long party, which is basically what poetry readings are supposed to feel like. [insta]
Rock Paper Scissors Collective: Opening Reception of “The Lines Were Separate, But No Different,” noon, Jack London Square Realty (Jack London Sq). Is there any love affair in the art world as passionate and enduring as the one between photographers and architects? Join photographer and filmmaker Lemia Monét Bodden for the opening reception of this exploration of the imprint African American architects have left on the landscape of Los Angeles. This appears to be an extension of Bodden's show at Incline Gallery last year, but since Incline Gallery is in the West Bay I missed it and you probably did too, so here's our chance. [partiful]
Short Film Showcase, 12:30, New Parkway (Downtown). An hour-long program of locally made short films focusing on underrepresented communities. [trickyink]
Breathless, 5pm, BAMPFA (Downtown Berkeley). Did you know they re-made Breathless in 1983, with Richard Gere? A strange choice, but, you know, making bad choices with our freedom is sort of the existential condition. Godard being pretty Godard-y. [bampfa]
Walter Riley on Civil Rights and Structural Attacks, 5pm, Local Economy (Rockridge). Meet the legendary Walter Riley to celebrate his new book, Civil Rights and Structural Attacks with Oakland organizer Jesse Strauss, in conversation with East Bay Yesterday Liam O'Donoghue. Riley was a civil rights activist in the Jim Crow South who organized voter registration, sit-ins, job campaigns, and was a Field Secretary for CORE in the Southeast Region, a criminal defense and civil rights lawyer since the 1980s, and at some point had a son named Boots. [luma]
The Oakland Slam & Wide Open Mic, 5pm, Nomadic Bookshop (Uptown). They’re running the Oakland Slam at Nomadic these days! Come give your best 3 minutes and listen to everyone else bold enough to try to make you cry, sweat, laugh and get into other word-driven moist conditions. [Nomadic Bookshop]
Also: Juneteenth Pre-Cookout at the Main Library at Main Library OPL (Lake-ish)
