SUBSCRIBER ONLY
Year in review: Local authors, indie bookstores and zines flourished in 2024
From local influencers giving back to new novels from local authors, these were the writers,...
Books
He smuggled drugs, became a Brown Beret and focused his later years on mental health and jobs
In “Border Crossings,” Juan Medina tells the partly autobiographical story of growing up in San...
Nikki Giovanni, poet and literary celebrity, has died at 81
Friend and author Renée Watson confirmed Giovanni died Monday with her lifelong partner Virginia Fowler...
SUBSCRIBER ONLY
2025 preview: San Diego authors and book events to read about in the new year
Look for new books from these authors with local connections: Sash Bischoff, Susan Meissner, Matt...
![Four times, Salima Witt has come close to dying. It would be nearly impossible to come away from each medical emergency and illness unchanged, but those changes have led to a deeper resilience and belief in herself. From septic shock to unconsciousness, to kidney cancer and encephalomeningitis, she learned to listen a bit differently, to […]](https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/SUT-L-ONEWITT-001_ebb0e7.jpg?w=119 "Four times, Salima Witt has come close to dying. It would be nearly impossible to come away from each medical emergency and illness unchanged, but those changes have led to a deeper resilience and belief in herself. From septic shock to unconsciousness, to kidney cancer and encephalomeningitis, she learned to listen a bit differently, to […]")
She nearly died, four times. It taught her a lot about life and she shares those lessons in her book, ‘STATIC’
Four times, Salima Witt has come close to dying. It would be nearly impossible to...
San Diego writer fits life and death into 41 words with winning matchbook story
Echo Guernsey was named the Library Shop SD's newest winner of the Matchbook Story Contest
![The story of what happened to Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind is both uniquely hers, and one shared by too many Indigenous women. When author and journalist Mona Gable began writing about LaFontaine-Greywind, she learned that violence against Native American women is a widespread problem that has persisted for centuries. “I’ve written a lot about domestic violence and […]](https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/SUT-L-SOCIAL-1201.jpg?w=140 "The story of what happened to Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind is both uniquely hers, and one shared by too many Indigenous women. When author and journalist Mona Gable began writing about LaFontaine-Greywind, she learned that violence against Native American women is a widespread problem that has persisted for centuries. “I’ve written a lot about domestic violence and […]")
Author finds deep and disturbing history of violence against Native American women in ‘Searching for Savanna’
The story of what happened to Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind is both uniquely hers, and one shared...
Journalist Sebastian Junger reports live from the brink of death
The veteran journalist will discuss his book about surviving a near-fatal aneurysm on Nov. 19...
![Columnist, author, and linguist Richard Lederer spent about six months writing his latest book, “American History for Everyone.” That was a lot longer than it’s typically taken him to write his dozens of previous books on language. “One reason for that is that etymologically embedded in the word ‘history’ is the word ‘story.’ Writing history […]](https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/SUT-L-ONELEDERER-003.jpg?w=132 "Columnist, author, and linguist Richard Lederer spent about six months writing his latest book, “American History for Everyone.” That was a lot longer than it’s typically taken him to write his dozens of previous books on language. “One reason for that is that etymologically embedded in the word ‘history’ is the word ‘story.’ Writing history […]")
Language, literature, laughs in new book about American history by linguist Richard Lederer
Columnist, author, and linguist Richard Lederer spent about six months writing his latest book, “American...
Arts and Culture Newsletter: San Diego Asian Film Festival marks 25th year
Also this week, a Joan Rivers play at South Coast Rep, Kirk Franklin's Reunion Tour,...
The matchbook challenge: Write a story that is short on words, big on creativity
The Library Shop SD's quirky annual contest is back and accepting entries through Nov. 15
10 new cookbooks to inspire delicious breakfast, lunch and dinner meals
Hungry for some delicious recipes? We found 10 new books with food ideas we want...
Book review: New novel about Oscar Wilde offers an alternative ending to his story
Author Louis Bayard will discuss the book in a free Zoom event Thursday hosted by...
Han Kang wins the Nobel Prize for literature. She’s the first South Korean to do so
Han is the first South Korean writer to win the Nobel literature prize. She also...
Arts & Culture Newsletter: San Diego International Film Fest returns
Also this week, a Latino storytelling festival, Soulkiss Theater's '2 Rappers, 2 Plays,' Art of...
In ‘The Art of Power,’ Nancy Pelosi knocks Trump but pleads for decency
The former U.S. Speaker of the House will talk about her book at the Balboa...
Arts and Culture Newsletter: Latinx New Play Festival opens Friday in La Jolla
Also this week, Jerry Seinfeld, the 'Little Women' musical, author Malcolm Gladwell and Cake at...
![Censorship doesn’t always have to be loud, like a towering plume of smoke from a blazing stack of controversial books. It can be quieter, like technically checking the box of including diverse literary works, but hiding those books from plain view, or never purchasing them at all. The problem isn’t simply in the silence that’s […]](https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/SUT-L-Banned-Books.jpg?w=132 "Censorship doesn’t always have to be loud, like a towering plume of smoke from a blazing stack of controversial books. It can be quieter, like technically checking the box of including diverse literary works, but hiding those books from plain view, or never purchasing them at all. The problem isn’t simply in the silence that’s […]")
Get them on the shelves and keep them there. Advocates continue to fight against book bans
Censorship doesn’t always have to be loud, like a towering plume of smoke from a...
San Diego author gives new, expansive main character energy with novel ‘Because Fat Girl’
Lauren Marie Fleming is the author of "Because Fat Girl," a contemporary romantic fiction story...
Kenny G, the smooth-jazz king, is in on the joke
The famed saxophone player, and now memoirist, is on a book tour that arrives Oct....
Banned Books Week starts with mixed messages as reports show challenges both up and down
Challenges have surged to record highs over the past few years, and the 2024 totals...
Ecological destruction along California’s coast fuels horror in ‘The Deading’
Nicholas Belardes draws on his years growing up on California's Central Coast for his debut...
In new essay collection, California writers examine their state through a personal lens
One of the book's 24 stories by Wendy Cheng recalls her complicated childhood as an...
2024 Fall Arts Preview: Here are the 60 best concerts, theater, other arts events this season in San Diego
From music and dance to books, visual art and stage, here are the best things...
SUBSCRIBER ONLY
Fall Arts Preview 2024: Our top book picks for the season
From visits from bestselling authors to exciting new local releases, autumn is filled with excitement...
Fall Arts Preview 2024: Medical background was Elizabeth DeLozier’s guide for upcoming debut novel
A physical therapist by profession, the North Park resident's upcoming historical fiction book is about...
TJ Klune says ‘Calvin & Hobbes’ inspired a ‘Somewhere Beyond the Sea’ character
The author, whose new novel is a sequel to 'The House in the Cerulean Sea,'...
San Diego’s Tribal Streetwear focus of new book that looks at its impact and legacy
'Tribal and the Cultural Legacy of Streetwear,' edited by San Diegan G. James Daichendt, is...
In ‘Please Come to Boston,’ author Gary Goldstein puts his protagonist on a path to self-discovery
For his third novel, Los Angeles-based author goes back to his college years for inspiration
North Park author’s debut novel explores wrestler’s struggle with hope, loss, life and death
Steve Schlam's 'The Harvesting of Haystacks Kane' is about a 607-pound wrestler facing in his...
SUBSCRIBER ONLY
Revisiting the cop shooting that ripped the seams of race relations in San Diego
"Reap the Whirlwind," a new book, recounts the case of Sagon Penn, a young Black...
Review: Old Globe’s ‘Holmes’ update a funny, fashionable take on literary classic
The Balboa Park theater is presenting the San Diego premiere of Kate Hamill's contemporary and...
San Diego’s Meet Cute riding the wave of popularity for romance bookstores
Meet Cute Romance Bookshop is among an increasing number of romance genre stores popping up...
Arts and Culture Newsletter: San Diego Paralympian profiled in ‘Power of Sports’ documentary
Also this week, a book on the Sagon Penn case, the Midway Museum's 20 millionth...
Memoir dives deep into the science of sharks
'Sharks Don't Sink' author Jasmin Graham will discuss her research in La Jolla next week
Legendary player Jack Givens and San Diego author Doug Brunk on Givens’ life in Kentucky basketball and beyond
Local author Doug Brunk and basketball player Jack Givens set to make Warwick's appearance to...
Arts and Culture Newsletter: SDMA opens ‘American Agitator’ exhibition
SDMA opens 'American Agitator,' 'Batman' screening, Cracker, Lea Salonga, Mel Brooks and 'Blazing Saddles,' Comic-Con...
Comic-Con: 13 things to see or do this week at Comic-Con
We did a deep dive into the Comic-Con schedule to pick some offerings that appealed...
What ‘Bright Sword’ author Lev Grossman loves about Comic-Con
Best known for "The Magicians," the Brooklyn-based writer is a featured speaker at this weekend's...
![San Diego native Joe Cabaniss has just published his debut novel, a collection of short stories that he describes as “30 years in the making,” even though the writing process took just 14 months. After a long career in copywriting, journalism and marketing, the 78-year-old Alpine retiree has finally written the list of story ideas he’d been carrying around in his wallet for three decades. Cabaniss is the author of “Life Songs and Other Passages: San Diego Stories,” a collection of 11 fictional coming-of-age tales, all of them connected in some way with San Diego. “As I wrote these stories […]](https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/sut-l-bookscabaniss-01.jpg?w=130 "San Diego native Joe Cabaniss has just published his debut novel, a collection of short stories that he describes as “30 years in the making,” even though the writing process took just 14 months. After a long career in copywriting, journalism and marketing, the 78-year-old Alpine retiree has finally written the list of story ideas he’d been carrying around in his wallet for three decades. Cabaniss is the author of “Life Songs and Other Passages: San Diego Stories,” a collection of 11 fictional coming-of-age tales, all of them connected in some way with San Diego. “As I wrote these stories […]")
San Diego of the ’50s-’70s is the home for retiree’s new short story collection
San Diego native Joe Cabaniss has just published his debut novel, a collection of short...
Comic-Con 2024: 26 things you need to know
The county's largest convention arrives Wednesday with thousands of events, exhibitors, appearances and vendors. Here...
S.D. Arts and Culture Newsletter: Oceanside singer Lea Love joins Holo Holo fest
Also this week: The Beat Farmers tribute, T. Jefferson Parker's new book, violinist Geneva Lewis,...
Joyce Maynard got letters after her last book. So she wrote a sequel
Maynard's new book picks up the story of Eleanor, a New Hampshire wife and mother,...
Fantasy novelist Tomi Adeyemi to speak in San Diego next week
The Nigerian-American author will discuss her latest novel "Children of Anguish and Anarchy" at Mysterious...
Why Maisie Dobbs author Jacqueline Winspear says it’s time to end the series
Jacqueline Winspear’s Maisie Dobbs novels immerse you so deeply into 20th-century British life that you...
San Diego author explores love, family, mental health in latest novel
Her mother doesn’t understand her change in hairstyle. She wants to be there for her...
Investigative reporter takes deep look into ‘Fat Leonard’ scandal. ‘The skeletons are in this book.’
Craig Whitlock can still remember the moment he first heard about "Fat Leonard." He was...
‘A sense of calm’: Amy Tan’s writing and illustrations soar in new book about birds
Most of the drawings in Amy Tan’s unusual and rewarding new book, "The Backyard Bird...
Local novelist, 76, turns her experience as a Latin American and Spanish art dealer into thrillers
For more than 20 years, Linda Moore ran a well-reviewed San Diego art gallery that...
More than ghosts and goblins, blood and gore, horror writers and fans get ready for StokerCon in San Diego
Kristina Grifantini, who writes fiction under the name KC Grifant, found inspiration for her debut...
UCLA professor tells story of ‘foot soldiers’ in human smuggling across the border in new book
Researcher and professor Jason De León wanted to tell a different story about human smuggling...
Travel writer explores ‘Beer Hiking’ in Southern California
When a publisher suggested Johanna Flashman write a book on outdoor treks that lead to...
A love of reading, fixation with San Diego Chicano history, leads to debut children’s book
Growing up in National City meant that children’s book author María Dolores Águila was never...
High suspense: 5 questions with the Encinitas author of ‘Matterhorn’
You could say former stockbroker-turned-spy-thriller author Christopher Reich knows how to make a killing.Since leaving...
It’s time to brush up your Shakespeare
Little information about William Shakespeare’s personal life is available, but from municipal records we can...
San Diego Book Crawl returning with new shuttle for tour of local independent bookstores
In a time of AI girlfriends, deepfake videos and 3D printed rockets, a product made...
Late start was a great start for these Southern California artists and authors
Many artists and authors discovered their hidden talents in their childhood or their teens. But...
San Diego veterinarian and author pens children’s book about America’s first female animal doctor
Animals and books—it’s probably safe to say Jacqueline Johnson loves them equally. As a kid,...
Famed San Diego author Don Winslow ready to trade his pen for a protest sign
Like the cops, crooks and gangland toughs who populate his books, Julian resident Don Winslow...
San Diego Writers Festival to host film director Ed Zwick, whose new Hollywood memoir tells all
On a recent Friday night, Jim Belushi walked into a high-rise apartment in Chicago and...
Vernor Vinge, visionary sci-fi author who helped foretell the rise of internet and AI, dies in La Jolla at 79
Vernor Vinge, the San Diego State University professor whose award-winning science fiction novels helped foretell...
A book celebrates James Foley and confronts a man involved in his murder
Among the scattered notes taped to the door of the Irish author Colum McCann’s home...
Spring arts preview 2024: Our top 10 book picks and events for the season
Of all the seasons, the spring is prime time for new book releases. Publishers often...
Spring arts preview 2024: Author Courtney Deane’s debut offers hope to those tired of hopelessly romantic novels
On the surface, it seemed entirely fitting to be interviewing Courtney Deane on Valentine’s Day....
The enduring legacy of Robert Frost
A Sesquicentennial Celebration of poet Robert Frost’s birth is coming to San Diego on Wednesday,...
Filipinx feminism and activism, revisited and expanded in ‘Closer to Liberation’
The first time these friends read a piece in which a Filipina American scholar was...
In ‘After Annie,’ Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist shows how a family recovers from monumental loss
Anna Quindlen knows what she’s doing. So there’s really no need to play Sigmund Freud...
Nation’s top poets to converge at Robert Frost Sesquicentennial conference in San Diego
For many Americans, the poetry of Robert Frost conjures images of bucolic life in New...
AI-narrated books are here. Are humans out of a job? This San Diego startup has a solution.
If you've listened to an audiobook or a narrated news article in the past year...
Author and scholar to discuss racist roots of ‘obesity epidemic’ at San Diego library
In her 2019 book, “Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia,” Sabrina...
UCSD professor emeritus Quincy Troupe reflects on Miles Davis, poetry and more
Back in the 1980s, Spin magazine asked Quincy Troupe who he'd like to write about...
A searching debut novel about a California community changed by wildfire
In her bracing debut novel, “A Fire So Wild,” Sarah Ruiz-Grossman chronicles a community in...
‘Burn Book’ torches tech titans in veteran reporter’s tale of love and loathing in Silicon Valley
Technology is so pervasive and invasive that it's polarizing people, producing feelings of love and...
A vibrant Afro-Mexican community has always been in Mexico, their country is finally catching up
It could be called a revelatory moment, learning about the presence, history, and culture of...
Author Elizabeth Gilbert to kick off San Diego’s Writer’s Symposium by the Sea
When we think of a writer, most of us will envision a solitary figure at...
Why Kristin Hannah decided to write about Vietnam War nurses in ‘The Women’
The idea to write about nurses in combat zones in the Vietnam War came easy,...
Bestselling historical novelists team up as co-authors on ‘The Phoenix Crown’
Seven years ago, bestselling novelists Kate Quinn and Janie Chang met at a historical fiction...
Local author, speaker rejects shame and silence for authenticity, empowerment
Life is too short and Krystal Casey had dreams, one of which included writing a...
Playwright Karen Zacarias digs under the skin of Gilded Age novel ‘The Age of Innocence’
Back in New York's Gilded Age of the 1870s, it was considered gauche to serve...
7 recommended reads that may help heal your connection with food
How is your relationship with food these days? For many of us, the honest answer...
An 18th century midwife investigates evil doings in ‘gripping’ novel ‘The Frozen River’
In Ariel Lawhon's "The Frozen River," narrator Martha Ballard reveals how a person would navigate...
Alcohol told him lies, but wellness coach and author found the truth when he quit drinking
There were a lot of images and messaging about masculinity that Dustin Dunbar saw when...
It’s OK to boldly go and purposely split an infinitive
DEAR RICHARD: Now retired from 50 years of college teaching and having no more student...
San Diego author Marilyn Woods loves being out of her comfort zone with second book, ‘After Goya’
There was a point during the pandemic shutdown when author Marilyn Woods noticed feeling emotionally...
SoCal author hopes her new dystopian climate change novel makes readers think
If you had the chance to escape the ravages of climate change by permanently joining...
Looking ahead: Four books and one book event I can’t wait for in 2024
One of the surprising takeaways from 2023 for me was witnessing just how many independent...
Take on the library’s winter reading challenge and learn more about your community and identity
SAN DIEGO — The San Diego Public Library is challenging readers of all ages to explore the...
Year in review: Looking back at 5 stellar local books in 2023
Much like the local music and theater scenes, San Diego’s thriving literary scene simply doesn't...
Encinitas grants official poet laureate status to longtime Cardiff resident
ENCINITAS — Encinitas now has an official Poet Laureate, and it’s the same person who was declared...
How these San Diego kids books beat out bestselling authors like James Patterson, Anderson Cooper
Silver Dolphin Books, a San Diego book imprint you’ve probably never heard of, tucked into...
La Jolla author’s guided journal helps travelers preserve their memories
For those to whom travel has sentimental value or perhaps a beloved activity — whether...
Human genome pioneer J. Craig Venter’s tales of his seafaring adventures are thrilling. His new book about them is less so
In between bites of eggs Benedict, genome guru Craig Venter paused recently to share a...
High-schooler wins this year’s matchbook (super) short story contest
SAN DIEGO — In a mere three sentences, a San Diego high-schooler nailed the nostalgia of childhood,...
After nearly 200 episodes, the ‘Backlisted’ podcast is nowhere close to running out of great books
For the past 8 years, John Mitchinson and Andy Miller have read and discussed books...
A 2023 gift guide that will strike a chord: 10 ideas for the music lover in your life
LOS ANGELES — For the obsessive record collector or the casual listener, the shower singer or the...
Pop art to ballet, reach for a coffee-table read when choosing holiday gifts
NEW YORK — A good book packs power. A good book thoughtfully chosen as a gift can...
Gifts for young readers: 11 books that teach kids about gratitude
These books aren’t all directly about gratitude. But they all offer a chance to chat...
The best books – fiction and nonfiction – to give this holiday season
Giving books as a gift can be a gamble, but 2023 saw a slew of...
12 books by San Diego authors you can buy at local shops this holiday season
One could argue that nothing says you care more than giving a book as a...
United Through Reading’s Storybook Ball
United Through Reading hosted its 15th annual black-tie fundraiser Oct. 28 at the Hilton San...