Los Angeles Review of Books PubLab | We are the official annual journal of the LA Review of Books Publishing Workshop, an immersive, collaborative summer program designed for students and innovators interested in publishing.

We are the official annual publication of the LA Review of Books Publishing Workshop, an immersive, collaborative summer program designed for students and innovators interested in publishing.

A man with a white beard doffs his hat at the viewer. Beside him is a table laden with dead game from the hunt. A goose, a stag, a hare, a boar, and many more animals lie with their mouths open.

I Get So Hungry When You Say You Love Me: Feminist Cannibalism

TWO UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTHS about Mimi Cave’s 2022 horror-romance Fresh: One, the meatball of human flesh, resting heavy and crimson atop a bed of pasta, is mouthwatering. Two, Sebastian Stan, playing an entrepreneur and chef specializing in human flesh, is hotter than...

Oil on canvas depiction of a wrestling scene, a man pinned on the ground, with people watching.

On Infamous Crimes Against Nature

What began as unremarkable arrests in the quiet suburbs of Boise, Idaho, quickly escalated into a scandal that gripped the nation. On Halloween night in 1955, three men—Ralph Cooper, Charles Brokaw, and...

A scanned, hand-cut ink drawing of an abstract organic form resembling a brain, distorted through digital manipulation.

What You Missed While You Were Dead

What You Missed While You Were Dead “Conversation Ended” (2025), NIGHTSHADE (Alejandro Concas-Rivas). Courtesy of artist. Welcome to the Memory Database, Charlie. Who would you like to speak to? Who would I like to speak to? Every time I come here, I try to talk to...

Abstract black ink painting featuring fluid, organic forms and circular splashes that resemble cells, spores, or cosmic matter, with dripping textures and dynamic motion against a white background.

Is Your Outfit Saying More than You Are?

NEW YORK, NEW YORK. Manhattan. The Fashion District. Wednesday, February 15, 2023. Breaths hang heavy in the winter evening air as the final day of New York Fashion Week draws to a close. The streets buzz with the residual energy of runway shows and after-parties. The...

A dreamy, abstract watercolor of a river with a figure standing next to it.

Autopsy of Memory

Ode to the wrinkle forming just slightly left of the center between my eyebrows. I’ve turned 28 and my skin has started to shrink, to pull, and my expressions now stay half a second longer, locked in time. Sometimes I try to pull the line out with a gua sha, tugging...

A close-up black and white photo of a person’s face with a double exposure effect. The eyes and mouth appear layered and slightly misaligned.

Dried-Up Stars (Lightning Bugs in My Stomach)

“Have you cried yet? I’ve only cried once.” My sister Thea’s speech is precise, like she’s not been wandering her mind across the sky. She’s poised against the brittle trunk of the only tree in the graveyard. She holds the end of a chewed lollipop stick with one hand...

A small concrete dam in a wooded area overgrown with moss and graffiti, with water cascading down its face and a cartoonish green face painted beneath the flow.

Disoriented with Time: Ruins in the Switchbacks

Artist Statement In this photography series, I highlight the architectural remnants in the Switchbacks located near Spokane, Washington. Reclaimed by graffiti artists and moss, these decaying foundations and dams now burst with vibrant color, life, and arcane...

A bronze cast of two people's clasped hands.

Echo of Her Dreams

FROM AN EARLY AGE, as the daughter of immigrants, you see resilience reveal itself in small, unnoticed moments. It comes as translating for your mother, sitting in waiting rooms with your imagination and alertness side by side, and watching your parents try to...