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.

Challenging the Peripheral: Reading Assam in Reema Rajbanshi’s Sugar, Smoke, Song

 Growing up in the capital city of Guwahati, Assam, life was marked by recurring floods and occasional violence, shaping a unique resilience in middle-class girls like us. We were taught two critical lessons with utmost seriousness: never to venture out...
Photograph of skin texture on collarbone

Skin

The sun hangs low in the sky like an overripe orange. You wish for a moment that you could reach up and pluck it, sink your teeth into it so you could taste something sweet, empty your mouth of the blood and dirt that has made a home there.You used to bite your lip...
Portrait of a young woman as a saint.

Joy Reyes Portfolio

Memories become larger than life in Joy Reyes’s mixed-media collection, embodying familial strength and love passed down through generations. In a vivid display of color and texture, the Dallas-based artist marries iconic imagery from her Mexican heritage with...
Black-and-white photograph of a blurred female dancer spinning in a thin silk dress.

Elizabeth Stoddard’s Unruly Girlhood

Weird girls are having a literary moment. A search for “weird girl books” on TikTok confirms this, yielding hundreds of videos celebrating the genre. Authors like Mona Awad, Sayaka Murata, and Ottessa Moshfegh feature heavily. These books vary widely in content but...
Sepia-toned woman surrounded by flowers

In Her Head

They met six months ago, in a low-lit bar downtown frequented by corporate twentysomethings. Virginia saw him approaching out of the corner of her eye and thought he looked nice enough. He was tall, wearing black pants and a dark blue button-up. While he talked to her...
Watercolor painting

Untitled, Still

           for 奶奶, in the land of steady hands Upstroke, downbeat, the waves fathomtowards the shallow surface of spring—            hiss      lake foam                 of           thin                  rain                     slicked                        ...
Staircase

Countercultural Chronotopes of Thomas Pynchon

The 1950s in the United States, marked by the post-World War II economic boom, were characterized by pressures to conform, Cold War fears, and increasing government surveillance. By the 1960s, the United States was primed for a revolution in thought and expression. As...
Black-and-white block print of a rooster crowing. Behind the rooster there is a small building in the distance.

Learning to Drink Black Coffee in Arkansas

I grew up in a house near the Randal Tyson Recreational Complex in Springdale, Arkansas. For sixth and seventh grade, I went to Helen Tyson Middle School, just down the road from Don Tyson Parkway, which would take you to the corporate headquarters of the...