Bookmobiles are a venerated American tradition–and, like lots of venerated American traditions, are foundering on lack of funding.

The D.I.Y. spirit behind “The Miracle” bookmobile, which ranges between LA and Oakland, is propelling this little Jeep even when funding gets scarce. You’ll be able to catch up with it at the “Actions, Conversations and Intersections” show at the LA Municipal Art Gallery this Saturday at 2:30pm.

They’re also encouraging book donations. Anyone can take, read, and pass along a book–you never have to return them–so donations fuel their work. Keeping in the spirit of free exchange of information without censorship, they are particularly looking for LA local history, West Coast history, science fiction, graphic novels, zines, what they call “priceless porn,” biography/memoirs, arts & crafts, “everything queer,” books en Espanol, and “anything that can be xeroxed and prepared for mass distribution and more!”

I’m not sure what “priceless porn” is, but I’m intrigued. All the info on “Actions, Conversations and Intersections” is here; I’d particularly recommend checking out the SmartGals “Winter Picnic Performance,” on Sunday at 2pm, featuring “freshly baked bread from the Bicycle Bread Company, hot coffee from Cafécito Organico, savory music, and sweet bits of surprising theater unwittingly triggered by our guests.” Neat!

I think LA would pretty much be a perfect city if it weren’t for the cars and the air quality (I work in Chatsworth–cough, cough). So Matt Logue’s Empty LA (via Urban Daddy) comes across like porn to me–something approaching post-apocalyptic porn, admittedly, but I am pretty sympathetic to the “hell is other people” school of thought so there you go. Logue’s vision of LA’s streets and beaches emptied of people and cars and all signs of life is exhilarating and kind of terrifying. The book comes in cloth and paper, in two format sizes–13 x 11 and 10 x 8. It’s marvelous.

On the other end of the fantasy LA spectrum are the amazing panoramic photos of ca. 1899 downtown LA–Bunker Hill–posted on Shorpy (see Chris Conkle’s comment for specifics about location) It’s an amazing testimony to this city’s ability to shed its skin. LA is a city that razes and rebuilds. While this opens us for the inevitable “why can’t we be more like San Francisco” criticism that we deny our history, at the same time, it’s part of the fantastic optimism (denial of reality even) of a verdant city in the middle of a desert, populated with folks who come here to recreate themselves. LA is where America arrived at the end of the imperative to “go west.” With no more frontier, we level and recreate this city over and over again.

LA Weekly had a cheeky article a few years back titled “The Evidence Room: Five Signs You’re Gentrifying.” At the time, the primary target of gentrification was Los Feliz, Silver Lake, and Echo Park.  I don’t think there’s a gelato parlor downtown yet, but clearly, for better or worse, downtown is being “revitalized” faster than you can say “doggie day care.”  Enter Gary Phillips, a community activist turned mystery and comic book writer who will debut the first three pages of his webcomic, Bicycle Cop Dave, next week on October 28 on Four Story.  Bicycle Cop Dave will follow LAPD officer David Richter as he patrols downtown LA and “encounters interesting characters from a lawyer smoking crack in a port-a-potty to a one-armed prophet in a Skid Row bar with his wooden tablet of odd commandments.”  Phillips also promises upside down bodies below the Sixth Street bridge, an inevitable Big Bad Developer villain, and at least a comment or two about the displacement of the poor as result of old gentrifying politics finding a new battleground downtown.  The story will unfold over the course of several weeks, as new pages will be published every other Wednesday until the entire comic is online.  I’m hoping he’ll stray away from hyper liberal tendencies to simply demonize gentrification without providing a more weighty critique; in any case, the comic is worth a bookmark and hopefully some good discussion.

[Full disclosure, I'm one of the authors of this book] Holy crap this book is amazing!!!

If you follow me on twitter then you’ve heard me ranting about this already, but Hi Hollywood has just been released and I have to say it’s a must read for anyone who works in the movie industry, does not work in the movie industry, enjoys watching movies, has seen a movie or has not seen a movie but is seriously considering it. While at face value this book is a collection of proposed movie treatments, if you peel back a few layers you find it has a much bigger purpose, and a much loftier goal. From the publishers description:

This book is about the magic of movies. About reaching to a higher standard. About daring to dream. About making movies awesome again. We dare you to read any one of the potential oscar winners presented here in rough treatment format and say that they wouldn’t be awesome movies. We fucking dare you.

It starts off with ‘Brunch of the Dead’ a radically new approach to the zombie genre, and movies quickly into ‘Disaster’ a film I’m sure every person who has ever enjoyed an on screen explosion would kill to see. Things get romantical with ‘Garbage Dude’ and ‘80 Foot Hamster’ is a story about cold blooded revenge that even the most kind hearted hippy could relate to. And that is just the beginning, I could go on and on, but that would just take time away that could be spent reading it on your own. And since it’s a free downloadable ebook you really have no reason not to. So what are you waiting for?

OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD. Seriously, I am slobbering stoked about this. Say what you want about recent Death Cab: Gibbard’s early work with the band, like in “We Have the Facts And We’re Voting Yes,” and his collaborations with Dntel (The Postal Service came about as a result of their first correspondence, the song “(This Is) The Dream of Evan and Chan”) is just fantastic. And Jay Farrar, the other half of Uncle Tupelo (the seminal alt-country outfit that split to form both Wilco and Farrar’s Son Volt) is a great songwriter.

But even I am flabbergasted at what Farrar’s attempted: setting the words of Kerouac to music. The album “One Fast Move or I’m Gone: Kerouac’s Big Sur,” primarily composed by Farrar with collaboration from Gibbard, sounds like the perfect storm of awesome. Apparently the two musicians realized their mutual love for the writer of “On the Road,” while they were involved in the production of a documentary of the same name about Kerouac (which screens tomorrow at Arclight with a Q&A with the director & producers; the film includes reflections on Kerouac by Tom Waits, Patti Smith, Sam Shepard, and more).

The duo is bringing their makeshift band, which is composed of other Death Cab, Son Volt, and Mountain Goats members, here to LA for two of the 6 US dates they’ll be playing. They’ll be at Largo at the Coronet this week on the 22nd, and the El Rey on the 23rd. I am SO there.

It’s not like Bill Watterson coming out of the woodwork, but it’s somewhat close:  first uncelebrated, now celebrated  Robert Crumb is making a rare public appearance at UCLA’s Royce Hall on October 29.  He’ll be here to discuss his life’s work, up to and including his latest endeavor, The Book of Genesis.  This foray into John Milton territory recently was hailed as an “honest, powerful violent rendering of the Bible’s first book” by the Los Angeles Times this past Sunday.  Francoise Mouly will lead the discussion.  (Francoise Mouly is the former cartoon editor and current art director at The New Yorker, introduced readers to an excerpt of The Book of Genesis earlier this summer in the magazine, and, incidentally, is married to Maus author Art Spiegelman) (I mention this only because you can now rest assured that this appearance won’t be one of those Charlie Rose type ordeals in which the moderator has no relevant background or knowledge about the interview subject’s expertise and so verbally flails about during the interview that he appears, at best, like a sycophant and, at worst like a fanboy).  Tickets are $18 for UCLA students; for us out-of-school-ers, the cultural tuition fee is hiked up to somewhere between $36 to $60, depending on how close you need to get to the chalkboard.

For those who miss the talk, you don’t have to miss the art:  UCLA will host a related exhibit in the Hammer Museum.  “The Bible Illuminated: R. Crumb’s Book of Genesis” will be on view from October 24 to February 7.  For future reference, Thursdays are free!

Yes, I know it’s raining and that means a stay-at-home night for some number of residents who harbor an overwhelming fear of precipitation. For those of you among the more adventurous, however, this is a great literary night. Michael Chabon, author of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, and more recently of Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father, and Son,  is giving a talk at the Central Library, and noir genius James Ellroy is presenting and signing his new novel, Blood’s a Rover, at Skylight. If that just whets your literary appetite, there’s more wordy goodness on Thursday when Wallace Shawn, who cowrote My Dinner with Andre and has just authored Essays, a book which promises to be more exciting than its title, talks with Bruce Wagner at Hammer and Jane Smiley signs her latest, her first novel for young readers, The Georges and the Jewels, at Borders Northridge. I admit I’m a first line fetishist, and Smiley’s novel satisfies. It begins like this, “Sometimes when you fall off your horse, you just don’t want to get right back on.” Amen, Jane.

I’m still not convinced there even IS a future for journalism, at least not as we’ve known it (and heck I have a degree in it). Further, I won’t exactly miss what it’s become. But that’s not the point -

Should you wish to witness a spirited and entertaining discourse on this very subject, however, why not head out to The Warehouse in Marina Del Rey on Saturday, and catch The Lowdown?

Here’s what your host Jeff Norman has to say about it:

The Lowdown is a bold cultural revival fueled by unique collaborations between world-class artists, authors, activists and other public-spirited leaders. Presenters and performers connect the dots between media, government, national security, sustainability, psychology and the arts. By confronting disinformation, promoting civic engagement and having fun in the process, we help people cope with life in America.

The Warehouse Restaurant
4499 Admiralty Way
Marina del Rey, CA 90292
Hosted by JEFF NORMAN and featuring performances and a discussion with

music by I SEE HAWKS IN L.A. (Full set at 5 PM)
Author PETER RICHARDSON
Journalist ROBERT SCHEER
LA Weekly founder JAY LEVIN
Comedian ED CRASNICK
Musician-satirist GARY GORDON
Drinks and appetizers available – no minimum required.
Happy hour discounts from 5 to 6!
FREE admission
Seating is first come, first served.
The evening will conclude with a book sale and signing by Peter Richardson, author of A Bomb in Every Issue: How the Short, Unruly Life of Ramparts Magazine Changed America, hosted by Book Soup.

(Ow, my linking hand!)

You don’t need to be Dylan Thomas or Dorothy Parker to understand that the writing bone is all too often connected to the gin drinking bone. So what happens when you sober up? How do you foster the creative spirit if you’re not loaded? Writers in Treatment has an upcoming panel devoted to that predicament.

On October 13 at the Skirball, WIT and Hazelden present Chasing the Muse (when you are stone cold sober). Hosted by William Cope Moyers, with filmmaker actress/singer Katey Sagal; writer/creator of Sons of Anarchy, Kurt Sutter; novelist Michelle Huneven; and journalist/author Mark Ebner, the conversation will range from sources of inspiration to the role of recovery in the creative process. Ray Bradbury once said “You must stay drunk on writing so reality doesn’t destroy you.” Yes, but how?

The panel is $25 and you can register online here.

And there is a dessert reception afterward because inspiration is even better when followed by dessert.

The largest fire in LA history is expected to keep burning through the weekend. It has burned more than 160,000 acres (250 square miles). Here’s Joan Didion on living in fire country:

People who live with fires think a great deal about what will happen “when,” as the phrase goes in the instruction leaflets, “the fire comes.” These leaflets, which are stuck up on refrigerator doors all over Los Angeles County, never say “if.” When the fire comes there will be no water pressure. The roof one watered all the night before will go dry in seconds. Plastic trash cans must be filled with water and wet gunny-sacks kept at hand, for smothering the sparks that blow ahead of the fire. The garden hoses must be connected and left where they can be seen. The cars must be placed in the driveway headed out. Whatever one wants most to save must be placed in the cars. The lights must be left on, so that the house can be seen in the smoke.

That’s from Didion’s essay “Fire Season.” You can get it here