Posts by Live Talks LA

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The fabulous Susanna Hoffs has written a novel! If you love The Bangles, you’ll love This Bird Has Flown. Hoffs tapped into the musical world she knows well to craft this story. It’s about a thirty-something pop star who’s hit rock bottom and, thanks to a chance encounter on a plane, revives her life and career. Music, fate, redemption, love: The book’s already been optioned by Universal Pictures, with Hoffs writing the screenplay.
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One of pop’s most beloved voices, Susanna Hoffs graduated from U.C. Berkeley with a degree in Art. In 1981 she co-founded The Bangles, with whom she recorded and released a string of chart-topping singles including Manic Monday, Walk Like an Egyptian, Hazy Shade of Winter, and Eternal Flame before embarking on a critically acclaimed solo career. She also wrote, recorded music for, and appeared in the Austin Powers movies, and played herself on Season 1 of “The Gilmore Girls.” She recently completed a solo album of new music produced by Peter Asher, set for release in early 2023.  This Bird Has Flown is her first novel. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, filmmaker Jay Roach.
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“In this sexy, page-turning treat, Susanna Hoffs writes as engagingly as she sings.” —Helen Fielding, author of the bestselling sensation Bridget Jones’s Diary
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“What a treat, and a pleasure, to find out that Susanna Hoffs can tell a story filled with characters as engaging as her song lyrics… with all the confidence you would expect from a seasoned explorer of the depths of love, music, and life.”―writer Ayelet Waldman
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Susan Orlean is the author of nine books, including The Library Book, The Orchid Thief, and Rin Tin Tin. She has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 1992, covering a range of subjects including pigeon racing, Tonya Harding, teen surfing, taxidermy, and basketball. She is currently working on a memoir and adapting The Library Book for television. She lives in Los Angeles with her family. 

Join award-winning NPR journalist Ari Shapiro for an evening of conversation about his memoir and tales from his storied broadcast career.
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Award-winning NPR journalist Ari Shapiro steps from behind the microphone as he visits Live Talks Los Angeles with the release of his first book, The Best Strangers in the World. On a quest to help people listen to one another, and to find connection and commonality with people outside our self-reinforcing bubbles, Shapiro reveals the stories behind heartwarming, heartbreaking and poignant narratives in this compelling memoir.
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Long-time broadcaster Ari Shapiro has reported for NPR from above the Artic Circle and aboard Air Force One, covering wars and files stories from dozens of countries and most of the 50 states. A native of Portland, Oregon, he’s also a frequent guest singer with Pink Martini, and has appeared on four of the group’s albums. He’s toured the U.S. with his one-man cabaret show, Homeward, as well as with other artists like Chita Rivera, Alan Cumming and Rita Moreno.
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“A witty, poignant book that captures Ari Shaprio’s love for the unusual, his pursuit of the
unexpected, and his delight at connection against the odds.” –Ronan Farrow
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Pamela Adlon is an Emmy Award-winning creator, actor, writer, producer, and director. Her groundbreaking, Peabody Award-winning & Critic’s Choice Award nominated comedy series, FX’s Better Things, showcases her raw, insightful point of view and an unapologetic, elevated commentary on motherhood, feminism and the complexity of modern life. Better Things marks Adlon’s  shift into directing, showrunning, writing, producing and more, all at the highest level of her craft. In addition to her screen work—both in front of and behind the camera—Adlon also leads her own all-female production company, Slam Book Inc., where she currently oversees more than a dozen projects in development, each focused on unique characters sharing their own personal stories. She has been vocal in her support of women and many other under-represented groups, putting her activism into practice at Slam Book by elevating these stories and empowering others to use their own voices as well.

From the Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling author of How to Be an Artist: a deliciously readable survey of the art world in turbulent times.
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Jerry Saltz is the senior art critic at New York magazine and its entertainment site Vulture, and the author of the New York Times bestseller How to Be an Artist. In 2018 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. A frequent guest lecturer at major universities and museums, he has lectured at Harvard University, the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and many others, and has taught at Columbia University, Yale University, the Rhode Island School of Design, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and elsewhere.
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Irwin Miller is an award-winning designer, artist and thought leader who has worked in the design industry for over 25 years with a focus of architecture and interior design. Irwin has been a Principal and Design Director with Gensler for over 20 years working on projects of every scope and scale around the world. Before that, he worked with a variety of international architects throughout Europe after receiving degrees from RISD and Harvard Graduate School of Design. Irwin has also worked in stop-motion animation and film – creating music videos and commercials over the past decade..
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“A critic of the people, bringing art to a broader audience.” —Architectural Digest.
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Now, in Art Is Life, Jerry Saltz draws on two decades of work to offer a real-time survey of contemporary art as a barometer of our times. Chronicling a period punctuated by dramatic turning points—from the cultural reset of 9/11 to the rolling social crises of today—Saltz traces how visionary artists have both documented and challenged the culture. Art Is Life offers Saltz’s eye-opening appraisals of trailblazers like Kara Walker, David Wojnarowicz, Hilma af Klint, and Jasper Johns; provocateurs like Jeff Koons, Richard Prince, and Marina Abramović; and visionaries like Jackson Pollock, Bill Traylor, and Willem de Kooning. Saltz celebrates landmarks like the Obama portraits by Kehinde Wiley and Amy Sherald, writes searchingly about disturbing moments such as the Ankara gallery assassination, and offers surprising takes on figures from Thomas Kinkade to Kim Kardashian. And he shares stories of his own haunted childhood, his time as a “failed artist,” and his epiphanies upon beholding work by Botticelli, Delacroix, and the cave painters of Niaux. 
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With his signature blend of candor and conviction, Jerry Saltz argues in Art Is Life for the importance of the fearless artist—reminding us that art is a kind of channeled voice of human experience, a necessary window onto our times. The result is an openhearted and irresistibly readable appraisal by one of our most important cultural observers.

Bringing his cosmic perspective to civilization on Earth, Neil deGrasse Tyson shines new light on the crucial fault lines of our time―war, politics, religion, truth, beauty, gender, and race―in a way that stimulates a deeper sense of unity for us all.
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Neil deGrasse Tyson is an astrophysicist and the author of the New York Times bestselling Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, among other books. He is the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History, where he has served since 1996. Dr. Tyson is also the host and cofounder of the Emmy-nominated popular podcast StarTalk and its spinoff StarTalk Sports Edition, which combine science, humor, and pop culture. He is a recipient of 21 honorary doctorates, the Public Welfare Medal from the National Academy of Sciences, and the Distinguished Public Service Medal from NASA. Asteroid 13123 Tyson is named in his honor.
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Bill Prady co-created the hit CBS series “The Big Bang Theory” with television veteran Chuck Lorre. He served as an Executive Producer of that series until its finale in May 2019.For his work with NASA (a storyline on “Big Bang” promoting space exploration), Prady was awarded the Agency’s Exceptional Public Achievement Medal, NASA’s third-highest civilian honor. He began his work in entertainment in 1983 at Jim Henson Productions where he wrote a wide variety of projects, the last being The Muppets Celebrate Jim Henson, a posthumous tribute to the late puppeteer for which he received one of his five Emmy nominations.Following his work with Henson, Prady wrote for a number of television comedy and drama series. His credits includeMarried… With Children, the HBO series Dream On, Dharma & Greg

In addition to his Emmy nominations, Prady has received two Writers’ Guild awards, a CableAce award and eleven People’s Choice awards for his work as both a writer and producer. He has also been nominated for two additional Writers’ Guild awards and five Golden Globes.
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Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization.
In a time when our political and cultural views feel more polarized than ever, Tyson provides a much-needed antidote to so much of what divides us, while making a passionate case for the twin chariots of enlightenment―a cosmic perspective and the rationality of science.
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After thinking deeply about how science sees the world and about Earth as a planet, the human brain has the capacity to reset and recalibrates life’s priorities, shaping the actions we might take in response. No outlook on culture, society, or civilization remains untouched.
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With crystalline prose, Starry Messenger walks us through the scientific palette that sees and paints the world differently. From insights on resolving global conflict to reminders of how precious it is to be alive, Tyson reveals, with warmth and eloquence, an array of brilliant and beautiful truths that apply to us all, informed and enlightened by knowledge of our place in the universe.