All LA County Library locations will be closed on Thursday, January 9, 2025 for a Day of Mourning to honor former President Jimmy Carter. Our digital library remains available 24/7.
Paint an L.A. Weather Landscape inspired by our One Book, One County book, L.A. Weather by María Amparo Escandón. For adults 18+.
Paint an L.A. Weather Landscape inspired by our One Book, One County book, L.A. Weather by María Amparo Escandón and the following book passage:
“It’s always nice out.”
“People around the country tend to think so. East Coast people, people from the Midwest. They say, ‘There’s no weather in L.A. It’s always seventy-two and sunny,’ but that’ inaccurate. Few people consider our five seasons to be different from one another, but they are. You know this. I know this because we’ve lived here all our lives. Ah, but go ahead and tell this to someone back east. Our winter rainy season overlaps with our sunny and mild spring, then with our jacaranda season, our horribly hot late summer, and the Santa Ana season. That’s five seasons there. Of course, some people in town would include the award season, but that’s not climate-related unless Oscars’ red carpet gets rained on. And then, what about the drought, the winds, the marine layer, the brushfires, the gigafires, the mud-slides, the landslides, the flash floods, the atmospheric rivers…”
About One Book, One County
One Book, One County is a community reading program for Summer 2024 that celebrates collaboration, education, and conversation across our county and emphasizes the power of connected libraries to create connected communities. This program is unique because instead of one book for one library system, all 9.8 million County residents are invited to read one book together, with supportive programming provided by a network of partnered Los Angeles County library jurisdictions. Learn more about this initiative at LACountyLibrary.org/onebook.
About L.A. Weather by María Amparo Escandón
The 2024 selection for One Book, One County is L.A. Weather by María Amparo Escandón. Published in 2022, L.A. Weather is a New York Times bestseller that follows the Mexican-American Alvarado family during a year in Los Angeles “as they wrestle with impending evacuations, secrets, deception, and betrayal, and their toughest decision yet: whether to stick together or burn it all down.”
María Amparo Escandón is a New York Times best-selling bilingual author (English/Spanish). Her novel, L.A. Weather, is a Reese’s Book Club pick and the winner of the Fiction Award at the International Latino Book Awards, 2022. Her first novel Esperanza’s Box of Saints, (Santitos in Spanish) has been the number one best seller in the Los Angeles Times Best Sellers List, it has 21 foreign editions and is read in over 86 countries. Her second novel is González & Daughter Trucking Co. (Transportes González e Hija, S.A. in Spanish.) María has been an L.A. resident for forty years.
Attendance is limited and advance registration is required. To sign up, see library staff, or register online at Visit.LACountyLibrary.org/Events and filter by location or event date.
AGE GROUP: | Adults |
EVENT TYPE: | History, Society, & Culture | Entertainment | Education & Literacy | Arts, Crafts, & Hobbies |
TAGS: | One Book One County |
Located in a shopping center from 1964 to 1974, the North Enterprise Branch became the A C Bilbrew Library with the opening of the present building on November 2, 1974. Los Angeles County Supervisor Kenneth Hahn was instrumental in the library obtaining funding through a Model Neighborhood Development Program to build a 21,000 square foot library with a capacity to house 100,000 books. The library was designed by Vincent Proby, an African-American architect and is named for Madame A C Bilbrew, a community leader and former deputy for Supervisor Hahn who was also a musician and poet.
In 1933, Mrs. Bilbrew was the first black soloist to appear on radio, and in 1928, she produced the first Negro chorus that was featured in Hollywood's first Negro talkie, titled "Hearts in Dixie." She was the first black person to have a radio show. Mrs. Bilbrew was also a producer of pageants and dramas, an outstanding dramatic reader, and choral director.
A C Bilbrew Library houses the Black Resource Center which supports research and study on social, historical, musical, and cultural aspects unique to the "Black Experience" such as Juneteenth and Kwanzaa. From 1980-2008, A C Bilbrew Library has hosted the County Library's African American History Month Celebration. The "Living Black History Tribute" first honoree was Eubie Blake. This became the "African-American Living Legend" Series. Past Honorees have included Cab Calloway, Count Basie, Rosa Parks, James Baldwin, Coretta Scott King, and Ray Charles. An interactive Living Legends digital display is featured in the main lobby. The library is located in an unincorporated area west of the City of Compton.
