Ruling San Francisco’s literary scene for just over two weeks and celebrating its 25th anniversary with over 120 events, Litquake 2024 promises untarnished dazzle. As in the past, this year’s literary festival from Oct. 10-26 shines light on local writers and offers programs for all ages. Readings, panels, parties, screenings and performances primarily are in San Francisco, and most events are free.
The ball gets rolling in the morning on Oct. 10 with Kidquake, co-presented by the San Francisco Public Library, offering activities especially for young readers. Later, the splashy opening night Booksellers Ball has 17 independent booksellers and local literati taking over Club Fugazi in North Beach to enjoy lit-themed libations and performances.
The first festival planned entirely by Norah Piehl, who was appointed executive director in 2023, this year’s events again take place in expected (bookstores, libraries) and unexpected locations (police stations, laundromats). The closing bash, Lit Crawl, brings together more than 250 authors and nearly 5,000 fans at storefront gatherings in the Mission.
Among 2024’s high-profile participating authors are Roddy Doyle, Dave Eggers, Rachel Kushner, Kaveh Akbar, Paul Lynch, Daniel Levitin, Paul Ramos, Hernan Diaz, Steve Young, Maxine Hong Kingston, Michelle Tea and Carvell Wallace.
Tea, an award-winning memoir, fiction, poetry and children’s lit writer with a new book called “Modern Magic” appears Oct. 13 at the Lost Church in a witchcraft-themed event with Diana Helmuth, Rana Tahir, Julia Halina Hadas and MK Chavez.
In “Modern Magic, Tea, a self-described witch and professional tarot reader, offers fascinating tidbits about the history of witches and the occult, brought to life with her signature humor—often at her own expense—and unbridled feminist, anti-racist, queer, trans perspectives. Most chapters conclude with suggested rituals and spells on subjects as varied as love, luck, sex, divine intervention, hexes, housework and dreams.
Timing is a topic Tea likes. She says, “Timing and luck are like we’re helping manifestation; lassoing energy or catapulting ourselves into the path of good luck.” She adds, “But time is an unpredictable snake, twirling through our lives and upsetting things. Time is functional, but there’s also powerful energy and mystery in untimed, mystical experiences.”
For Tea, place-making means deliberately creating heightened sacred spaces, even in homes. She says, “I went through a bad divorce and had to spiritually wash my house. Now it feels great. When people walk into the room where I do intentional spirit work and magic, they feel it without my even saying anything.”
Tea says witchery takes consistent practice. Life happens against a backdrop of chaos, and yet we are all “shards of the divine,” she insists. Tapping into the divine platform causes people to loosen up, release static identities and experience spiritual breakthroughs.
Tea writes about crones and anti-aging prejudice that erodes belief in the mystical power of a body at any age. She dares to ask, “What happens if we embrace aging and not just white knuckle it? Writing about witchery has amped up my level of certainty about my history and practices. Trust is grounded; faith is going out on a limb. Trust is holding something in your hand; faith and magic are ephemeral. You can trust yourself when something seems correct to you, even if you can’t prove it.”
On Oct. 19 at 111 Gallery, Carvell Wallace, author of the bestselling memoir “Another Word for Love,” appears with moderator Traci Thomas and poets Morgan Parker and sam sax in “How to Get Free: Healing in the USA.”
In his memoir, Wallace, an East Bay resident, describes growing up Black and queer as the only child of a single mother who frequently neglected him. But amid severe economic conditions and battles with identity, he did experience profound love from his mother, other family members and people who believed in him. His book reveals a person honestly examining ugliness and conflict, yet also recognizing life’s beauty.
“I don’t think I’m saving the world with this book. And if there is such a thing, I can’t do it. I’m not a superhero…. Really, all there is, is, ‘What is my daily contribution?’ Sometimes I give up lucrative jobs, money, to stay in line with my values, to be the best version of me,” Wallace says.
While writing essays about the hardest parts of his childhood, young adult life, and the self-awareness he encountered after becoming a father, Wallace says he “sorta blacked out.” Unable to be present with the pain, he shifted to “writer’s head,” focusing on word choice, sentence length and structure.
He says, “I knew the more horrid the stuff, the less I had to write. Get in and get out—no florid hoop-de-doodle. I couldn’t languish in it. I don’t think the reader would want to, either. Later, writing in more pleasant territory, I knew we could go into the garden and smell the flowers.”
About fathering his son, 21, and daughter, 19, he says, “Parenting is never done. You love your kids so much and want them to have the best of you, of the world. You learn quickly that’s not possible and it’s really painful. Your unhealed stuff impacts them and you can’t go back and undo it. But being in loving relationship—with people, nature, the land—is the No. 1 way I heal.”
To have a working life requires being in harmony with the desire to live and love: “There’s an imperative to be in balance with the (loving and) larger forces in and outside of ourselves. I really like that idea and want to boost that in myself and others. That’s the extent of my faith,” Wallace says.
For Wallace, simple acts matter: “Getting up, even when I’m feeling like life sucks. Helping one of my kids, or reaching a word count, sweeping behind the stove, showing up. The sound of me trying is putting effort in, regardless of how I feel. Truly do the work, then take a day to chill and enjoy it,” he says.
Michelle Tea appears at 8:15 p.m. Oct. 13 at the Lost Church, 988 Columbus Ave., San Francisco. Tickets are $20.90 at thelostchurch.
Carvell Wallace appears in “How to Get Free: Healing in the USA” at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 19 at 111 Minna Gallery and Event Space, 111 Minna St., San Francisco. Tickets are $20 at litquake2024.sched.com.
Litquake runs Oct. 10-26, mostly in San Francisco, with some events in the East Bay and South Bay. For the complete schedule, visit litquake.org.
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