Welcome! On this page you'll find information about previous and upcoming events celebrating the publication of my first book, ABC ISSUE NO. 3: Scream at the Librarian: Sketches of our Patrons in Downtown Los Angeles by Joel J. Rane, with illustrations by Raymond Pettibon and Cristin Sheehan Sullivan; published by Booklyn Artists Alliance, 2007. Enjoy your stay and thank you for visiting!
From June 2001 to April 2006, I was a reference librarian in the Literature and Fiction Department of the Central Library, Downtown Los Angeles. I rode a bicycle each morning from my apartment to Sunset Boulevard, and then took the subway, reading a book, pretending not to see the insanity around me. Instead of becoming habitual, this routine became more difficult day by day.
On 13 September 2007, Scream at the Librarian debuted at the Kim Light Gallery in Culver City, California.
There's my proud surrogate mom, Kim, greeting the crowd while I sign copies. Everyone who bought a book at the release party got a special gold star. Hey, I AM a librarian, after all. 
After the signing, I pulled out my notes, put on my command voice and put on a performance for the lucky guests. 
It was the first time I'd read since early 2000. I presented excerpts from the book, including...
The Cougher sat directly opposite the Pinot, near the patio diners. He rarely came inside the library and I don't recall seeing him sit anywhere else. He was of indeterminate older age, balding, long, curly hair, an unkempt beard, and a vengeful twinkle as he looked up from his hunched back. He planted himself across from the restaurant and smoked upwind, cheroots and cigars, the smoke blowing across the patio, and as he smoked, he coughed. Amazing coughs, lung-busters that could shame my three-pack-a-day grandfather in his crypt. The lawyers and their clients glanced over nervously. The Cougher troubled them, bubonic plague, tuberculosis, SARS, avian flu.
The Singer's rant had no educational value. She sang loudly and off-key, insisting to strangers how much she loved Jesus Christ, and if provoked, she began gibbering in tongues. She did this to the man who told her to shut up, giving him the evil eye and stabbing her index finger through a stream of alien sounds. A few days later, she appeared in my department of the Central Library. "Uh oh," I said. The other librarians at the desk looked up; they knew the drill. With all of us watching, she waved energetically. "Hello! Hello! Jesus loves you!"
The Devil was a truly lost soul, the kind of homeless with matted hair, skin burnt and dirtied to a leathery complexion, clothes tattered, mouth open but no language emerging. He never came inside the library--indoors was not his situation. Across his forehead, in large, dark numerals, he'd written "666". He'd mosey through the garden, hissing at the straights and the other homeless, dragging a battered burden cart. "Devil!" I'd exclaim in delight whenever I saw him. Unlike the panhandlers, the Devil asked for nothing, and I considered him a fellow traveler in my Downtown. He grinned when I called his name; he liked to hear it spoken aloud.
I also read an excerpt from my novel Supporting the Homeless and this poem from my collection, Has Time Come for Silver Lake?:
I tried to feel sorry for youFinally I read the poem "Symptom Recital" by Miss Dorothy Parker. Then, courtesy of my friends Bill Weigel and Beth Chance of Boulder Creek, California, the author and audience enjoyed a bottle of rare Swiss absinthe.
Photos courtesy of Miles Lightwood.
Return to Scream at the Librarian! Vaya con dios!
Updated Tuesday, 12 February 2008, by joel at joelrane.com.
