Stay Home and Read to Support the Library's Cybernauts!

All proceeds raised through the Stay Home and Read a Book Ball this year will directly support the Los Angeles Public Library’s Cybernauts program.

Cybernauts are trained computer support staff that provide much needed on-demand technological assistance and small group trainings to Library users. On any given week, the 39 Cybernauts employed at 36 neighborhood libraries assist around 1,500 patrons with anything from setting up an email account, to using a smart phone, to creating a resume or downloading files. Cybernauts work to advance digital equity in Los Angeles by helping individuals and communities develop the critical skills needed for full participation in society, democracy, and the economy.

Read more about what Cybernauts do and why we need them at the Library!

Laila Lalami | Stay Home and Read a Book Ball Chair

READ LAILA’S CHAIR LETTER HERE

Laila Lalami is the author of four novels, including The Moor’s Account, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and The Other Americans, which was a Los Angeles Times bestseller and a finalist for the National Book Award. She is a professor of creative writing at UC Riverside. Her new book, a work of nonfiction called Conditional Citizens, will be published in spring 2020.

Hanif Abdurraqib | Honorary Chair

“As I run out of reasons to go outside with each passing year, I have found no greater comfort than allowing books to be my escape. Books, my new and endless outside.”

Hanif Abdurraqib is a poet, essayist, and cultural critic from Columbus, Ohio. His poetry has been published in Muzzle, Vinyl, PEN American, and various other journals. His essays and music criticism have been published in The FADER, Pitchfork, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. His first full length poetry collection, The Crown Ain’t Worth Much, was named a finalist for the Eric Hoffer Book Prize, and was nominated for a Hurston-Wright Legacy Award. His first collection of essays, They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us, was named a book of the year by Buzzfeed, Esquire, NPR, Oprah Magazine, Paste, CBC, The Los Angeles Review, Pitchfork, and The Chicago Tribune, among others. He released Go Ahead In The Rain: Notes To A Tribe Called Quest with University of Texas press in February 2019. The book became a New York Times Bestseller, and was met with critical acclaim. His second collection of poems, A Fortune For Your Disaster, was released by Tin House Books in September 2019.

Caitlin Doughty | Honorary Chair

“Wait, you’re telling me that curling up with a book from the Los Angeles Public Library, something I already do every night of the week (shoutout to the Washington Irving Branch), can suddenly be supporting an amazing cause? Put the tea on and sign me up; my introvert’s heart is all aflutter!”

Caitlin Doughty is a mortician, activist, and funeral industry rabble-rouser. In 2011 she founded the death acceptance collective The Order of the Good Death, which has spawned the death positive movement. Her books Smoke Gets in Your Eyes and From Here to Eternity were both New York Times bestsellers. She lives in Los Angeles, where she runs her funeral home.

Roxane Gay | Honorary Chair

“There is no better way to celebrate than to stay at home with an amazing book. The Stay at Home and Read a Book Ball is the gift that keeps on giving. It allows us to celebrate and support the L.A. Public Library by doing that thing we love most–losing ourselves in a great story.”

Roxane Gay’s writing appears in Best American Mystery Stories 2014, Best American Short Stories 2012, Best Sex Writing 2012, A Public Space, McSweeney’s, Tin House, Oxford American, American Short Fiction, Virginia Quarterly Review, and many others. She is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times. She is the author of the books Ayiti, An Untamed State, the New York Times bestselling Bad Feminist, the nationally bestselling Difficult Women and the New York Times bestselling Hunger. She is also the author of World of Wakanda for Marvel. She has several books forthcoming and is also at work on television and film projects.

Ottessa Moshfegh | Honorary Chair

“Reading is a miraculous activity–something that’s good for you that you can actually enjoy doing. It makes you happier and smarter, as long as you choose your book wisely. Read a book on March 1st. You’ll like yourself better after.”

Ottessa Moshfegh is a fiction writer from New England. Her first book, McGlue, a novella, won the Fence Modern Prize in Prose and the Believer Book Award. She is also the author of the short story collection Homesick for Another World. Her stories have been published in The Paris Review, The New Yorker, and Granta, and have earned her a Pushcart Prize, an O. Henry Award, the Plimpton Discovery Prize, and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. Eileen, her first novel, was shortlisted for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Man Booker Prize, and won the PEN/Hemingway Award for debut fiction; My Year of Rest and Relaxation, her second novel, was a New York Times bestseller.

Cathleen Schine | Honorary Chair

“To crawl into bed and read a book – that is what I was born to do. Thank you, LAPL, for this festive occasion (excuse) to do what I do best. Join me in bed, L.A. readers! Time for this year’s Stay Home and Read a Book Ball.”

Cathleen Schine is the author of the internationally best-selling novels The Love Letter, and Rameau’s Niece. Schine’s other novels are Alice in Bed, To the Bird House, The Evolution of Jane, She is Me, The New Yorkers, The Three Weissmanns of Westport, Fin & Lady, They May Not Mean To, But They Do, and her new novel, The Grammarians. In addition to novels she has written articles for The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, The New York Times Sunday Magazine, and The New York Times Book Review. Her essays have been included in Best American Essays 2005, Fierce Pajamas, an Anthology of New Yorker Humor, and The Big New Yorker Book of Dogs. She grew up in Westport, Ct. And lives in Venice, California.