Join us on Friday, July 26 at 7pm PT when we welcome Jesse Katz for the release of his book, The Rent Collectors: Exploitation, Murder, and Redemption in Immigrant LA, at 9th Ave!
Presented in partnership with Alta Journal
Masks Encouraged for In-Person Attendance
Or watch online at the link below
https://youtube.com/live/Pc25se1FKwk
Praise for The Rent Collectors
"The Rent Collectors will not leave you where it found you. Its searing, breathtaking detail always invites you to a reverence for complexity. This book helps us all to no longer settle for the one dimensional view again. Katz taps into our ache to find our shared humanity and indeed discover compassion as the answer to every question. This is urban reportage at its finest and most human."--Gregory Boyle, founder of Homeboy Industries and bestselling author of Tattoos on the Heart
"For longer than seems humanly possible, Jesse Katz has been one of our greatest chroniclers of L.A.'s street underworld. So it's no surprise that The Rent Collectors is a tale tuned fine, and filled with some exquisitely cinematic characters - Mexican Mafia honchos, baby mammas, cops, MacArthur Park street vendors, and a lost kid with devil horn tattoos. But I will admit that its appearance causes me some dismay, because, damn, I wish I'd written it." --Sam Quinones, bestselling author of Dreamland and The Least of Us
"In this lyrical, intelligent, and deeply literary work, Jesse Katz takes us on an unforgettable journey into the mind and life of a forgotten, reviled man. Like a character from Dostoevsky, Giovanni Macedo is a troubled sinner thrust into the cruelty of an urban landscape, a world Katz recreates with boundless compassion, and with painstaking and unflinching detail. Rent Collectors is a landmark of true-crime writing about the city that helped give birth to the genre, Los Angeles." --Héctor Tobar, bestselling author of Deep Down Dark and Our Migrant Souls
About The Rent Collectors
Tattoos on the Heart meets Ghettoside in this gripping true story about a botched gang murder set in the invisible economy of LA's immigrant street vendors.
Baby-faced teen Giovanni Macedo is desperate to find belonging in one of LA's most predatory gangs, the Columbia Lil Cycos--so desperate that he agrees to kill an undocumented Mexican street vendor. The vendor, Francisco Clemente, had been refusing to give in to the gang's shakedown demands. But Giovanni botches the hit, accidentally killing a newborn instead. The overlords who rule the Lil Cycos from a Supermax prison 1,000 miles away must be placated and Giovanni is lured across the border where, in turn, the gang botches his killing. And so, incredibly, Giovanni rises from the dead, determined to both seek redemption for his unforgivable crime and take down the gang who drove him to do it.
With The Rent Collectors, Jesse Katz has built a teeth clenching and breathless narrative that explicates the difficult and proud lives of undocumented black market workers who are being extorted by the gangs and fined by the city of LA--in other words, exploited by two sets of rent collectors.
About Jesse Katz
Jesse Katz spent fifteen years at the Los Angeles Times and another nine years at Los Angeles magazine. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, New York magazine, Rolling Stone, GQ, The American Prospect, Pacific Standard, California Sunday Magazine, and in the anthologies Best American Magazine Writing, Best American Crime Writing, and Best American Sports Writing. He teaches at the University of California, Irvine, and has volunteered at both Central Juvenile Hall and the Heman G. Stark Youth Correctional Facility. He lives in Los Angeles.
show less
Presented in partnership with Alta Journal
Masks Encouraged for In-Person Attendance
Or watch online at the link below
https://youtube.com/live/Pc25se1FKwk
Praise for The Rent Collectors
"The Rent Collectors will not leave you where it found you. Its searing, breathtaking detail always invites you to a reverence for complexity. This book helps us all to no longer settle for the one dimensional view again. Katz taps into our ache to find our shared humanity and indeed discover compassion as the answer to every question. This is urban reportage at its finest and most human."--Gregory Boyle, founder of Homeboy Industries and bestselling author of Tattoos on the Heart
"For longer than seems humanly possible, Jesse Katz has been one of our greatest chroniclers of L.A.'s street underworld. So it's no surprise that The Rent Collectors is a tale tuned fine, and filled with some exquisitely cinematic characters - Mexican Mafia honchos, baby mammas, cops, MacArthur Park street vendors, and a lost kid with devil horn tattoos. But I will admit that its appearance causes me some dismay, because, damn, I wish I'd written it." --Sam Quinones, bestselling author of Dreamland and The Least of Us
"In this lyrical, intelligent, and deeply literary work, Jesse Katz takes us on an unforgettable journey into the mind and life of a forgotten, reviled man. Like a character from Dostoevsky, Giovanni Macedo is a troubled sinner thrust into the cruelty of an urban landscape, a world Katz recreates with boundless compassion, and with painstaking and unflinching detail. Rent Collectors is a landmark of true-crime writing about the city that helped give birth to the genre, Los Angeles." --Héctor Tobar, bestselling author of Deep Down Dark and Our Migrant Souls
About The Rent Collectors
Tattoos on the Heart meets Ghettoside in this gripping true story about a botched gang murder set in the invisible economy of LA's immigrant street vendors.
Baby-faced teen Giovanni Macedo is desperate to find belonging in one of LA's most predatory gangs, the Columbia Lil Cycos--so desperate that he agrees to kill an undocumented Mexican street vendor. The vendor, Francisco Clemente, had been refusing to give in to the gang's shakedown demands. But Giovanni botches the hit, accidentally killing a newborn instead. The overlords who rule the Lil Cycos from a Supermax prison 1,000 miles away must be placated and Giovanni is lured across the border where, in turn, the gang botches his killing. And so, incredibly, Giovanni rises from the dead, determined to both seek redemption for his unforgivable crime and take down the gang who drove him to do it.
With The Rent Collectors, Jesse Katz has built a teeth clenching and breathless narrative that explicates the difficult and proud lives of undocumented black market workers who are being extorted by the gangs and fined by the city of LA--in other words, exploited by two sets of rent collectors.
About Jesse Katz
Jesse Katz spent fifteen years at the Los Angeles Times and another nine years at Los Angeles magazine. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, New York magazine, Rolling Stone, GQ, The American Prospect, Pacific Standard, California Sunday Magazine, and in the anthologies Best American Magazine Writing, Best American Crime Writing, and Best American Sports Writing. He teaches at the University of California, Irvine, and has volunteered at both Central Juvenile Hall and the Heman G. Stark Youth Correctional Facility. He lives in Los Angeles.
Join us on Friday, July 26 at 7pm PT when we welcome Jesse Katz for the release of his book, The Rent Collectors: Exploitation, Murder, and Redemption in Immigrant LA, at 9th Ave!
Presented in partnership with Alta Journal
Masks Encouraged for In-Person Attendance
Or watch online at the link below
https://youtube.com/live/Pc25se1FKwk
Praise for The Rent Collectors
"The Rent Collectors will not leave you where it found you. Its searing, breathtaking detail always invites you to a reverence for complexity. This book helps us all to no longer settle for the one dimensional view again. Katz taps into our ache to find our shared humanity and indeed discover compassion as the answer to every question. This is urban reportage at its finest and most human."--Gregory Boyle, founder of Homeboy Industries and bestselling author of Tattoos on the Heart
"For longer than seems humanly possible, Jesse Katz has been one of our greatest chroniclers of L.A.'s street underworld. So it's no surprise that The Rent Collectors is a tale tuned fine, and filled with some exquisitely cinematic characters - Mexican Mafia honchos, baby mammas, cops, MacArthur Park street vendors, and a lost kid with devil horn tattoos. But I will admit that its appearance causes me some dismay, because, damn, I wish I'd written it." --Sam Quinones, bestselling author of Dreamland and The Least of Us
"In this lyrical, intelligent, and deeply literary work, Jesse Katz takes us on an unforgettable journey into the mind and life of a forgotten, reviled man. Like a character from Dostoevsky, Giovanni Macedo is a troubled sinner thrust into the cruelty of an urban landscape, a world Katz recreates with boundless compassion, and with painstaking and unflinching detail. Rent Collectors is a landmark of true-crime writing about the city that helped give birth to the genre, Los Angeles." --Héctor Tobar, bestselling author of Deep Down Dark and Our Migrant Souls
About The Rent Collectors
Tattoos on the Heart meets Ghettoside in this gripping true story about a botched gang murder set in the invisible economy of LA's immigrant street vendors.
Baby-faced teen Giovanni Macedo is desperate to find belonging in one of LA's most predatory gangs, the Columbia Lil Cycos--so desperate that he agrees to kill an undocumented Mexican street vendor. The vendor, Francisco Clemente, had been refusing to give in to the gang's shakedown demands. But Giovanni botches the hit, accidentally killing a newborn instead. The overlords who rule the Lil Cycos from a Supermax prison 1,000 miles away must be placated and Giovanni is lured across the border where, in turn, the gang botches his killing. And so, incredibly, Giovanni rises from the dead, determined to both seek redemption for his unforgivable crime and take down the gang who drove him to do it.
With The Rent Collectors, Jesse Katz has built a teeth clenching and breathless narrative that explicates the difficult and proud lives of undocumented black market workers who are being extorted by the gangs and fined by the city of LA--in other words, exploited by two sets of rent collectors.
About Jesse Katz
Jesse Katz spent fifteen years at the Los Angeles Times and another nine years at Los Angeles magazine. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, New York magazine, Rolling Stone, GQ, The American Prospect, Pacific Standard, California Sunday Magazine, and in the anthologies Best American Magazine Writing, Best American Crime Writing, and Best American Sports Writing. He teaches at the University of California, Irvine, and has volunteered at both Central Juvenile Hall and the Heman G. Stark Youth Correctional Facility. He lives in Los Angeles.
read more
Presented in partnership with Alta Journal
Masks Encouraged for In-Person Attendance
Or watch online at the link below
https://youtube.com/live/Pc25se1FKwk
Praise for The Rent Collectors
"The Rent Collectors will not leave you where it found you. Its searing, breathtaking detail always invites you to a reverence for complexity. This book helps us all to no longer settle for the one dimensional view again. Katz taps into our ache to find our shared humanity and indeed discover compassion as the answer to every question. This is urban reportage at its finest and most human."--Gregory Boyle, founder of Homeboy Industries and bestselling author of Tattoos on the Heart
"For longer than seems humanly possible, Jesse Katz has been one of our greatest chroniclers of L.A.'s street underworld. So it's no surprise that The Rent Collectors is a tale tuned fine, and filled with some exquisitely cinematic characters - Mexican Mafia honchos, baby mammas, cops, MacArthur Park street vendors, and a lost kid with devil horn tattoos. But I will admit that its appearance causes me some dismay, because, damn, I wish I'd written it." --Sam Quinones, bestselling author of Dreamland and The Least of Us
"In this lyrical, intelligent, and deeply literary work, Jesse Katz takes us on an unforgettable journey into the mind and life of a forgotten, reviled man. Like a character from Dostoevsky, Giovanni Macedo is a troubled sinner thrust into the cruelty of an urban landscape, a world Katz recreates with boundless compassion, and with painstaking and unflinching detail. Rent Collectors is a landmark of true-crime writing about the city that helped give birth to the genre, Los Angeles." --Héctor Tobar, bestselling author of Deep Down Dark and Our Migrant Souls
About The Rent Collectors
Tattoos on the Heart meets Ghettoside in this gripping true story about a botched gang murder set in the invisible economy of LA's immigrant street vendors.
Baby-faced teen Giovanni Macedo is desperate to find belonging in one of LA's most predatory gangs, the Columbia Lil Cycos--so desperate that he agrees to kill an undocumented Mexican street vendor. The vendor, Francisco Clemente, had been refusing to give in to the gang's shakedown demands. But Giovanni botches the hit, accidentally killing a newborn instead. The overlords who rule the Lil Cycos from a Supermax prison 1,000 miles away must be placated and Giovanni is lured across the border where, in turn, the gang botches his killing. And so, incredibly, Giovanni rises from the dead, determined to both seek redemption for his unforgivable crime and take down the gang who drove him to do it.
With The Rent Collectors, Jesse Katz has built a teeth clenching and breathless narrative that explicates the difficult and proud lives of undocumented black market workers who are being extorted by the gangs and fined by the city of LA--in other words, exploited by two sets of rent collectors.
About Jesse Katz
Jesse Katz spent fifteen years at the Los Angeles Times and another nine years at Los Angeles magazine. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, New York magazine, Rolling Stone, GQ, The American Prospect, Pacific Standard, California Sunday Magazine, and in the anthologies Best American Magazine Writing, Best American Crime Writing, and Best American Sports Writing. He teaches at the University of California, Irvine, and has volunteered at both Central Juvenile Hall and the Heman G. Stark Youth Correctional Facility. He lives in Los Angeles.
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1231 9th Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94111
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