L. John Harris celebrates the release of his new book published by Heyday, Portrait in Red, at Mrs. Dalloway’s in Berkeley, in conversation with Marion Abbott.

In-person event. 2904 College Avenue Berkeley, CA.

L. John Harris, born in Los Angeles, studied art and literature at UC Berkeley in the 1960s. Seduced by Berkeley’s food revolution in the 1970s, Harris worked at several iconic shops and restaurants and wrote The Book of Garlic (1974). He launched his cookbook company, Aris Books, in 1980 and his “Foodoodles” cartoon byline in Bay Area magazines led to a series of illustrated memoirs: Foodoodles (2010), Café French (2019) and My Little Plague Journal (2022). Mr. Harris coproduced with PBS in 2001 the film Los Romeros: The Royal Family of the Guitar and serves as the curator of the Harris Guitar Collection at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

After beginning her career in trade book publishing, Marion Abbott co-founded and co-owned Mrs. Dalloway’s (with Ann Leyhe) from 2004-2021. Her short stories, essays, and book reviews have appeared in anthologies, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post, and Literary Hub. She now works as a freelance editor and is writing a book about her years as an indie bookseller.