Writing the Golden State: The New Literary Terrain of California

A collection of literary essays about California from some of the state’s most established, and most exciting upcoming writers.

Writing the Golden State: The New Literary Terrain of California explores California through twenty-five essays that look beyond the clichés of the “California Dream,” portraying a state that is deviant and recalcitrant, proud and humble, joyful and communal. It is a California that reclaims the beauty of the unwanted, the quotidian, and the out-of-place. Constantly in search of “the spirit of a place” Writing the Golden State pries into the themes of familial genealogy, migration, land and housing, and national belonging and identity. Collectively, the essays demonstrate how individuals and towns have weathered some of the social, political, and economic changes of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

Carribean Fragoza is an artist and writer from South El Monte and the author of Eat the Mouth that Feeds You, a PEN award finalist.

Romeo Guzman is an assistant professor in U.S. History at Claremont Graduate University and the author of East of East: The Making of Greater El Monte.

Samin Joudat is an Iranian American researcher, writer, editor, visual artist, and educator interested in the aesthetics and politics of technology and culture. @saminejoudat