“Things are always changing. This is just one of the big jumps instead of the little step-by-step changes that are easier to take. People have changed the climate of the world. Now they’re waiting for the old days to come back.” —Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Sower
On Thursday morning, Octavia’s Bookshelf owner Nikki High arrived at her Pasadena store to discover something unusual: power. High posted the news on Instagram, inviting displaced followers to use the store to charge devices or get online. Two nights before, high winds with gusts up to 99 miles an hour had stoked flames in Altadena that quickly burrowed into parts of Pasadena. By Wednesday evening, the Eaton Fire had grown to nearly 11,000 acres and forced over 30,000 people to evacuate. Thousands of structures burned, some within two miles of the bookstore.
News of the bookshop’s Wi-Fi spread, and neighbors slowly started trickling into the store. Then people started dropping off water. Food arrived, served on folding tables. By the end of the day, bookstore manager Kiki Williams had pulled High aside: “I think we have an operation here,” she said.
Within a day, the 621-square-foot North Hill Avenue space transformed into a mutual aid hub. High and her tiny team of employees boxed up the store’s entire inventory and stuffed it in the attic. They restocked shelves with food and toiletries from the bags of donations dropped off by folks driving in from as far away as San Diego. The former Poetry section was suddenly lined with cans of Campbell’s tomato soup and Chef Boyardee Beefaroni. The Puzzles & Games bins filled with diapers and baby wipes.
On Sunday, High sits outside at a table with a bag of Cheez-Its while handwriting a list of low-stock items (lotion, kids’ medicine, blankets). “I’m running on adrenaline,” she says, gesturing to a can of orange-flavored Celsius. “But it’s starting to peak a bit.” High, who’s lived in the Altadena area for 47 years, is displaced by order of a mandatory evacuation herself; her house is one of five remaining on the entire block. She’s unable to return home to assess any damage—the National Guard had closed off her street after reports of looting. Still, High is unwavering, committed to servicing the very community that buoyed her last year when Octavia’s faced financial trouble. “I thought I might have to close up,” High recalls. “The community said absolutely not.”
Each morning since the fire’s outbreak, High posts on Instagram with requests for volunteers and donations. Within three hours, the bookshop is usually at capacity. Volunteers are stationed inside and outside the store to help with donation drop-off and item sorting. Asha Wafer, a yoga instructor at the nearby studio Practice, helps stunned displaced families select toiletries from the shelves. “A lot of them are so distraught,” she describes, “they ask me, ‘What do I need?’” Wafer is a native Angelena; her grandparents, victims of redlining, eventually bought a home in Compton after briefly considering buying in Altadena. “The generational loss for Black families is deeply felt,” Wafer says. “It could have been my family.”
The parallels between the current landscape and Parable of the Sower, the New York Times bestseller by the bookstore’s namesake author, Octavia E. Butler, are not lost on High. The 1993 novel, set uncannily in 2025, follows the young Lauren Olamina as she evacuates her fire-ravaged Los Angeles suburb while America teeters into utter societal and climate collapse. High sees the novel as equal parts inspiration and warning: “So much about Parable of the Sower was rebuilding,” she says. “Lauren Olamina left a blueprint.” On Saturday morning, the Los Angeles Times reported that the Altadena cemetery where Butler is buried had caught fire.
Later, on Sunday afternoon, Jennee and Kenji Baugham stop inside Octavia’s Bookshelf to grab KN95 masks. On Tuesday, the couple and their 18-year-old son with mental health issues had been forcibly evacuated from their home in Altadena. The Baughams are currently living with family in Temple City; they don’t know when they can return home. The damage from the fire will likely require months of construction, possibly including installation of new floors and walls.
The Baughams say they’re relying on free services like the ones provided by Octavia’s to help them keep going. “Octavia’s was the first hub that popped up,” Jennee says. “It started with ‘Come charge your phone,’ and it turned into ‘We have water.’” Jennee, a fifth-grade teacher in Arcadia, previously taught ASL at Aveson in School of Leaders in Altadena. The elementary school is now gone. Jennee says she can think of only two students’ families who didn’t lose their homes.
As Jennee greets a colleague from school, Kenji ducks inside his trunk. He comes out with a tamale pot, taped closed and weighted down with three cans of chickpeas. Inside is a ball python, curled up next to a piece of cloth and a yogurt container filled with water.
In addition to the snake, the Baughams took their three dogs when they evacuated. They’re grateful to have their pets—as well as space for their pets, however small. Kenji says they know of someone with a goat who’s living in their car with the animal.
The Baughams’ house is now outside the mandatory evacuation zone, but the National Guard also won’t let them return. Equally frustrating: AAA insurance won’t call them back (closed for the weekend). Fortunately, the Baughams managed to escape with all their personal documents. Jennee says she forgot two things: her medicine and a copy of Parable of the Sower that she’d purchased at Octavia’s two weeks earlier.•
Due to unforeseen circumstances, we have rescheduled this Thursday’s January CBC gathering. Please join us on Tuesday, January 28, at 5 p.m. Pacific time, when author Viet Thanh Nguyen will sit down with CBC host John Freeman and a special guest to discuss The Sympathizer. Register for the Zoom conversation here.
PUZZLE
Complete Alta’s crossword inspired by The Sympathizer. —Alta
MANGO AND SCOTCH
Make Lindsay Merbaum’s dangerously delicious smash cocktail the Sympathizer. —Alta
BIG SUR
Read Alta books editor David L. Ulin’s review of Pico Iyer’s Aflame: Learning from Silence. —Alta
POST-WWII JAPANESE INCARCERATION
Read CBC editor Anita Felicelli’s review of poet and writer Brandon Shimoda’s latest nonfiction work, The Afterlife Is Letting Go. —Los Angeles Times
TRUE GRIT
Ulin writes a powerful essay about determination and the unexpected desire to be home while in New York during the Los Angeles fires. —New York Times
SHOWCASE FOR YOUNG AUTHORS
McSweeney’s and 826 Valencia’s charitable arm, the Hawkins Project, have donated funds to establish the International Library of Youth Writing. —Publishers Weekly
Alta’s California Book Club email newsletter is published weekly. Sign up for free today.
