Last night, Alta Journal celebrated its Baja Issue at a mesmerizing new Oakland bookstore and bar called Clio’s. The space, part Hogwarts-style speakeasy, part Playboy Mansion, officially launched on New Year’s Eve. It has since been open to the public on Fridays and Saturdays, as well as throughout the week for literary events like this one. Alta was delighted to hop into Clio’s, host our first East Bay issue party, and welcome readers new and old to the latest of our free quarterly literary salons.

If you weren’t able to make this event, make a note to check out Clio’s, an unconventional and remarkable concept located just off Lake Merritt. Guests descend a few curvy stairs before entering a low-lit, bohemian multiroom space, its walls lined with a potpourri of used books. Timothy Don, the store’s co-owner and the art editor of Lapham’s Quarterly, has organized Clio’s literary inventory chronologically to represent “the history of ideas…a timeline of human civilization.” When browsers wander among the shelves, they’ll start with the beginning of the cosmos, getting lost in philosophy, natural history, religion, and fiction until (perhaps two or three negronis later) they find themselves back in the present moment.

“The goal here is also to have our collection dovetail into the deepest and widest of California writers and California publishers in the world,” Don says. “So we’re very excited to start fulfilling this mission with Alta tonight.”

Blaise Zerega, Alta’s editorial director, began the show by welcoming the guests, a diverse crowd of readers, Clio’s enthusiasts, and passersby who were drawn in by the cozy scene as they walked down Grand Avenue. Zerega introduced the Baja Issue, meant to “throw our readers a curveball. We’re all about California and the West, and we went south: we moved from Alta California to Baja California.” The format of the evening would embrace this same spirit of unconventionality. With two of four contributors out sick, Alta editors Beth Spotswood and Matt Haber pinch-hit as readers to bring the issue to life.

Spotswood began by presenting Alta contributor Joy Lanzendorfer’s immersive piece “Sea of Change,” which uncovers John Steinbeck’s voyage to the Sea of Cortez in 1940, a refuge from fame, marital strife, and looming war. With both humor and melancholy, the piece tells the story of Steinbeck’s explorations of the region’s ecology with the marine biologist Ed Ricketts, his best friend and literary muse.

Journalist Kate McQueen was next up, to read “The Never-Ending Story,” a gripping piece following Bruce Davis, a former Manson family member who is now 81 and has faced parole 33 times. McQueen cowrote the feature with incarcerated journalist Joe Garcia. In it, the pair raise fundamental questions about our state’s parole system, the meaning of rehabilitation, and the cultural spectacle of high-profile crimes.

Last, legendary feminist photographer Judy Dater took the stage to be interviewed by Haber. They discussed the arresting photos from her exhibit The Gun Next Door, the subject of an Alta online story by Jessica Zack. Dater’s exhibit is a collection of intimate and unnerving portraits of gun owners with their weapons. Several portraits from this series were hung throughout Clio’s and were one of the most popular draws of the night. When asked whether the project had changed her view on gun ownership, Dater responded, “My opinion about guns didn’t change, but my opinion of the people who owned them did.… I’m a people photographer. That’s what I do: I take photos of people.… It was impossible for me to stereotype them.”

After Alta’s presentation and readings, Clio’s was alive with chatter and movement as guests returned to Dater’s photos, flipped through the new issue, and, cocktails in hand, pulled gem after gem from the store’s shelves.

Issue parties like these take place every quarter in the Bay Area and Los Angeles. Make sure you’re signed up for Alta’s newsletters to stay in the loop and never miss another Alta event.•