Adam Parfrey

In 1987, Adam Parfrey compiled, edited and co-published a collection of essays, interviews and art about and by UFO and religious cults, serial murderers, conspiracy kooks, and body-modification and piercing fetishists that seemed to presage the extreme cultural obsessions of what would come to be called Generation X. The brisk sales of the book, "Apocalypse Culture," raised interesting questions about the cultural value of the deliberately provocative material.

San Francisco's Litquake announced the schedule for its eight-day literary festival, which takes place in several venues during October, on Tuesday. Eight-hundred and forty local and international authors will be reading and talking about books. Some of the notable authors scheduled to appear are former U.S. poet laureate Robert Hass, humorist Merrill Markoe, Kenyan exile Ngugi wa Thiong'o, mystery writer Zoe Ferraris, satirist Will Self, California poet laureate Juan Felipe Herrera, writer Michelle Tea, Zyzzyva editor Oscar Villalon, poet Matthew Zapruder, fantasist Karen Joy Fowler, comedian Michael Ian Black, essayist Rebecca Solnit, underground publisher Adam Parfrey, novelist Andrew Sean Greer, poet D.A. Powell, thriller writer David Corbett, actor Chris Elliott, novelist Joshua Mohr and Salon.com founder David Talbot.

San Francisco's Litquake announced the schedule for its eight-day literary festival, which takes place in several venues during October, on Tuesday. Eight-hundred and forty local and international authors will be reading and talking about books. Some of the notable authors scheduled to appear are former U.S. poet laureate Robert Hass, humorist Merrill Markoe, Kenyan exile Ngugi wa Thiong'o, mystery writer Zoe Ferraris, satirist Will Self, California poet laureate Juan Felipe Herrera, writer Michelle Tea, Zyzzyva editor Oscar Villalon, poet Matthew Zapruder, fantasist Karen Joy Fowler, comedian Michael Ian Black, essayist Rebecca Solnit, underground publisher Adam Parfrey, novelist Andrew Sean Greer, poet D.A. Powell, thriller writer David Corbett, actor Chris Elliott, novelist Joshua Mohr and Salon.com founder David Talbot.

When the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig disaster sent a torrent of toxic oil into the Gulf of Mexico, there was at least one person — sitting at the moment in a federal penitentiary in Colorado — briskly penning, "I told you so. " Failures of technology don't get much bigger than this, and Theodore Kaczynski, whose murderous, 17-year revolution against technology as the Unabomber got him sentenced to life in prison, couldn't...

When the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig disaster sent a torrent of toxic oil into the Gulf of Mexico, there was at least one person — sitting at the moment in a federal penitentiary in Colorado — briskly penning, "I told you so. " Failures of technology don't get much bigger than this, and Theodore Kaczynski, whose murderous, 17-year revolution against technology as the Unabomber got him sentenced to life in prison, couldn't...

As corporate publishing grows ever more corporate, the specialized work of nonfiction, the photography volume that beckons to a certain rarefied taste, the historical work that explores, let's say, areas of less than burning interest to a vast reading public are all less likely to find support at major houses.

The men's magazines surveyed in Adam Parfrey's "It's a Man's World" had their effulgence during the first long leg of the Cold War. Their evolution, reflected in the feverishly vivid illustrations Parfrey has assembled, is readily linked to notions of masculinity that seemed firmly in place throughout World War II and embattled ever after.

They're banned on EBay and would probably be frowned upon by the U.S. government. Nevertheless, a pair of Osama bin Laden propaganda posters make up some of the odd and controversial artifacts for sale at publisher Adam Parfrey's exhibition this month at the Ghettogloss Gallery in Silver Lake.

Earlier this summer, almost 100 psychedelic music fans, subculture aficionados, students of the occult and local literati climbed the flower-petal-strewn steps of publisher couple Jodi Wille and Adam Parfrey's Silver Lake home for a salon celebrating the upcoming publication of "The Source: The Untold Story of Father Yod, YaHoWa 13 and the Source Family" (Process), the definitive history of a mystical cult that thrived in Los Angeles between 1970 and 1974.

Her closet may have been full of designer dresses, but Sharon Tate was a flower child all the way down to her toes. Most comfortable barefoot, she used to skirt the "shoes required" laws in snooty late '60s Beverly Hills by looping leather string around her toes and across the tops of her feet, and then tying the ends around her ankles. Voila: sandals. Even the Malibu Barbie doll, said to be inspired by the actress and her bikini-clad character, Malibu, from the 1967 beach comedy "Don't Make Waves," was barefoot in her box. Details like these seem trivial when held up against the events of Aug. 9, 1969, when Tate, 26 years old and eight months pregnant with her husband Roman Polanski's child, was murdered by Charles Manson's followers in her Benedict Canyon home.

The men's magazines surveyed in Adam Parfrey's "It's a Man's World" had their effulgence during the first long leg of the Cold War. Their evolution, reflected in the feverishly vivid illustrations Parfrey has assembled, is readily linked to notions of masculinity that seemed firmly in place throughout World War II and embattled ever after.

As corporate publishing grows ever more corporate, the specialized work of nonfiction, the photography volume that beckons to a certain rarefied taste, the historical work that explores, let's say, areas of less than burning interest to a vast reading public are all less likely to find support at major houses.

In 1987, Adam Parfrey compiled, edited and co-published a collection of essays, interviews and art about and by UFO and religious cults, serial murderers, conspiracy kooks, and body-modification and piercing fetishists that seemed to presage the extreme cultural obsessions of what would come to be called Generation X. The brisk sales of the book, "Apocalypse Culture," raised interesting questions about the cultural value of the deliberately provocative material.

She lost her boyfriend, her best friend and both her grandparents in the same year, any one of which would have been traumatic. But Jolene Siana was only 16. She was already struggling with difficult life issues. She didn't know her father, because he was never told she'd been born. And she says her mother was emotionally and physically abusive.

*--* SO. CAL. RATING Fiction LAST WEEK WEEKS ON LIST *--* *--* 1 The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown (Doubleday: $24.95) A 1 20 Louvre curator's killing leads to clues hidden in Leonardo's paintings and a secret society with something to hide 2 The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger (Doubleday: 5 16 $21.95) A recent college grad puts up with a nightmare of a boss at a high-fashion magazine 3 Trading Up by Candace Bushnell (Hyperion: $24.