L.A. Times Dec. Book Club with California Poet Laureate Lee Herrick

California Poet Laureate Lee Herrick, who celebrates his home state in the poem “My California,” will be in conversation Dec. 12 with Times editor Steve Padilla.Herrick joins book club readers to discuss his first year on the road as California’s poet-in-chief and his approach to telling stories that capture the state’s vitality and diversity.Gov. Gavin Newsom appointed the Fresno writer and professor to be the state’s 10th poet laureate in November 2022. “Each poet laureate, typically, is asked to advocate for poetry, educate and bring poetry to as many communities as he or she or they can,” Herrick said at the time. “That can take the shape of readings or talks … in everything from a grade school to a university to a prison to a book club — and everything in between.”Herrick is the author of three poetry collections, including “Scar and Flower,” a finalist for the 2020 Northern California Book Award. He also has written “Gardening Secrets of the Dead” and “This Many Miles From Desire.”Born in South Korea, Herrick was adopted when he was 10 months old by parents from Northern California. Formerly Fresno’s poet laureate, he teaches at Fresno City College and in the MFA program at the University of Nevada, Reno at Lake Tahoe.