From F. Scott Fitzgerald to Nathanael West, Joan Didion to Raymond Chandler, many writers have been inspired by Los Angeles. In this installment of City Guides, Carolyn Kellogg, staff writer at the Los Angeles Times and Jacket Copy blogger, visits her favorite haunts made famous by writers of both past and present.

In response to the Deep-water Horizon oil spill, writers Heidi Lynn Staples and Amy King created Poets for Living Waters, an online poetry forum featuring works written in response to the disaster, spurring a host of nationwide events that give poets not only an opportunity to take action against the catastrophe but also to speak out in support of our natural environment.

Showtime's Californication—a series about a best-selling writer (played by David Duchovny) who succumbs to the glitzy West Coast lifestyle—is renewed for a second season and leaves contributor Ken Gordon wondering, "What's the appeal?"