Bull kelp near Caspar, California, in 2023. File photo: Gregory Bull/AP

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🧛🏾 A gathering for everyone who likes a good shock, “celebrating all things grim, grotesque, unsettling, macabre, and weird in fiction,” the monthly last-Thursday group Repulsive Reads returns to the library to discuss Octavia Butler’s 2005 vampire sci-fi novel “Fledgling.” Get a jump on April’s cruel assignment: Ira Levin’s “Rosemary’s Baby.” Thursday, March 26, 5 p.m. North Branch. FREE

📚 Author Josie Iselin and illustrator Ellen Litwiller mark the release of their new book “The Mysterious World of the Bull Kelp Forest” with a conversation and slideshow of images from the book capturing the underwater forests that makes the waters of the North Pacific coast a wondrous habitat. Thursday, March 26, 7 p.m. Mrs. Dalloway’s Bookstore. FREE (registration encouraged)

📚 Whiting Award and National Book Critics Circle Award-winner Layli Long Soldier, an enrolled member Oglala Lakota Nation, reads her poetry and discusses her writing, a conversation followed by an audience Q&A. Thursday, April 2, 5 p.m. Maude Fife Rm 315, Wheeler Hall. FREE

🎤 Part of the 37th Annual Bioneers conference, this double bill features prolific musician, composer and eco-activist Garth Stevenson, whose double bass work has delighted (or confused) seals, penguins and whales (encounters he’ll present accompanied by stunning video footage), and Berkeley’s own soul-powered Destani Wolf, an inveterately inventive vocalist who performs regularly at the Freight as a member of Bobby McFerrin’s Motion. Friday, March 27, 8:15 p.m. The Freight. $45

💃 Veteran DJ Luis Medina presents a 77th birthday fundraiser for KPFA with Sabroso, a salsa/Afro-Latin dance party featuring two hour-long sets by the talent-packed Julio Bravo and Salsabor along with DJ El De La Clave, a dance performance by the Cuban rueda dance troupe Rueda Con Ritmo, and a salsa dance lesson with Felipe Martinez. Friday, March 27, 8 p.m.-1 a.m. La Peña Cultural Center. $25-$30

🎷 The RealTime Collective, the Bay Area all-star quartet featuring pianist Tammy L. Hall, saxophonist Kristen Strom, bassist Ruth Davies and drummer Sylvia Cuenca, celebrates the music of a pianist and composer who spanned nearly a century of jazz innovation with the program “Mary Lou Williams: Soul On Soul.” The artists discuss Williams’ legacy in a pre-concert talk. Friday, March 27, 7:30 p.m. The Jazzschool.$25

🎭 Louise Pearl’s one-woman show “Pass the Nails and Shame The Devil” recounts her family’s ordeal building their own house amidst Oakland’s 1980s crack epidemic as her strong-willed, Louisiana-born parents gather a motley crew of men to make this dream home into a reality. Saturdays, March 28-April 18, 5 p.m. The Marsh. $25-$100 (14+)

🎶 Bassist Caroline Chung brings her Citizen’s Jazz brigade back to Fourth Street for an afternoon of propulsive grooves and infectious tunes. Saturday, March 28, 1 p.m. Fourth and Delaware. FREE

📚 Richmond author Nikoo Yahyazadeh shares her distressingly topical new children’s book, “Yasi and Mina’s Pomegranate Tree,” an age-appropriate, relatable tale of two young friends in Tehran facing the hardships of war. Saturday, March 28, 11 a.m. North Branch. FREE

🎹 Three of the region’s most distinctive musical voices — electric bassist Michael Manring, flutist Larry Kassin, and pianist John R. Burr — join forces for a live concert recording in the improvisation-steeped trio’s first East Bay appearance. Sunday, March 29, 3 p.m. The Back Room. $20

🍷 Berkeley’s purveyor of kosher libations, Covenant Winery, holds its first-ever Passover Market featuring local artisans, food vendors, Judaica and, of course, their own Pesach-ready vintages for all your Passover needs. After shopping, enjoy a pita sandwich from Hummus Bodega and a glass of wine on the tasting patio. ⁠⁠Sunday, March 29, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Covenant Winery. FREE

📚 Mocked by his adversaries and personally insulted by Napoleon, 19th century French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck transformed the field of biology with the first evolutionary theory of life, an intellectual feat explored in Jessica Riskin’s new book “The Power of Life: The Invention of Biology & the Revolutionary Science of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck.” Riskin will be joined in conversation by Thomas W. Laqueur. Tuesday, March 31, 7 p.m. Mrs. Dalloway’s Bookstore. FREE (registration encouraged)

🖊️ This year’s Herb Caen Lecture, “Press Freedom in Peril,” features Jodie Ginsberg, CEO of the Committee to Protect Journalists, and Jason Rezaian, director of Press Freedom Initiatives for The Washington Post, in conversation with San Francisco Chronicle Editor-in-Chief Emilio Garcia-Ruiz. Tuesday, March 31, 5:30 p.m. Logan Multimedia Center. $10

🎥 The Berkeley Pakistan Initiative presents Kamran Anwar’s documentary “Songs of the Sufi,” a musical and artistic journey through the mystical music tradition Qawwali. Tuesday, March 31, 5 p.m. 10 Stephens Hall. FREE

🎥 What do the android noir of “Blade Runner,” the dystopian eugenics of “Gattaca,” and the slapstick cop comedy of “Rush Hour” have in common? They all feature Frank Lloyd Wright’s distinctive architectural creations to help define their visual worlds. Before Berkeley architectural historian Mark Anthony Wilson discusses his new book about Wright and cinema at theBerkeley City Club on April 11, the library is screening all three of the above films. Wednesday, April 1, 3:30 p.m. Central Library.FREE

🗓️ See more things to do in Oakland and Richmond. And check out our big list of affordable things to do anytime in Berkeley. Sign up for our weekly arts and culture newsletter, The Scene.

If there’s an event you’d like us to consider for this roundup, email us at the-scene@berkeleyside.org. The deadline to submit events for Around Berkeley is end-of-day Monday. If there’s an event that you’d like to promote on our calendar, you can use the self-submission form on our events page.

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