Gary Kamiya, Author, Cool Gray City of Love: 49 Views of San Francisco; Co-founder, Salon.com; Columnist, "Portals of the Past, SF Chronicle

In conversation with Mark Hertsgaard, Independent Journalist and Author

Learn the hidden history of San Francisco with Cool Gray City of Love, a new, kaleidoscopic love letter to San Francisco by Kamiya. Each of the 49 chapters explores a different location in the city, from the seamy depths of the Tenderloin to the towering cliffs at Lands End. From the city's absurd beginnings as a distant and moth-eaten colonial outpost to its instantaneous fame during the Gold Rush; from its apocalyptic destruction by earthquake and fire to its perennial embrace of rebels, dreamers, hedonists and misfits of all stripes, the City by the Bay has always followed a trajectory as wildly independent as the untrammeled natural forces that created it. Kamiya's columns about San Francisco history, "Portals of the Past," appear every Saturday in the San Francisco Chronicle. He is a Bay Area native.

Also know: Photo by Fred Costino