Reading the City
Dec 9 to 15
Welcome back to Reading the City, a weekly newsletter of bookish events in and around NYC.
It’s a quiet one in terms of book launches, but we have a couple festive galas to make up for it. The
reading and annual holiday party tonight is sold out, so I recommend you subscribe to their newsletter to not miss out next time!As ever, send feedback, send help, send events I should have on my radar, say hi! And please share the love with your bookish friends.
Monday, Dec 9
Franklin Park Reading Series
This month Franklin Park features poets and novelists Gregory Pardlo (Spectral Evidence), Raymond Antrobus (Signs, Music), Joshua Mohr (Saint the Terrifying), Sarah Blakley-Cartwright (Alice, Sadie, Celine), Santiago Jose Sanchez (Hombrecito), and Leah Umansky (Of Tyrant and substack
). Hosted by founder Penina Roth, expect drink specials and a raffle for the readers' latest books.Free; 8-10pm; 766 Franklin Avenue, 618 St Johns Pl, Brooklyn
Edwin Frank: Stranger than Fiction
New York Review Books editorial director Edwin Frank and The New Yorker’s James Wood come together for a reading and conversation about the radical transformations of the 20th century novel and Frank’s new book, Stranger than Fiction.
From $25; 92nd Street Y, 1395 Lexington Ave, New York
Daniel Kehlmann and Peter Filkins on Elias Canetti's The Book Against Death
Daniel Kehlmann and Peter Filkins discuss The Nobel Prize winner Elias Canetti’s landmark The Book Against Death—a collection of Canetti’s powerful, disarming, and often bleakly comic observations, diatribes, musings, and commentaries on and against death now released in English.
$5 redeemable in-store, RSVP required; 6.30pm; McNally Jackson Seaport, 4 Fulton St, New York
Tuesday, Dec 10
Sarah Blakley-Cartwright: Alice Sadie Celine
Sarah Blakley-Cartwright celebrates the paperback publication of Alice Sadie Celine—a steamy and incisive novel that follows one woman’s affair with her daughter’s best friend, testing the limits of love and ambition in a mesmerizing portrait of the inner lives of three very different women—in conversation with Megan Cummins (Atomic Hearts, forthcoming).
$5, redeemable in store; 7pm; P&T Knitwear, 180 Orchard Street, New York
Eliot Stein: Custodians of Wonder
BBC Travel editor Eliot Stein launches Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions, and the Last People Keeping Them Alive—a vivid look at 10 astonishing people who are maintaining some of the world’s oldest and rarest cultural traditions—in conversation with Off Duty travel editor Sebastian Modak.
$5, redeemable in-store; 7-9pm; Powerhouse Arena, 28 Adams Street, Brooklyn
The Center for Fiction 2024 Annual Awards Benefit
There’s still time this year for a donation to support the work of The Center for Fiction, which could take the form of a ticket to their annual benefit. Join for a celebration of the power of storytelling, with cocktails, dinner, and the presentation of this year's Lifetime of Excellence in Fiction Award, Medal for Editorial Excellence, and First Novel Prize, featuring Tyriek White, Jesmyn Ward, and Lisa Lucas.
From $1,000; 6:30-10pm; Cipriani 25 Broadway, New York
Experiments & Disorders
A celebration of cross-genre writing, curated by Tom Cole and Christen Clifford, welcomes Vera Blossom (How to Fuck Like a Girl: Essays) and Lee Ann Brown (Other Archer).
$8; 7-30-8.30pm; Dixon Place, 161A Chrystie Street, New York
Wednesday, Dec 11
The Perverted Book Club
After a year-and-a-half hiatus, bring backs The Perverted Book Club for a night of erotic readings. Hosted by and featuring Jemima Kirke, Lola Kirke, James Frey, Lili Anolik, Mackenzie Thomas, , , and Alex Dimitrov.
$23.18; 7pm; Tara Downs Gallery, 424 Broadway New York
Thursday, Dec 12
Drink & Draft with Little Nights
If in need of a little end-of-year inspiration, Drink ’N Draft makes space for you to get out of your head and onto the page with a series of visual prompts. Write something new, continue a work-in-progress, or see where the evening takes you. Optional sharing, all genres welcome, no experience necessary.
$20; 7-9pm; Land to Sea, 402 Graham Avenue, Brooklyn
Krystal Anali Vazquez: Lady without Land
Krystal Anali Vazquez discusses her debut novel Lady Without Land—a story told in fragments about señorita who feels lost in and lost without Los Angeles—in conversation with Victoria Buitron.
$5; 7-8.30pm; Cafe con Libros, 724 Prospect Pl, Brooklyn
Friday, Dec 13
Orlando Reade: What In Me is Dark
Brooklyn Institute for Social Research faculty Orlando Reade launches his debut book What In Me is Dark: The Revolutionary Afterlife of Paradise Lost—a hybrid of literary criticism and political history, traces the “revolutionary afterlives” of Milton’s epic poem through twelve of its most prominent interlocutors—in conversation with BISR faculty Rebecca Ariel Porte, literary scholar Katie Kadue, and Anna Della Subin (Accidental Gods), discussing how, across centuries and geographies, old myths get redeployed to describe new and emerging political realities.
Free, $10 suggested donation; 7pm; BISR Central, 68 Jay Street, #425, Brooklyn
Emerging Writers Reading Series with Ross Gay
The Emerging Writers Reading Series features MFA students (the "emerging writers") from a mix of genres—Alishya Almeida, Dante Clark, Shay Martin-Jones, Meghan Reed, and Kimberly Rogers—reading alongside headlining author, Ross Gay (The Book of (More) Delights).
Free; 7pm; KGB Bar, Private Curtain, 85 East 4th Street (first floor), New York
Saturday, Dec 14
Biblio Bacchanal: New York City in a Cocktail
Discuss—and drink!—through history with a selection of four cocktails curated by , author of Signature Cocktails and New York Cocktails, joined by New York Times reporter and whiskey expert Clay Risen (American Rye).
$35; 5-7pm; The Center for Fiction, 15 Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn, and livestreamed
Brooklyn Poets Annual Awards Gala
The fifth annual Awards Gala and fundraising campaign for Brooklyn Poets, this year honors distinguished poet Patrick Rosal with an introduction by special guest Ross Gay. In an evening of cocktails, dinner, readings and award presentations, with speakers Angel Nafis, xochi quetzali cartland, Jay Deshpande, and María Elisa Schmidt.
From $175, or $25 to livestream; 5-10pm; Dumbo Loft, 155 Water Street, Brooklyn
Sunday, Dec 15
Sunday Salon
The next Sunday Salon welcomes Anastacia-Reneé (Here in the (Middle) of Nowhere), Luis Jaramillo (The Witches of El Paso), Alana Saab (Please Stop Trying to Leave Me), and Rebecca Suzuki (When My Mother is Most Beautiful), with hosts Wilbert Turner III and Carissa Chesanek, and DJ DubSix to set the vibe.
Free; 5-7pm; Von Bar, 3 Bleecker Street, New York
Literary Saloon
The Literary Saloon, hosted by Wesley Straton (The Bartender’s Cure), this month features Sarah Bridgins (Death and Exes), Rachel Dodes and Lauren Mechling (co-authors of The Memo), Jen Lue, and Nina St. Pierre (Love is a Burning Thing).
Free, but drink purchases from their Café & Bar are requested; 5pm; The Center for Fiction, 15 Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn
NB. Please check all details before attending, the fact checker went awol.
I’m a Brooklyn-based journalist and author. My debut novel Amphibian is available now from Ig, as well as Virago in the UK, and forthcoming from dtv in Germany. My first book, No Way Home: A Memoir of Life on the Run (St. Martin’s Press, 2018) followed my childhood as the daughter of an international pot smuggler and federal fugitive. I’m here and here on Instagram. Get in touch with any bookish events you’d like me to include!