Welcome back to Reading the City, a weekly newsletter of bookish events in and around NYC.
This week, the newly opened Liz’s Book Bar hosts their inaugural author event and they’ve lined up Joseph Earl Thomas, Vinson Cunningham, and Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah. What a way to launch! Also, we have Anna DeForest in conversation with Amy Hempel, Ayşegül Savaş talking to Adam Dalva, and a whole bunch of reading series from poetry salons to open mics. Enjoy!
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, July 15
Embracing Every Hue: The Poetry Reading Series
A new reading series launching at KGB – congrats! – kicking off with poets Matt Gellman (Beforelight), Ashna Ali (The Relativity of Living Well, forthcoming), and Robert Wood Lynn (How To Maintain Eye Contact). Curated and emceed by educator and poet Darius Phelps.
Free; 7-9pm; KGB Red Room, 85 East 4th Street, New York
Halle Butler: Banal Nightmare
A launch event with Halle Butler (The New Me) for a discussion of her new novel Banal Nightmare, capturing the volatile, angry, aggrieved, surreal, and entirely disorienting atmosphere of the modern era, in conversation with Andrew Martin (Early Work).
From $8; 7-8pm; Strand Book Store, 828 Broadway 3rd Floor, Rare Book Room, New York
Tuesday, July 16
Ayşegül Savaş: The Anthropologists
Ayşegül Savaş (Walking on the Ceiling) discusses her latest work of fiction, The Anthropologists—a soulful examination of homebuilding and modern love, unfolding over a series of apartment viewings, late-night conversations, last rounds of drinks, and lazy breakfasts—with Adam Dalva (Olivia Twist).
$10; 7pm; The Center for Fiction, 15 Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn, and livestreamed
Anna DeForest: Our Marvelous Dying
Anna DeForest (A History of Present Illness) launches Our Marvelous Dying—set in a pandemic-hushed city, the novel meditates on the twin drives of life and death, and how all of us reckon, day by day, with their ecstatic, inevitable collide—in conversation with Amy Hempel (Sing To It).
$5; 7-9pm; Powerhouse Arena, 28 Adams Street, Brooklyn
Phillip Lopate: My Affair with Art House Cinema
Phillip Lopate launches his latest book My Affair with Art House Cinema, featuring Lopate’s selected essays and reviews from the last quarter century.
Free; 6-7.30pm; The Corner Bookstore, 1313 Madison Avenue, New York
m.s. RedCherries: mother
Brooklyn writer and citizen of the Northern Cheyenne Nation m.s. RedCherries presents her debut book mother—a stunning, multimorphic work of poetry and prose about Indigenous identity—in conversation with Xochitl Gonzalez (Olga Dies Dreaming).
Free; 7.30-8.30pm; Greenlight bookstore, 686 Fulton Street, Brooklyn
Brooklyn Books & Booze
Curated by author and journalist Randee Dawn, Brooklyn Books & Booze welcomes Catherine Yu (Helga), Cerece Rennie Murphy (Enchanted), Victor Manibo (Escape Velocity), and John C. Foster (Rooster).
Free; 7pm; Barrow’s Intense Tasting Room, 86 34th Street, Brooklyn
The Palace Reading Series
Readings from Leemore Malka (Hard and Sweet as Cold Cake), Andy P. Smith (Substack:
), Barrie Miskin (Hell Gate Bridge: A Memoir), and John Iadarola, and hosted by Rita Puskas and Marisa Cadena. 2 for 1 well/draft specials all night.Free; 7-9pm; The Greenpoint Palace, 206 Nassau Avenue, Brooklyn
Scribe Tribe
Lily Lady presents Scribe Tribe, a poetry collective by the people, for the people. With a lineup of Aurora O'Greenfield, Beckett Rosset, Doug Arnold, Wes Knoll, Abyn Reabe, Perdum Siadatian, and Tilghman Goldsborough.
Free; 7pm; Honeys 93 Scott Ave, Brooklyn
Wednesday, July 17
The Coffee House
Ryan Chapman, author of The Audacity, talks art, philanthropy, and financial collapse at the lovely Salmagundi Club, in conversation with Julian Tepper (Cooler Heads).
Free; 6.30pm; Salmagundi Club, 47 5th Ave, New York
Olivia Gatwood: Whoever You Are, Honey
Olivia Gatwood (New American Best Friend) launches her debut novel Whoever You Are, Honey—a dark exploration of how women build themselves, beneath the gaze of love, friendship, and the algorithm—in conversation with Melissa Lozada-Oliva (Candelaria).
$10, redeemable in-store; 7-8pm; Books Are Magic Montague, 122 Montague Street, Brooklyn, and livestreamed free
Open Book
A literary open mic hosted by Becka Olson and Writing Under the Influence. Signup starts at 7pm, readings start at 8pm.
Free; 8pm; Fiction Cafe & Cocktail Bar, 308 Hooper St, Brooklyn
Thursday, July 18
Realism, Representation, and Blackness: a Conversation with Joseph Earl Thomas
The first author event at the newly opened Liz’s Book Bar in Carroll Gardens, which I can’t wait to check out. Joseph Earl Thomas (God Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer) heads up a panel, including Vinson Cunningham (Great Expectations) and Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (Chain-Gang All-Stars), with Paige Sweet of the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, to discuss this: Literary realism may be the dominant mode of literary representation; but does it still have teeth?
$12.51; 7-8.30pm; Liz’s Book Bar, 315 Smith Street, Brooklyn
Nicole Treska: Wonderland
Nicole Treska celebrates the Brooklyn launch of her debut memoir Wonderland, about growing up inside Boston's criminal underworld, moderated by .
Free; 7pm; Black Spring Books, 672 Driggs Ave, Brooklyn
Cake Zine Launch Party
Celebrate the launch of Candy Land, the new issue of Cake Zine, with dessert, DJ sets, tattoos inspired by the issue, projections, tarot readings, and specialty cocktails. Cake cutting at 10 p.m., with dancing to follow.
$15; 7pm-12am; Public Records, 233 Butler St, Brooklyn
Caitlin Dees: Meditations for Party Girls
Celebrating Caitlin Dee’s Meditations for Party Girls, other readers include Sophia June (substack:
), Jomé Rain, Nicky Josephine, Emily Danielle, Lauren Badillo Milici, and Toni Kochensparger, with a magical ritual performed by .Free; 7-9pm; KGB Red Room, 85 East 4th Street, New York
Friday, July 19
Sultry Summer Soirée
TENSE presents the latest iteration of Beckett's, a Sultry Summer Soirée. The cast of readers include: August Lamm, Nico Walker, Zach Graham, Becket Rosset, Peter Vack, Guy Dess, and Sophie Madeline Dess. With performances by Cassidy Grady and Johnny St. George, and theater directed by Noelle Franco, Mia Vallet, Jonah Howell, and Beckett Rosset.
8pm-12am; $23.18; The Locker Room, 373 South 1st Street, Brooklyn
NB. Please check all details before attending, the fact checker went awol.
I’m a Brooklyn-based writer, editor, and teacher, and the author of No Way Home: A Memoir of Life on the Run (St. Martin’s Press) and Amphibian (forthcoming from Virago and Ig). I’m here and here on Instagram. Get in touch with any bookish events you’d like me to include!