We've made a recording of this event free to all. Please support our institution and these productions by making a tax-deductible contribution.
Emma Straub plays many roles as a leader in the literary world: independent bookstore owner, award-winning novelist, and children’s book author, to name a few. Straub is a Guggenheim Fellow, a New York Times best-seller, and the owner of Brooklyn’s Books Are Magic, where she helps celebrate our vibrant literary world through countless readings and events.
Straub’s new novel, American Fantasy, has been named one of the most anticipated books by Time, The New York Times, People, and Harper’s Bazaar. Set on a nineties-boy-band-themed cruise, Straub’s characters explore the intersections of aging, nostalgia, memory, and possibility, creating a hilarious, intimate portrait of the surprises and reawakenings that life can provide.
Ayelet Waldman is the author of A Really Good Day, My Marriage, and the essay collection Bad Mother. She was one of the creators of the Netflix show Unbelievable, and was an executive producer for the show Star Trek: Picard. Waldman is also a political activist, editing essay collections on women’s prisons, landmark ACLU cases, and the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. In May, Waldman will publish her new novel A Perfect Hand, the story of a maid in 19th century England that seamlessly blends humor into examinations of gender and class.
Photo by Alpha Smoot