The Fiction Impulse in Nonfiction Criticism
Three literary critics consider the boundary between fiction and nonfiction, literature and criticism. While Sarah Chihaya (Bibliophobia), Andrea Long Chu (Authority), and Jeremy Gordon (See Friendship) immerse themselves in others’ fictions as they work, they must approach these works from another literary tradition, that of literary criticism. But are the novelist’s and critics’ impulses really […]
Ghosts of Yesterday
The past has a way of creeping up on you. In Fox, Joyce Carol Oates introduces us to Francis Fox, an enigmatic English teacher whose mysterious history catches up to him when his car is found submerged in a pond with an unidentified body. In Dwyer Murphy’s The House on Buzzards Bay, a group of […]
The Silence in Stories
Three acclaimed international authors explore the effect of silence and untold stories on their characters. In The Ghetto Within, Santiago H. Amigorena portrays a Polish emigre in Argentina haunted by the fate of his mother in the Warsaw Ghetto; Swedish author Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s Sisters reveals guarded family stories that bond and fracture relationships of […]
NBF Presents: Friendship that Inspires
Hear author and 5 Under 35 honoree Weike Wang as she reads from her new work, Rental House, followed by a discussion about writing in and about New York, literary mentorships, and how friendship (and writing) evolves over time. Wang is joined in conversation by Ruth Dickey, Executive Director of the National Book Foundation. Presented […]
New Forms of Heartbreak
Whether love fosters recovery, discovery, or resilience – it’s messy. In Katie Yee’s Maggie, or a Man and Woman Walk Into A Bar, a woman grapples with the end of a marriage due to an affair during a breast cancer diagnosis, where she reflects on the relationship in conversation with her tumor that she names […]
Viet Thanh Nguyen and Imani Perry in Conversation: Nonfiction and the Personal Lens
Join us for a conversation between two esteemed authors who explore identity, culture, class, and history through a personal lens. In her book Black in Blues: How a Color Tells the Story of My People, Imani Perry examines the relationship between the color blue and its presence in Black history. In his book To Save […]
Family, Unraveled
All families are complicated, with legacy, personal choices, and societal expectations shaping or breaking the bonds that hold them together. In Jason Diamond’s The Kaplan’s Plot, a son returns home to take care of his dying mother and learns of long-buried secrets and shames from his family’s past. In Katie Kitamura’s Audition, an actress and […]
The Weight of What Remains
History, whether in the familial or broader sense, has a way of haunting the present through memories, life choices, and beyond. In Susan Choi’s Flashlight, a father’s disappearance leaves his wife and daughter adrift as they attempt to move on, but questions about that night continue to echo. In Alejandro Heredia’s Loca, Sal and Charo […]
Beyond the Page
In Nnedi Okorafor’s Death of the Author, Lincoln Michel’s Metallic Realms, and Fernando A. Flores’ Brother Brontë, fiction and reality blur together as narratives metastasize within the pages of the pages and so on. In Death of the Author, a woman’s debut novel finds unexpected success, but as her fame rises, she loses control of […]
Loneliness and Exile
In this virtual panel, three novelists explore dislocation, belonging, and the search for connection. Sulaiman Addonia (The Seers) chronicles the early weeks of a young Eritrean refugee in London, following the intimate and erotic lives of asylum seekers. Sarah Moss (Ripeness) reveals family secrets woven into an English woman’s migration between 1960s Italy and modern […]
Alumni of the Occult
Remember the good ol’ days of college, where you turned bunnies into boys, learned to be the anti-Christ, and joined the inner circle of an amateur magician who suddenly died? No? In Mona Awad’s We Love You, Bunny, Cassandra Khaw’s The Library at Hellebore, and Kate van der Borgh’s And He Shall Appear, achieving alumni […]
A Prophet of One’s Own
In Jess Walter’s So Far Gone, a hermit-like retired journalist is forced to confront the radically alien beliefs of his former son-in-law, who has joined the Church of the Blessed Fire, a feeder organization for a far-right militia group. In Karen Russell’s The Antidote, the Prairie Witch is the communal balm her Nebraska townspeople need […]
Naked on the Page
The premise of sharing intimate details of our lives can sound daunting, but in practice — sharing one’s life on the page with honesty, thoughtful consideration, and critique — can it actually allow us to get closer to ourselves? Join us for a conversation between Melissa Febos, author of The Dry Season, and Catherine Lacey, […]
Story and Sovereignty
Each season, BKBF presents several international debut authors whom we want to shine the light on for our audience. This year we present Korean translator and writer Jinwoo Park (Oxford Soju Club), Canadian playwright and director Aurora Stewart de Peña (Julius Julius), Ugandan-Canadian journalist Iryn Tushabe (Everything is Fine Here) , and Berlin-based writer Ella […]
The Mad, Mad World of Motherhood
Three graphic novelists grapple with the physical labor, mental load, and beauty of motherhood in this virtual panel. Rachel Deutsch’s The Mother traces her journey toward motherhood and egalitarian parenting while dealing with family trauma. In Mama Needs A Minute, Mary Catherine Starr speaks frankly about what she sees as the imbalance between her and […]
Gaza: The First Draft of History
Three writers, Omar El Akkad (One Day Everyone Will Have Been Against This), Sarah Aziza (The Hollow Half), and Ahmed Alnaouq (We Are Not Numbers) discuss the complexities of documenting recent or ongoing personal and collective crises upon the page, and the blurry line between what can be understood as the current events and as […]
Mapping History and Its Fault Lines
How do you make sense of the hidden rifts and fractures in a country’s past? How do you read the warning signs? The Cartographer of Absences, by Mozambican writer Mia Couto (translated by David Brookshaw), unearths long-buried secrets of colonial-era atrocities. Geetanjali Shree’s Our City that Year (translated by Daisy Rockwell), explores the underground tensions—and […]
It’s Puzzling: The Power of Crosswords and Games, presented by NYU
There’s more to puzzles than fun and games (though they are definitely fun and challenging). Join Barry Joseph, author of Matching Minds with Sondheim: The Puzzles and Games of the Broadway Legend, and Juliana Pache, author and creator of Black Crossword: 100 Mini Puzzles Connecting the African Diaspora, for a conversation taking a deeper look at the cultural significance of games and […]
Secrets of the Stacks: Garden Edition
When you think about botanical gardens, flowers, trees and beautiful landscapes come to mind. What you likely don’t think of are libraries. But found within the world’s most renowned gardens are significant botanical research libraries with unique and historic collections. Join Stephen Sinon, LuEsther T. Mertz Library’s William B. O’Connor Curator of Special Collections, Research […]
The Sounds of Subversion
Punk Rock and Hip-Hop have distinct ways of bringing words to life, but both are deeply connected with comics. Rooted in underground DIY culture, the melding of these art forms can challenge the social and personal status quo in profound ways. Bianca Xunise’s Punk Rock Karaoke is a joyous tale of young besties trying to […]
The Stories of a People, A Language, a Place…
Where better than a library to hold and embody the countless stories that make up a culture? Join Susan Bronson, from the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst MA, Shawn Iwaoka from the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles, and Susan A. Fletcher, from the McCracken Research Library in Cody, WY for a conversation about […]
Who? New! International
Each season, BKBF presents several international debut authors whom we want to shine the light on for our audience. This year we present Palestinian writer and journalist Yasmin Zaher (The Coin), British Sri Lankan writer Praveen Herat (Between This World and the Next), and Malaysian Australian creative writing instructor Jessica Zhan Mei Yu (But the […]
Ways of Surviving
In her debut Broughtupsy, Christina Cooke introduces 20-year-old Akúa as she attempts to reconstruct her fractured family by flying from Canada to her native Jamaica to reconnect with her estranged older sister with her younger brother’s ashes in tow. In Madwoman, Chelsea Bieker delves into the heart of what it really means to survive violence […]
An Ode to Irreverence
In Lexi Freiman’s The Book of Ayn, a writer travels from New York to Los Angeles to Lesbos as she searches for artistic and spiritual fulfillment in the path of Ayn Rand. In Rejection: Fictions, Tony Tulathimutte explores how our delusions affect our desire for connection in seven connected stories. In How It Works Out, […]
The Pulp and Quick of Life: Vigdis Hjorth and Eva Baltasar in Conversation
Writers of potent, electrifying, and candid novels – Vigdis Hjorth (If Only, trans. from Norwegian by Charlotte Barslund) and Eva Baltasar (Mammoth, trans from Catalan by Julia Sanches) – come together to discuss passion and disenchantment. If Only tells the story of a young woman who begins a tumultuous affair, a cascading fantasy that eventually […]
A.I. and the Writer: An Unlikely Friendship – Presented with NYU’s 370J Project.
One novelist, one memoirist and one poet — all working with A.I. as muse, collaborator and inspiration from the early days of generative A.I. to ChatGPT and into an uncertain future. What are the possibilities of A.I. for writers, and what are the perils? Join essayist and author Ethan Gilsdorf (Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks […]
Writing Personal and Collective Histories
Writers Hisham Matar (My Friends), Rania Mamoun (Something Evergreen Called Life, trans Yasmine Seale), and Omar Khalifah (Sand-Catcher, trans Barbara Romaine) come together to discuss the duty of the writer during periods of global crisis, in a conversation moderated by writer and translator Yasmine Seale. What do writers owe their collective communities, as contemporary artists […]
Surviving Coexistence
Genre-abundant writers, poets, and academics Bhanu Kapil (Incubation: A Space for Monsters) and Billy-Ray Belcourt (Coexistence: Stories) convene for an intimate and multifaceted conversation on the ways their work approaches survival – in the face of imperialism, settler-colonialism, misogyny, and more – and the ways they embrace hybridity and invert monstrosity in favor of fluidity, […]
Violent New Lands
In Kevin Barry’s The Heart in Winter, an opium-smoking Irishman and his mail-order bride are on the run in 1890s Montana. In Ye Chun’s Straw Dogs of the Universe, 10-year-old Sixiang journeys across an unfamiliar American landscape in the hopes of finding her long-lost father, who works on the railroads in California. In Like the […]
Archives of the Self
In what ways does reckoning with our personal and political histories and archives allow us to reckon with ourselves? New works by Iman Mersal (Traces of Enayat, trans Robin Moger), Daniel Saldaña Paris (Planes Flying Over a Monster, trans Christina MacSweeney and Philip K. Zimmerman), Kateřina Tučková (The Last Goddess, trans Andrew Oakland), and Mircea […]
What is “Reality?”
It is often said about American life and the media that we occupy two “different realities.” Similarly, we hear about the new synthetic reality of deepfakes, generative AI, and the metaverse. But what if “reality” has always been a shakier proposition than we realized? For this wide-ranging panel, three very different authors, with three very […]
Writing Our Histories
Amitava Kumar questions what ordinary existence is in his novel My Beloved Life, which tells the story of India’s history over the last 85 years through the lens of a modest father. In Temim Fruchter’s City of Laughter, Shiva, a queer Jewish mythology student, retraces four generations of her family’s secrets in Poland to try […]
Secrets and the Supernatural
In the trilogy’s conclusion, Olivie Blake’s The Atlas Complex, the Alexandrians return to the library in a race for survival, power grabs, and betrayal. In Graveyard Shift, M.L. Rio follows five night shift workers who meet in the local cemetery to unearth the truths lurking in an open grave. In The Sapling Cage, Margaret Killjoy […]
Love Is A Fantasy
Go on an epic journey with renowned authors Adrienne Tooley (The Second Son), Ava Reid (A Study in Drowning), Chloe Gong (Foul Heart Huntsman), and Jordan Ifueko (The Maid and the Crocodile) as they discuss the elements that make up a thrilling and swoon-worthy romantasy novel–from a sapphic romance to a gothic Welsh fantasy to […]
When Worlds Collide
New York Times bestselling author Amélie Wen Zhao (Song of Silver, Flame Like Night), New York Times bestselling author Dustin Thao (When Haru was Here) and Pura Belpré honoree Camille Gomera-Tavarez (The Girl, The Ring, & The Baseball Bat) discuss how they tackle dreams, grief, epic battles, and relationships in alternate worlds that straddle reality […]
Great Expectations
Whether it’s creating an alter-ego for yourself in an online role-playing game, traversing the streets of New York to film a mockumentary about Ping-Pong, letting go of perfectionism in the wake of major tragedy, or entering into an admittedly hare-brained love coaching scheme, we often go to great lengths to contend with the expectations of […]
Writing Resistance
From Mumbai to Tenochtitlan—the ancient capital of the Aztec empire—and a fictional city called Nevers; disparate landscapes come to life in the voices of their inhabitants. In their latest books, authors Devika Rege (Quarterlife), Álvaro Enrigue (You Dreamed of Empires, trans Natasha Wimmer), and Dorothy Tse (Owlish, trans Natascha Bruce) track the collision of worlds […]
Containing Multitudes: Memoirs of Self-Realization
Beyond just chronicling a life, the memoir has long been a site for the discussion of self-realization and discovery, of inquisition and reckoning. In each of their books, Tracy O’Neill (Woman of Interest), Lucy Sante (I Heard Her Call My Name), and Carvell Wallace (Another Word for Love) explore themselves on the page, digging into […]
A New Kind of Hunger
Flawed, sharp, and messy characters on journeys of self-discovery and indulging in sexually explicit love affairs. Two women bond over their shared desire for pain and pleasure in Exhibit by R.O. Kwon. In Tongues by Thomas Grattan follows a young gay man who moves to NYC after a bad breakup, where he gets hired as […]
The Poetic Eye
Poets Catherine Barnett (Solutions for the Problem of Bodies in Space), Nick Flynn (Low), Marie Howe (New and Selected Poems), Dawn Lundy Martin (Instructions for the Lovers) share work that exemplifies poetry’s unique potential to observe everyday life, love, loneliness, and grief. Introduced by Parker Menzimer, Poetry Society of America.
NBF Presents: Archival (R)evolutions
National Book Award–honored authors consider the power of archives and evolution—within literature, across genres, and in the building of literary communities. Moderated by Ruth Dickey, Executive Director of the National Book Foundation. Presented in partnership with the Brooklyn Book Festival and the National Book Foundation.
Worlds within Worlds presented by the Whiting Foundation
The New Yorker staff writer Helen Shaw talks with Whiting Award-winning writers Shayok Misha Chowdhury (Public Obscenities), whose eloquent bilingual play, exploring what desire, language, and memory reveal and obscure, was a 2024 Pulitzer Prize finalist; Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig (The King of Hell’s Palace), whose witty and politically acute work exploring whistleblowing amidst the pressures […]
Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror: Memoirs by Ingrid Rojas Contreras, Safiya Sinclair and Phillip Lopate
Presented with Brooklyn Public Library’s BPL Presents, three authors discuss new memoirs. Interweaving family stories more enchanting than those in any novel, Ingrid Rojas Contreras writes, in The Man Who Could Move Clouds, a luminous testament to the power of storytelling as a healing art and an invitation to embrace the extraordinary. How to Say […]
Poets on Love, Sex & Desire
Poets Richie Hofmann (A Hundred Lovers), Cyrée Jarelle Johnson (Slingshot), José Olivarez (Promises of Gold), and Maggie Millner (Couplets) read from their work and discuss desire, the sublime, and heartbreak. Moderated by Parker Menzimer, Poetry Society of America.
This Modern Life
Join these authors in conversation as they confront the pivotal challenges of contemporary life. Brandon Taylor’s The Late Americans follows a group of friends and lovers in Iowa City as they navigate ambition, relationships, and class. Martin Riker’s The Guest Lecture delves into the mind of a young feminist economist through a crisis of the […]
A Half Century of Hip-Hop
This summer’s grand celebration of hip-hop’s 50th anniversary was beautiful and affirming for longtime fans and practitioners of this perennially maligned and underestimated genre/subculture. Now that the landmark events have passed, what do we make of not just the story of hip-hop but its evolving place in the public imagination? Jonathan Abrams (The Come Up: […]
Books Unbanned: A Night of Artivism (In Person)
Books Unbanned: A Night of Artivism is an afterparty with a purpose featuring live performances from acclaimed artists, activists and actors! The event will feature special guest authors including Ibram Kendi, Michael Harriot, Dr. Kaye Whitehead and more. Hosted by author and AAPF Executive Director Kimberle Crenshaw, the event will also feature music by a […]
History Redux and Myths Retold
Whether it’s disrupting long-held belief systems or accepted historical narratives, three writers challenge readers to reconsider what we think we know. In ten books and 91 chapters, Eve decides it’s time to tell her version of the story of Genesis in Carmen Boullosa’s The Book of Eve (translated by Samantha Schnee). While in Leila Aboulela’s […]
Crook Manifesto and The Stolen Coast
Enjoy readings and dialogue with two-time Pulitzer Award-winning novelist and 2017 BoBi Honoree Colson Whitehead as he shares the elaborate layers of his newest book Crook Manifesto. He is joined in conversation by novelist Dwyer Murphy (The Stolen Coast). This intimate conversation promises an exploration of the artistry, intellect and reflections that breathe life into […]
Of Spirits and Monsters
From the peripheries of death, in a Taiwanese village, occupied Korea, and a decaying Mexican estate, come stories of lives marginalized by sexual orientation and class, and devastated by war and grief. In Kevin Chen’s Ghost Town (translated by Darryl Sterk) and Yu Miri’s The End of August (translated by Morgan Giles), the dead tell […]
Walter Mosley and Joyce Carol Oates: In Conversation
Two of the most formidable writers of our time appear in conversation about their life’s work, exploring the creative impulse, writing across genres, and the constant tension between good and evil. In Joyce Carol Oates’ short story collection Zero-Sum, the mystery of interior life manifests in characters striving for both vengeance and seduction. In Touched, […]
Class Combat
Journey through the multifaceted realm of class dynamics. In Andre Dubus III’s Such Kindness, a working-class man is forced to redefine his identity when an accident leaves him unable to work and dependent on painkillers. In Jenny Fran Davis’ Dykette, a couple explores the dimensions of normativity and nonconformity when they accept an invitation to […]
Oh, the Horror
In this panel, fear takes on new meaning. Allegra Hyde investigates the climate crisis and “global weirdings” as her fictive landscape in the short story collection The Last Catastrophe. Gabino Iglesias centers a hitman’s journey in The Devil Takes You Home. Victor LaValle merges horror, sisterhood, and a mysteriously fatal steamer trunk in Lone Women. […]
PEN Presents: Free the Books
In facing the rising threats to the freedoms to read and imagine, PEN America convenes a dialogue with beloved writers on the recent and dramatic rise in the efforts to censor and silence Black and LGBTQ+ perspectives. New York Times bestselling author Casey McQuiston and independent publisher and children’s author Cheryl Willis Hudson, will be […]
How Art and Storytelling Shape Human Identity: A Conversation with Oliver Jeffers and Roxane Gay
Renowned and bestselling authors Oliver Jeffers (Begin Again) and Roxane Gay (Opinions) discuss the roles art and storytelling play in shaping human identities and communities, how these stories have contributed to prejudices and global conflicts throughout history and today, and where we go from here.
Reading Wars presented by The New York Review of Books
Reading and writing have rarely been as politicized in the US as they are today. While GOP governors and legislators enact bans on books and syllabuses they see as undermining core American values—targeting works that touch on race, gender, and sexuality—some on the Left have argued for purging syllabuses of once-canonical authors and even altering […]
Secrets of the Stacks 2023
The natural world, music and cultural heritage reside in the striking and unique library collections found in some of New York City’s top cultural institutions. Join Rhonda Evans, Director, Mertz Library at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx, the largest botanical research library, in the U.S; Dr. John O’Neill, Curator of Rare Books […]
Can the Future Be Saved? A Conversation with Anand Giridharadas and Chris Hayes
Can the Future Be Saved? A Conversation with Anand Giridharadas. In The Persuaders: At the Front Lines of the Fight for Hearts, Minds, and Democracy, Anand Giridharadas profiles organizers, politicians, and ordinary citizens who live there without losing an unyielding faith that they can make the world they want to see one conversation at a […]
NBF Presents: What Comes After the Debut
Join National Book Foundation “5 Under 35” honorees Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (Friday Black; Chain Gang All Stars), Alexandra Chang (Days of Distraction; Tomb Sweeping), and C Pam Zhang (How Much of These Hills Is Gold; Land of Milk and Honey) to celebrate the recent publication of their second books. The authors discuss what it means […]
Celebrating Hilton Als, the 2023 Brooklyn Book Festival BoBi Honoree.
Pulitzer Prize winning critic Hilton Als, author of The Women, White Girls, and, most recently, My Pinup will be joined in conversation by writer and cultural critic Jennifer Krasinski.
Cookbook or Memoir: Genre-bending with Asian American Food Writers presented by the Asian American Writers’ Workshop
Join Asian American food writers Eric Kim (Korean American: Food That Tastes Like Home), Priya Krishna (Indian-Ish: Recipes and Antics from a Modern American Family), Abi Balingit (Mayumu: Filipino American Desserts Remixed), and Betty Ann Quirino (Every Ounce of Courage: A Daughter’s Reflections On Her Mother’s Bravery) as they talk about what it means to […]