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Free events for Saturday, 12/14/19
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Are you looking for literary events like book readings, book signings, poetry readings? Then you came to the right place. Start using these unique New York City opportunities today!
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30 free poetry readings, book signings, author readings in New York City (NYC) Sat, 12/14/2019 - and on...

Not a day goes by in New York City (NYC) without a free poetry reading or a book signing or a book reading by a famous or not yet famous author. Don't miss the opportunities that only New York provides!

Reading | What the Dickens?: The 10th Annual Marathon Reading of A Christmas Carol


Ring in the holidays with the tenth annual reading of Charles Dickens' classic. Grab your closest friends and settle in with dozens of terrific readers. This year's confirmed readers include: Tom Beer, Sarah Broom, Isaac Butler, Alexander Chee, Vinson Cunningham, Deborah Eisenberg, Rachel Fershleiser, Isaac Fitzgerald, Josh Gondelman, Rabbi Marisa Elana James, Leslie Jamison, Maris Kreizman, Lisa Lucas, Elissa Schappel, Parul Sehgal, Leanne Shapton, Rob Spillman, Darcey Steinke, Monique Truong, Kate Tuttle, Sarah Weinman, and John Wray.
   New York City, NY; NYC
Sat, Dec 14
12:00 pm
Free
Readings, December 14, 2019, 12/14/2019, What the Dickens?: The 10th Annual Marathon Reading of A Christmas Carol

Poetry Reading | We Were Promised Flying Cars: Futurist and Social Justice-Themed Haikus


Egyptian-American poet and digital media entrepeneur Kareem Rahma launches his debut poetry collection of futurist and social justice-themed haikus. The event will include a reading and conversation with Jennifer Baker (Everyday People: The Color of Life), followed by a brief Q&A.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Sun, Dec 15
7:00 pm
Free
Poetry Readings, December 15, 2019, 12/15/2019, We Were Promised Flying Cars: Futurist and Social Justice-Themed Haikus

Author Reading | The Olivier Sisters: A Biography


From the beginning of their lives, the Olivier sisters stood out: surprisingly emancipated, strikingly beautiful, markedly determined, and alarmingly 'wild'. Rupert Brooke was said to be in love with all four of them; D. H. Lawrence thought they were frankly 'wrong'; Virginia Woolf found them curiously difficult to read. The sisters seemed always to be one step ahead of their time. Margery and Daphne studied at Cambridge when education was still thought by some to be damaging to ovaries. Noel became a doctor; Daphne a pioneering teacher; Margery's promising trajectory was shot down by mental illness; Brynhild, the great beauty of the four, excelled as a Bloomsbury hostess yet gave it up for love and a life of uncertainty. In this intimate, sweeping biography, Sarah Watling brings the sisters in from the margins, tracing lives that span colonial Jamaica, the bucolic life of Victorian progressives, the frantic optimism of Edwardian Cambridge, the bleakness of two world wars, and a host of evolving philosophies for life over the course of the twentieth century.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Mon, Dec 16
6:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, December 16, 2019, 12/16/2019, The Olivier Sisters: A Biography

Author Reading | Titian's Touch: Art, Magic and Philosophy


At the end of his long, prolific life, Titian was rumored to paint directly on the canvas with his bare hands. He would slide his fingers across bright ridges of oil paint, loosening the colors, blending, blurring, and then bringing them together again. With nothing more than the stroke of a thumb or the flick of a nail, Titian's touch brought the world to life. With author Maria H. Loh.
   New York City, NY; NYC
Mon, Dec 16
6:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, December 16, 2019, 12/16/2019, Titian's Touch: Art, Magic and Philosophy

Author Reading | Don't Be Evil: How Big Tech Betrayed Its Founding Principles -- and All of Us


The economic analyst lays bare big tech's assault on our data, our livelihoods, and our minds. In the early days, when Google was a scrappy upstart with a utopian vision of transforming the world for the better through tech, its mantra was "Don't be evil." But they and other behemoths of the tech world--including Amazon, Facebook, and Apple--have long since abandoned their founding principles in the name of monetizing both our data and our attention through digital surveillance, privacy breaches, predatory algorithms, and products designed to manipulate our desires. Don't Be Evil is acclaimed journalist Rana Foroohar's investigation of the dark turn tech has taken from weaving our social fabric to undoing it.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Dec 17
6:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, December 17, 2019, 12/17/2019, Don't Be Evil: How Big Tech Betrayed Its Founding Principles -- and All of Us

Poetry Reading | Poetry Poetry: A Special Crossover Edition


A reading featuring writers Kay Ulanday Barrett (When the Chant Comes), Jimena Lucero, Addie Tsai (Dear Twin), and Amanda Galvan Huynh (Songs of Brujería). We’re guaranteeing a night full of joy, earth signs, blood, light, snacks, and brilliance as our featured artists turn inside-out form, genre, and possibility.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Dec 17
7:00 pm
Free
Poetry Readings, December 17, 2019, 12/17/2019, Poetry Poetry: A Special Crossover Edition

Poetry Reading | Literature Out Loud: The New York Public Library's Best Poetry Books of 2019


Do you want to find time for literature in your busy life? Join to celebrate literature in bite-size servings! Read aloud, enact, and discuss passages of classic and contemporary literature from across the globe. This month, we will explore poetry selected for the New York Public Library's Best Poetry Books of 2019. Gather and discuss brand-new, acclaimed contemporary poetry. All literary enthusiasts are welcome! Come participate in literature, connect with other readers, and take with you a bit of literary insight to season the rest of your day. 
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Thu, Dec 26
1:00 pm
Free
Poetry Readings, December 26, 2019, 12/26/2019, Literature Out Loud: The New York Public Library's Best Poetry Books of 2019

Author Reading | A Beautiful Crime: Thriller in Venice


From Christopher Bollen, the author of The Destroyers, comes another “delicious literary thriller” (People)—a twisty story of deception, set in contemporary Venice and featuring a young American couple who have set their sights on a high-stakes con.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Sun, Dec 29
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, December 29, 2019, 12/29/2019, A Beautiful Crime: Thriller in Venice

Author Reading | Dear Edward: Plane Crash's Sole Survivor


Author Ann Napolitano will be discussing the launch of her new novel, a heart-wrenching and life-affirming story of a 12-year-old boy as he struggles with the worst kind of fame--as the sole survivor of a notorious plane crash.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Mon, Jan 6
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 06, 2020, 01/06/2020, Dear Edward: Plane Crash's Sole Survivor

Author Reading | The American People: Volume 2: The Brutality of Fact: A Novel


In 2015 Larry Kramer presented the first installment of his opus forty years in the making. The American People: Volume 1: Search for My Heart was a devastating satire that reimagined American history from John Wilkes Booth to Joseph McCarthy. He completes that history in Volume 2: The Brutality of Fact, coloring in scenes of everything from brothels in 1950s Washington, D.C. to the activism of the 1980s and beyond. The Brutality of Fact tells the story of the government’s neglect of an intensifying plague, and the activists who set out to shock the nation’s conscience.  Kramer was a founding member of Gay Men’s Health Crisis (GMHC) and ACT Up New York. The records of both organizations are held at The New York Public Library. He is joined in conversation by Cullman Fellow and author of The World Broke in Two, Bill Goldstein, who is currently researching a biography on Kramer at the Library. 
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Jan 7
6:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 07, 2020, 01/07/2020, The American People: Volume 2: The Brutality of Fact: A Novel

Author Reading | Animalkind: Remarkable Discoveries About Animals and the Remarkable Ways We Can Be Kind to Them


The founder and president of PETA, Ingrid Newkirk, and bestselling author Gene Stone explore the wonders of animal life and offer tools for living more kindly toward them. Restrictions may apply. Call store for details.
   New York City, NY; NYC
Tue, Jan 7
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 07, 2020, 01/07/2020, Animalkind: Remarkable Discoveries About Animals and the Remarkable Ways We Can Be Kind to Them

Author Reading | The Age of Illusions: How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory


Andrew Bacevich's thought-provoking and penetrating account of the post-Cold war follies and delusions that culminated in the age of Donald Trump.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Jan 7
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 07, 2020, 01/07/2020, The Age of Illusions: How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory

Author Reading | The Ferrante Letters: An Experiment in Collective Criticism


Like few other works of contemporary literature, Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels found an audience of passionate and engaged readers around the world. Inspired by Ferrante’s intense depiction of female friendship and women’s intellectual lives, four critics embarked upon a project that was both work and play: to create a series of epistolary readings of the Neapolitan Quartet that also develops new ways of reading and thinking together.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Jan 7
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 07, 2020, 01/07/2020, The Ferrante Letters: An Experiment in Collective Criticism

Author Reading | Ultimate Veg: Easy and Delicious Meals for Everyone


From simple suppers and family favorites, to weekend dishes for sharing with friends, this book is packed full of phenomenal food - pure and simple. Whether it's embracing a meat-free day or two each week, living a vegetarian lifestyle, or just wanting to try some brilliant new flavor combinations, this book ticks all the boxes. With Jamie Oliver. Restrictions may apply. Call store for details.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Wed, Jan 8
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 08, 2020, 01/08/2020, Ultimate Veg: Easy and Delicious Meals for Everyone

Poetry Reading | Literature Out Loud: Poetic Outliers -- British Edition


Do you want to find time for literature in your busy life? Join to celebrate literature in bite-size servings! Read aloud, enact, and discuss passages of classic and contemporary literature from across the globe. This month, the poetry of individuals who composed their work independent of cultural centers, intellectual trends and established poetic traditions will be explored. In this session, you can read and discuss the works of British poetic outliers such as William Blake and Emily Bronte. All literary enthusiasts are welcome! Participate in literature, connect with other readers, and take with you a bit of literary insight to season the rest of your day.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Thu, Jan 9
1:00 pm
Free
Poetry Readings, January 09, 2020, 01/09/2020, Literature Out Loud: Poetic Outliers -- British Edition

Author Reading | Phase Transition Publication Party


Coinciding with Aki Sasamoto’s Phase Transition, all are invited to celebrate the accompanying publication, designed by Kyla Arsadjaja and edited by Lydia Bell. The publication features writing by Sasamoto, Bell, scholar Rachel Valinsky, and an intimate conversation between Sasamoto and choreographer Ishmael Houston-Jones. Valinsky’s essay, “To the Limit,” explores how Sasamoto uses “the motif of the limit across forms and containers,” tracing the origins of Phase Transition to previous works exploring scientific notions of change states, hypothesis, and flexibility. The conversation with Houston-Jones delves into Sasamoto’s early influence in dance improvisation, especially as a dancer in the work of Yvonne Meier. The publication also features a series of photographs of Phase Transition in development by artist Ben Hagari.  
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Sat, Jan 11
4:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 11, 2020, 01/11/2020, Phase Transition&nbsp;Publication Party

Author Reading | 3 Playwrights Read Their Work


Playwrights Corinne Donly, Kristen Kosmas, and Haruna Lee share an attention to language, a formal inventiveness, a commitment to social and environmental justice, and a deep interest in theater's liveness, its tangible connection to the possibilities it enacts. In this event, celebrating the release of their newest works from 53rd State Press, Donly, Kosmas, and Lee read excerpts from their plays and discuss dreams, nightmares, hells, utopias, alchemy, translation, change, and theater as a space of becoming what we are not yet.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Mon, Jan 13
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 13, 2020, 01/13/2020, 3 Playwrights Read Their Work

Author Reading | Zagat 2020 NYC Guide: 40th Anniversary Edition


Welcome Zagat CEO Chris Stang and sommelier/winemaker Aldo Sohm. They will be discussing the latest edition of the iconic guide, Zagat 2020 NYC Restaurants: Special 40th Anniversary Edition, as well as the New York City dining and restaurant scene.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Mon, Jan 13
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 13, 2020, 01/13/2020, Zagat 2020 NYC Guide: 40th Anniversary Edition

Author Reading | Imaginary Museums: 26 Surreal Miniatures


Twenty-six surreal miniatures about displacement, mystery, and transformation from the winner of a 2019 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award. In this collection of compact fictions, Nicolette Polek transports us to a gently unsettling realm inhabited by disheveled landlords, a fugitive bride, a seamstress who forgets what people look like, and two rival falconers from neighboring towns.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Jan 14
7:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 14, 2020, 01/14/2020, Imaginary Museums: 26 Surreal Miniatures

Poetry Reading | Three Poems: Poetry in the Digital Age


Hannah Sullivan’s debut collection, which won the 2018 T. S. Eliot Prize, reinvents the long poem for a digital age.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Wed, Jan 15
7:00 pm
Free
Poetry Readings, January 15, 2020, 01/15/2020, Three Poems: Poetry in the Digital Age

Author Reading | The Shepherd’s Calculus: Fast-Paced Political Thriller


CS Farrelly’s debut novel, this fast-paced political thriller centered on election meddling by a foreign power examines what happens when the cornerstones of American identity – capitalism and religion – clash with its principles of justice.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Thu, Jan 16
6:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 16, 2020, 01/16/2020, The Shepherd&rsquo;s Calculus: Fast-Paced Political Thriller

Poetry Reading | Voices of Poetry


Voices of Poetry is honored to present an evening of exceptional poetry featuring five acclaimed poets – Doug Anderson, Elizabeth T. Gray, Jr.,  Richard Hoffman, Jennifer Martelli, and Annie Pluto.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Thu, Jan 16
7:00 pm
Free
Poetry Readings, January 16, 2020, 01/16/2020, Voices of Poetry

Author Reading | Among the Boat People: A Memoir of Vietnam


Nhi (Nancy) Chung and four other women writers will read from Chung’s Among the Boat People. Here, Chung describes growing up in Saigon; life after the Communist takeover in which the Chung family, because it was Chinese, suffered persecution; Chung’s escape by boat, in which Chung lost brother, mother, and sister; and life in the U.S., working with Amerasian refugees (Vietnamese mothers and American GI fathers) who suffered discrimination and alienation in the new homeland.  
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Fri, Jan 17
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 17, 2020, 01/17/2020, Among the Boat People: A Memoir of Vietnam

Author Reading | Brand New Art from China: A Generation on the Rise


A talk by Barbara Pollack, also the author of The Wild, Wild East: An American Art Critic's Adventures in China.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Jan 21
6:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 21, 2020, 01/21/2020, Brand New Art from China: A Generation on the Rise

Author Reading | American Dirt: That Glimmer of Hope


Jeanine Cummins's American Dirt is a rare exploration into the inner hearts of people willing to sacrifice everything for a glimmer of hope. Restrictions may apply. Call store for details.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Jan 21
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 21, 2020, 01/21/2020, American Dirt: That Glimmer of Hope

Poetry Reading | Literature Out Loud: Poetic Outliers -- British Edition


Do you want to find time for literature in your busy life? Join to celebrate literature in bite-size servings! Read aloud, enact, and discuss passages of classic and contemporary literature from across the globe. This month, the poetry of individuals who composed their work independent of cultural centers, intellectual trends and established poetic traditions will be explored. In this session, you can read and discuss the works of American poetic outliers such as Emily Dickinson and Paul Laurence Dunbar. All literary enthusiasts are welcome! Participate in literature, connect with other readers, and take with you a bit of literary insight to season the rest of your day.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Thu, Jan 23
1:00 pm
Free
Poetry Readings, January 23, 2020, 01/23/2020, Literature Out Loud: Poetic Outliers -- British Edition

Author Reading | Unmaking the Presidency: Donald Trump's War on the World's Most Powerful Office


Susan Hennessey's definitive account of how Donald Trump has wielded the powers of the American presidency. The extraordinary authority of the U.S. presidency has no parallel in the democratic world. Today that authority resides in the hands of one man, Donald J. Trump. But rarely if ever has the nature of a president clashed more profoundly with the nature of the office. Unmaking the Presidency tells the story of the confrontation between a person and the institution he almost wholly embodies. Restrictions may apply. Call store for details.
   New York City, NY; NYC
Thu, Jan 23
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 23, 2020, 01/23/2020, Unmaking the Presidency: Donald Trump's War on the World's Most Powerful Office

Author Reading | Run-DMC's Joseph Simmons Presents His Book Old School Love: And Why It Works


Rap pioneer Joseph "Rev Run" Simmons and his wife Justine on how to make love last. Restrictions may apply. Call store for details.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Mon, Jan 27
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 27, 2020, 01/27/2020, Run-DMC's Joseph Simmons Presents His Book Old School Love: And Why It Works

Author Reading | Living in Color: What's Funny About Me


Welcoming actor and comedian Tommy Davidson. He will be discussing and signing his memoir, his unique story on making it in Hollywood, being an integral part of television history, on fame and family, and on living a life that has never been black and white. Restrictions apply. Call store for details.
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Tue, Jan 28
7:00 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 28, 2020, 01/28/2020, Living in Color: What's Funny About Me

Author Reading | Run Me to Earth


The Young Lions Award winner author Paul Yoon narrates a story of escape and survival in 1960s Laos. United by devastating loss, Alisak, Prany, and Noi are taking shelter in a bombed out hospital when they meet Vang, a doctor who is helping the wounded. Soon the three teens are serving as motorcycle couriers, delicately navigating their bikes across the fields filled with unexploded bombs, beneath the indiscriminate barrage from the sky. When at last Vang secures their escape on the last helicopter out of the country, their lives change forever.  Run Me to Earth spans decades and continents as Paul Yoon weaves a story that is equal parts history, heart, and hope. 
   New York City, NY; NYC
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Wed, Jan 29
6:30 pm
Free
Author Readings, January 29, 2020, 01/29/2020, Run Me to Earth
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