Book Release Party TONIGHT at LIC Bar, 6pm!

Tonight's the night! Come on out to beautiful Long Island City, Queens and meet us at 6pm at LIC Bar to celebrate the release of Forgotten Borough: Writers Come to Terms with Queens!

Books will be available for sale and for signing, and we'll have fabulous readings from contributors SUSAN Y. CHI, MARCY DERMANSKY, and ARTHUR NERSESIAN.* And it's all FREE!

Click here for more info and to RSVP! Then take a trip on the 7 train and join us as we celebrate our collective Queens pride. Hope to see you there!

*Note: Contrary to the flyer, Nicole Cooley will no longer be reading at the event. Oh, to have Photoshop on my netbook.

Forgotten Borough Book Release Party: 2/26/11 at LIC Bar!

Thanks to all who came out to the Forgotten Borough AWP event and who stopped by the SUNY Press table—and especially to those who bought copies! Such a blast!

Forgotten Borough is officially available for sale from SUNY Press and looks FANTASTIC, if I do say so myself. Order your copy from SUNY today and support a wonderful nonprofit publisher!

If you'll be in the NYC area on Saturday, February 26, we'll be celebrating the release of the book at LIC Bar from 6 to 8 p.m.! Books will be for sale, courtesy of Mobile Libris, and we'll hear short readings from contributors Nicole Cooley, Marcy Dermansky, and Arthur Nersesian!

Click here for more details and to RSVP on Facebook! All are welcome!

Marcy Dermansky on Astoria and writing about Queens

Today's Forgotten Borough plug comes from contributor Marcy Dermansky, who has an interview up on 30th Ave, a new site that celebrates the diversity of 30th Avenue in Astoria, Queens, and the stories of the people who live there.

In her interview, Marcy talks about she came to live in Astoria and her Forgotten Borough piece, "Waiting for Big Bird"—the first story she wrote about her current home turf.

[Marcy] moved to Astoria ten years ago.

"I certainly didn't know I'd be here for this long. I came to New York and people said 'move to Queens, it's happening, and it's cheap'. We like it so we've stayed and have moved a couple of times around here. Astoria is very community-oriented. I've almost liked it better since having Nina than beforehand, which you wouldn't necessarily expect. Suddenly I know my neighbors a lot more. I keep meeting mothers with strollers. People are warm and helpful."

Her short story "Waiting for Big Bird" is set in Astoria (specifically in Café Bar on 34th Avenue) and is coming out in a forthcoming anthology called Forgotten Borough – Writers come to terms with Queens. But she says: "That’s the first time I've written about Queens. I think with fiction a lot of times you write about a place after you've left it. I'll probably write more about Queens when I live somewhere else."

Click here to read the rest of Marcy's interview, and check out the other stories of 30th Avenue! Imagine if there were a website for every neighborhood in Queens...