KGB Bar

Darin Strauss is the best-selling author of The New York Times Notable novels The Real McCoy and More Than It Hurts You and The Los Angeles Times Book of the Year Chang & Eng.  His latest book, Half a Life, coming September 15th, has been excerpted in GQ and on This American Life.  Strauss has seen his work translated into 14 languages, and published in 20 countries; he’s received numerous awards, most recently a Guggenheim in Fiction Writing.  Also a screenwriter – he’s worked with Disney films, Julie Taymor, and, on the adaptation of Chang & Eng, with Gary Oldman – Darin has additionally written fiction, essays, and criticism for the Times, GQ, Esquire, One Story, McSweeney’s, The Washington Post, Salon, and many others. 

Marcy Dermansky is the author of the novels Bad Marie and Twins.  Hailed by The Nervous Breakdown as “genuinely sexy, dark and subversive but also freaking weirdly hilarious,” Bad Marie is a Barnes and Noble Fall 2010 Discover Great New Writers pick.  Time Magazine pronounced Bad Marie “irresistible.” Marcy’s short fiction has been published in McSweeney’s, Alaska Quarterly Review, and Five Chapters.  She lives in Astoria with her husband, writer Jurgen Fauth, and her daughter Nina.

Ben Greenman is an editor at the New Yorker and the author of several acclaimed books of fiction, including Superbad, A Circle is a Balloon and Compass Both, Please Step Back, and most recently, What He’s Poised to Do.  His fiction, essays, and journalism have appeared in numerous publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Paris Review, Zoetrope, McSweeney’s, and Opium, and he has been widely anthologized.  He is also a regular contributor to the online music site www.moistworks.com.  He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and two children.

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Behind the Book is a literacy nonprofit working with low-income students in NYC public schools.  Our mission is to excite children and young adults about reading.  Working in the 1st -12th grades, we bring authors and their books into individual classrooms to build literacy skills and a new generation of book readers.  www.behindthebook.org