Tonight at the 92Y Tribeca, I’m hosting the first (hopefully — as in, hopefully there will be a second) open mic! Jeremiah Lockwood of The Sway Machinery is playing a set, and Elisa Albert, author of The Book of Dahlia, will be reading. A few months ago, it was one of those Shabboses where I’d ODed on writing, and now that I couldn’t write anymore, I just wanted to read manically. So I took Elisa’s new book, which I’d been wanting to read for a while (her first collection made me actually like Philip Roth, a feat which I’d deemed impossible), and started reading.

And I didn’t stop.

The sun was coming up, which seemed particularly noteworthy considering the novel’s content. It’s a funny, wry, more-wise-than-it-seems look at a girl who finds out she’s dying. It’s not at all what you’d expect, which is odd to say, considering we basically have every expectation in the world loaded up in our heads when it comes to dying. But the agony of going out to eat with your parents after a brain scan, and the sort of perverse joy in ordering the most expensive thing on the menu, is one of those tiny details that is meaningful and beautiful and terrible all at once — and that’s exactly what you’ll find from her.

And Jeremiah — well, I just heard the new Sway Machinery album, set for a release date in February, and I don’t know if the world is ready for it, but it’s so ready for the world.

Sign up for the open mic at 7:30, and have a quick drink with me. Show begins at 8:00 promptly.

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