Please join us for an evening of conversation with Elaine Castillo and Preti Taneja, in celebration of the recent release of How to Read Now (by Elaine Castillo) and Aftermath (by Preti Taneja).

Named one of ’30 of the planet’s most exciting young people’ by the Financial Times, Elaine Castillo was born and raised in the Bay Area. Her debut novel America Is Not the Heart was named one of the best books of 2018 by NPR, San Francisco Chronicle, The New York Public Library, The New York Post, The Boston Globe, Real Simple, Lit Hub, and has been nominated for the Elle Award, the Center for Fiction Prize, the Aspen Words Prize, the Northern California Independent Booksellers Book Award, and the California Book Award.

Preti Taneja is a writer and activist, and Professor of World Literature and Creative Writing at Newcastle University. She is contributing editor at And Other Stories, and at The White Review. Preti’s first novel, We That Are Young, (Galley Beggar Press) won the Desmond Elliott Prize and was listed for awards including the Folio Prize and the Prix Jan Michalski. It has been translated into several languages and is published in the USA by AA Knopf. Her second book is Aftermath, (Transit Books/ And Other Stories) a lament on the language of prison, terror, trauma and grief following the London Bridge attacks in 2019. Aftermath is currently shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize.