Read The Room Presents... Best-Selling Food Writers!
June 3, 2025
Welcome to READ THE ROOM, a series of readings by some of New York's leading writers. Our guest readers represent a broad cross-section of the literary world, featuring authors of published works from top magazines, newspapers, websites, and books.
For this installment, we welcome James Beard Foundation Award-winner John Birdsall and New York Times bestselling author Laurie Woolever for readings, conversation, Q & A, book signings, and quality food and drink!
John Birdsall, author of What is Queer Food?
“The book defies category: it’s a history and a philosophical argument, a chain of interconnected stories told in Birdsall’s unmistakable voice, sexy and joyous and angry and thrumming with life.”
— Helen Rosner, The New Yorker
“Birdsall (The Man Who Ate Too Much) provides an eye-opening exploration of how food has helped shape ‘the queer arc of survival’ in American life. Combining a novelistic imagination with razor-sharp analysis, Birdsall fills in historical gaps to highlight the resiliency of queer people and cast the culture of food and dining as an unlikely but powerful symbol of resistance.”—starred review, Publishers Weekly
Laurie Woolever, author of Care and Feeding
"The success of Care and Feeding is in Woolever’s keen storytelling. She knows how to craft a story, and guide us along multiple paths simultaneously….her adroit storytelling doesn’t rely on the famous men. She’s successfully made herself the focus, and creates more than enough narrative tension with her own dramas to sideline Batali and Bourdain. Woolever’s story has power too because she creates a relatable connection….She allows us in, and we can see ourselves reflected in her success and failures.” –Chicago Review of Books
“[Woolever] is a funny, acerbic and empathetic writer. One of the most refreshing aspects of “Care and Feeding” is that she doesn’t belabor the point that she was a hot mess….She feeds. She cares. And we read and care too.” –The New York Times Book Review
Your hosts: Kathleen Squires and Ronnie Rodriguez, Chef’s Dinner Table
Not only are we serving up a buffet of contemporary literature, with signed books for sale, we are also sharing food by our chef Julie Carrion plus wines, beer and soft drinks too. Tasty bites sponsored by Fra' Mani, artisan creators of award-winning salumi!
So, come on down to Little Italy and get your culture on!
Price: $65