Scarsdale Adult School Catalog Winter 2024
Author Visit: Kirstin Chen, Counterfeit (2022) Meet New York Times best selling author Kirstin Chen in conversation with Anna Katsavos as they discuss Counterfeit (2023), a Reese’s Book Club pick and the subject of a fierce eight-way bidding war for TV rights. Fast-paced thriller, feminist caper, and cautionary tale all rolled into one, this clever read is lots of fun. Thoroughly entertaining, Chen has set out to deconstruct the American dream as well as the myths of “the model minority,” exploding stereotype after stereotype about Asian and Asian Americans. Main characters Ava Wong and Winnie Fang, college roommates turned con-artists, find themselves involved with a designer handbag scam that is about to blow up. Ava, a strait-laced, rule-abiding Chinese American lawyer with a successful surgeon as a husband, a young son, and a beautiful home has built the perfect life. Winnie, once timid and shy, is now a confident woman of the world, dripping in luxury goods -- including a coveted Birkin in classic orange -- but she needs a favor. And so the adventure begins.
Presented via alternating points of view and told in two very distinct voices, the protagonists' confessions aim to explain how Ava and Winnie's ordinary lives detoured toward a life of crime, but, in the end, we are left wondering whose version is authentic and whose is fake. Time will be reserved for Q&A. Pair this course with the book discussion led by Anna Katsavos ( Course 12425 ), also in the winter schedule. Separate registration is required.
KIRSTIN CHEN is the author of Soy Sauce for Beginners (2014) and Bury What We Cannot Take (2018). Born and raised in Singapore, she attended Stanford University and got her Master’s at Emerson College. She has received fellowships and awards from the Steinbeck Fellows Program, Sewanee, Hedgebrook, Djerassi, the Napa Valley Writers’ Conference, the Toji Cultural Foundation, and the National Arts Council of Singapore. Her writing has appeared in TheCut , Real Simple , Literary Hub , Writer’s Digest , and Zyzzyva . She has taught at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, the University of San Francisco, Ashland University, and elsewhere. She currently lives in New York City and San Francisco.
ANNA KATSAVOS (see bio for “Author Visit: Ann Napolitano, Hello Beautiful (2023)”). Monday, February 12 • 1:00pm-2:15pm • Online • Course 12379 • $30
Author Visit: Mary Beth Keane, The Half Moon (2023)
Meet New York Times bestselling author Mary Beth Keane in conversation with Anna Katsavos as they discuss The Half Moon (2023). Keane's fourth novel concerns a faltering marriage but also the small details of ordinary daily life. The entire book takes place in the span of just one week in the life of Malcolm Gephardt, owner of the Half Moon bar, and his wife Jess, who has been trying unsuccessfully to have a baby and now seems poised to leave Malcolm for another man with three young children. As their town is engulfed in a massive blizzard, the inner lives of the two main characters remain front and center through Keane's absorbing prose. Time will be reserved for Q&A. Pair this course with the book discussion led by Anna Katsavos ( Course 12428 ), also in the winter schedule. Separate registration is required.
MARY BETH KEANE attended Barnard College and the University of Virginia, where she received an MFA. She was awarded a John S. Guggenheim fellowship for fiction writing, and has received citations from the National Book Foundation, PEN America, and the Hemingway Society. She is also the author of The Walking People , Fever , AskAgain , and Yes , a New York Times bestseller. ANNA KATSAVOS (see bio for “Author Visit: Ann Napolitano, Hello Beautiful (2023)”). Monday, March 4 • 1:00pm-2:15pm • Scarsdale Public Library Online • Course 12427 • $30
www.ScarsdaleAdultSchool.org • (914) 723-2325
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