Since being published in hard cover by Fordham University Press/Empire State Editions in May 2022, Our Laundry, Our Town: My Chinese American Life from Flushing to the Downtown Stage and Beyond, was covered by The New York Times in a “Sunday Routine” profile, NPR/WNYC’s All of It with Alison Stewart and The Brian Lehrer Show, NY1’s Live at 10 with Cheryl Wills and CUNY-TV, among many others. In-person and virtual Author Events, Book Talks and Readings and Podcast profiles have also been enthusiastically received in book stores, branches of the New York Public Library, art galleries such as City Lore, where the book had its in-person launch on May 20, 2022 and at college and university venues such as CUNY/AAARI (Asian American/Asian Research Institute) where the book had its virtual launch––also on May 20. This page contains a complete listing of this coverage––with links to the media wherever possible––followed by a list of Author Events for the book––current, future and past. But let us start at the beginning, by giving thanks to all of the generous “blurbers.” (Looking ahead, the memoir will be published in paperback in October 2023.)
Pre-Publication Blurbs
“Powerful, funny at times, and consistently inspiring, Our Laundry, Our Town turns one artist’s journey into the story of AAPI communities and emergence of a movement over the past half-century. Alvin Eng’s engaging memoir looks back on the past to envision a better future.”—DAVID HENRY HWANG, screenwriter and Tony Award–winning playwright of M. Butterfly
“Our Laundry, Our Town makes an important and badly needed East Coast contribution to the continually evolving Asian American literary canon. Asian American and Ethnic Studies students and others will be able to find their personal experiences of regret, resignation, and, hopefully, triumph defined with pathos and humor, and written from—what has been rare in this genre—an adult’s point of view. And the book is absolutely fun to read!”—JEFFERY PAUL CHAN, author of Eat Everything Before You Die; co-editor of Aiiieeeee! anthologies,and co-founder of the first Asian American Studies program in the United States at San Francisco State University
“Alvin Eng’s fascinating, funny, aching, searching, loving memoir derives its power from that key element of New York City’s dynamism and magic: that behind every apartment door and scrappy storefront, in every far-flung outer-borough neighborhood, lie vast worlds, sweeping histories, and epic tales of questing souls melding the old ways into something meaningful and new.”—LISA KRON, playwright, actor and Tony Award-winning bookwriter and lyricist of Fun Home
“Second-generation Asian American youth always feel like they’re the first to not belong. How liberating, then, to encounter Our Laundry, Our Town. The book tells a moving tale of the distances that separate you from your immigrant parents, as well as a Toisanese labor history set in a laundry, but there’s a surprising twist. The protagonist is a young punk who hates math, loves The Who, and finds himself navigating the late-twentieth-century multicultural bohemia of rock and hip hop, Asian American film and theater, and avant-garde queer performance. In this humorous, amiable, and deeply heartfelt memoir, Eng seems to have achieved the Asian American dream: honoring his mother and father before him while also creating a community where he can be his whole self and finally belong.”
—KEN CHEN, Associate Director of Creative Writing at Barnard College; former Executive Director, Asian American Writers’ Workshop
“Our Laundry, Our Town reveals how and why Eng has become a writer, by way of his youthful identity quest through music, television, Cantonese opera, Chinese and American cinema, theatre, and performance. The awareness, self-knowledge, and self-acceptance he acquires is won sometimes painfully, sometimes comically, from a synthesis of American and Chinese culture particular to the time and place he inhabits. “—LINDA S. CHAPMAN, Lilly Award and GLAAD Media Award winner, former Associate Artistic Director, New York Theatre Workshop
“An evocative perspective on the Chinese American experience, a personal time-capsulated journey from immigrant Chinatowns back to China’s motherland. Eng creates a memoir-style blend of satire, sociology, and history to explore familial relationships, issues of identity, race, societal expectations—a multi-generational spin on assimilation and ‘Americanization’ that struggles through ‘longing to belong.’ Eng is a gem.”—HENRY CHANG, author of the Detective Jack Yu crime novel series
“Alvin Eng’s masterful, sweeping memoir about growing up with his five siblings in a dysfunctional family in the back of the Foo J. Chin Chinese Hand Laundry in Flushing, Queens is laced with his marvelous humor, family anecdotes and metaphors that bring a century of the Chinese American Experience to life. I was deeply touched, especially by the spirits parallels between the folks in Thornton Wilder’sOur Town and the laundry and the beautiful idea that his parents didn’t really see each other either––like the characters in the play. Just a beautiful book.” –STEVE ZEITLIN, folklorist, author of Poetry of Everyday Life and Founding Director of City Lore
Press Interviews and Reviews
BOOK MARKETING BUZZ, Interview, March 29, 2022
QUEENS LEDGER, Profile, May 10, 2022
THE WELL NEWS, Profile, May 17, 2022
QUEENS CHRONICLE, Profile, May 19, 2022
HASTY BOOK LIST , Interview, May 23, 2022
DEBORAH KALB BOOK Q&A, Interview, May 26, 2022
TRIBECA CITIZEN, Profile, June 3, 2022
POP MATTERS, Review, June 3, 2022
NEW YORK TIMES “Sunday Routine” Profile, June 12, 2022
LONG ISLAND WEEKLY, Profile, June 5, 2022
THORNTON WILDER SOCIETY NEWSLETTER, Interview, July 2022
INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER, Profile, December 1, 2022
WASHINGTON INDEPENDENT REVIEW OF BOOKS, Interview, January 31, 2023
Television / Live Streaming
LIVE AT TEN with CHERYL WILLS, NY1-TV, aired on May 9, 2022
OPEN BXRX FRIDAY with RHINA VALENTIN Bronx TV Net – 8-minute segment aired on May 12, 2022
AUTHOR TALK with KEW & WILLOW BOOKS (with Amy Chin), posted on May 26, 2022
ASIAN AMERICAN LIFE, CUNY-TV, aired September 2022
BOOK IT WITH CA, CUNY-TV, aired November 2022
Radio / Podcasts
LEONARD LOPATE AT LARGE WBAI/Pacifica Radio NYC, aired on May 11, 2022
NEW BOOKS NETWORK podcast with Deirdre Tyler, posted May 16, 2022
BOOK LAUNCH FRIDAY NIGHT LECTURE with CUNY/AAARI, posted on May 20, 2022
VIRTUAL MEMORIES PODCAST with Gil Roth, posted on May 24, 2022 (my birthday)
ALL OF IT with ALISON STEWART ON NPR/WNYC, aired on May 31, 2022
LITERARY THURSDAYS with QUEENS PUBLIC LIBRARY, aired on June 2, 2022
THE BRIAN LEHRER SHOW, NPR/WNYC, aired on August 4, 2022
AUTHOR EVENTS (past)
Two-Part Book Launch – MAY 20, 2022
Part I – Virtual City University of New York / Asian American/Asian Research Institute CUNY/AAARI
Friday Lecture Series with Antony Wong
Part II: In Person City Lore, East Village, NYC
With emcee, co-director Molly Garfinkel and Fordham Press’s Richard Morrison
MAY 25, 2022
AARP Houston Kew & Willow Books, Kew Gardens, Queens, NYC
Asian American Family Secrets Hidden in Plain Sight with Amy Chin
MAY 26, 2022
Kew & Willow Books, Kew Gardens, Queens, NYC
Live Streamed Virtual Author Talk and Conversation with Amy Chin
JUNE 2, 2022
Queens Public Library, Cambria Heights branch, Queens, NYC
Literary Thursdays Virtual Reading and Discussion series.
JUNE 8, 2022
Yu & Me Books, Chinatown, NYC
Author Meet-n-Greet
JUNE 12, 2022
21 Pell Street Community Center, Chinatown, NYC
Reading, concert and discussion with Skyler Chin
Emcees, Dominic Wong, Rob Gee
JUNE 25, 2022
New York Public Library, Hudson Park branch, West Village, NYC
Reading and discussion.
SEPTEMBER 15, 2022
KGB Bar, East Village, NYC
Drunken! Careening! Writers series with Charles Salzberg
Emcee and founder, Kathleen Warnock
SEPTEMBER 23, 2022
Word Books, Jersey City, N.J.
Open Mic Spotlight reading with emcee Emdash
SEPTEMBER 28, 2022
Dixon Place, LES, NYC
Guerilla Lit Series with Philip Brunetti and Topaz Winters
Emcee:Lee Matthew Goldberg
OCTOBER 12, 2022
New York Public Library, Chatham Square branch, Chinatown, NYC
Asian American Authors in Conversation with branch manager Sean Ferguson (subbing for Arthur Ling, who had Covid!)
OCTOBER 25, 2022
Queens Public Library, Flushing Main Street branch,
Hometown Author Talk
NOVEMBER 12, 2022
Inquiring Minds Bookstore & Café, Saugerties, NY
Reading and conversation with Sarah Litvin, Executive Director, Reher Center for Immigrant Culture & History. Hosted by bookstore manager Hannah Peterson.
NOVEMBER 14, 2022
Rough Draft Books Kingston, NY
Local Author Meet-n-Greet with Mark Morganstern
NOVEMBER 19, 2022
Judson Memorial Church, NYC
People’s Voice Café series, Special Guest of Warren Lehrer & Judith Sloan
JANUARY 6, 2023,
Hudson Guild, NYC
Hudson Guild AuthorsReading and Discussion with Michelle Tokarczyk and Michelle Herman Emcee: Jonathan Kuhn
JANUARY 25, 2023,
New York Public Library, New Amsterdam branch, Tribeca, NYC
Lower Manhattan Book Club Lunar New Year Book Talk!
Book was Lunar New Year selection of NYPL’s Lower Manhattan Book Club!
Reading, followed by talk with librarian Karen Loder
AUTHOR EVENTS (upcoming)
…stay tuned for Spring 23 events!
alvineng.com 