Pub Week, Summer Events, and the Audiobook

My new novel, The Many Masks of Andy Zhou, comes out on in less than 24 hours! For those of you in/willing to travel to Southeast Michigan: the book launch party is this Saturday, June 10, from 2PM–4PM at 27th Letter Books in Detroit. I’ll be joined by some local author friends, who’ll be reading from their own stories for kids/teens, and I’ve just confirmed today that a student-volunteer lion dance team will be performing. We’ll have some fried dumplings and bubble tea too – bring your kids!

Summer Events

While I’m not doing a full-on book tour this time, I do have some other virtual and in-person events scattered throughout the summer:

• June 16 @ 3PM ET (Virtual): Chatting with Penguin’s School and Library team (whilst riding a Hi-Chew sugar wave) as part of their Middle Grade Munchies series
• July 12 @ 2PM ET (Virtual): Brodart panel for librarians, “Tell Me More: Diverse Voices”
• July 14 @ 10:15AM ET (Virtual): Nerdcamp PA panel, “Keeping Kids at the Heart of Stories” (with my BookSmitten podmates)
• July 16 @ Time TBD (In-person): Detroit Book Festival, Book Beat table, Eastern Market Shed 5
• July 23 @ 6:30PM ET (In-person): Writing and Maskmaking Workshop @ Ann Arbor District Library

I’m excited for all of these events, but especially for the last one, as I’ll be debuting a new writing/crafting workshop for students. If you want to book me for a visit this summer or fall, you can find more details on my Author Visits page.

Audiobook

The audiobook will release the same day as the hardcover (again, that’s tomorrow/Tuesday/in less than 24 hours!). It’s read by the multi-talented Eddy Lee, who’s voiced Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh! characters and performed on Broadway, including as a cast member on the US tour of Hamilton. Here’s an excerpt from the audiobook:

Once you read/listen to the full novel, I’m certain you’ll see why Eddy was not only a “spiritual” fit for the book but just an excellent fit in general. Even from that small scene you can hear the warmth and vulnerability in his performance. Another bonus: Eddy grew up in East Lansing, Michigan.

The audiobook was co-produced by Karen Dziekonski, who also produced the audiobook for See You in the Cosmos (and knocked it out of the park). I was thrilled to see Karen mention it in as one of her summer picks (alongside Tom Hanks’s book!). If you’re wondering why I also have a “read by” credit on these pages: I read my own author’s note at the end.

👺

I’ve gone way past my usual quota of exclamation points in this letter, and it’s because I have a lot to be excited about. I greatly appreciate your support and hope you’ll get your copy of either the hardcover or audiobook (or both!) this week if you haven’t already pre-ordered. An unexpected outcome of this book’s publication is that I find myself using the Tengu emoji much more often, and when I use it, I always use it as both a wink and a bow – a slightly mischievous gratitude.

And so: 👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺