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BFF Night w/ Katie Yee: Maggie; or, A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar

July 24, 2025 @ 6:00 pm - 6:45 pm EDT
Free

Join us for a night celebrating books and besties at Melissa Joy Manning Jewelry!

Join us for an evening celebrating books and besties with Katie Yee. Get a signed book, sip a margarita, buy some bling! The first 30 people who buy a book bundle ticket will receive a FREE pair of Melissa Joy Manning Hug Earrings!

Prose Hoes subscribers receive 25% off of forever bracelets.

A Chinese American woman spins tragedy into comedy when her life falls apart in a taut, wry debut novel that grapples with grief, motherhood, and myths—perfect for fans of Joan Is Okay and Crying in H Mart.

A man and a woman walk into a restaurant. The woman expects a lovely night filled with endless plates of samosas. Instead, she finds out her husband is having an affair with a woman named Maggie.

A short while after, her chest starts to ache. She walks into an examination room, where she finds out the pain in her breast isn’t just heartbreak—it’s cancer. She decides to call the tumor Maggie.

Unfolding in fragments over the course of the ensuing months, Maggie; Or, a Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar follows the narrator as she embarks on a journey of grief, healing, and reclamation. She starts talking to Maggie (the tumor), getting acquainted with her body’s new inhabitant. She overgenerously creates a “Guide to My Husband: A User’s Manual” for Maggie (the other woman), hoping to ease the process of discovering her ex-husband’s whims and quirks. She turns her children’s bedtime stories into retellings of Chinese folklore passed down by her own mother, in an attempt to make them fall in love with their shared culture—and to maybe save herself in the process.

In the style of Jenny Offill and the tradition of Nora Ephron’s hilarious and devastating writing on heartbreak and womanhood, Maggie is a master class in transforming personal tragedy into a form of defiant comedy.

Katie Yee is a writer from Brooklyn. She has received fellowships from the Center for Fiction, the Asian American Writers’ Workshop, and Kundiman. Her work has appeared in the Los Angeles Review of BooksNo TokensThe Believer, the Washington Square ReviewTriangle HouseEpiphany, and Literary Hub. By day, she works at the Brooklyn Museum. By night, she writes, usually under the watch of her judgmental rescue dog, Ollie.

Details

Event RSVP Website:
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/bff-night-w-katie-yee-maggie-or-a-man-and-a-woman-walk-into-a-bar-tickets-1357407214519
Date:
July 24, 2025
Time:
6:00 pm - 6:45 pm EDT
Cost:
Free
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