A wildly inventive, laugh-out-loud, occasionally ghost-haunted exploration of love, identity, and what it means to be human.About this Event
Be the first to get your hands on during this night-of-release bash!
Join us in welcoming the brilliant mind behind Real Americans and Goodbye, Vitamin: Rachel Khong. Rachel is coming to Lovestruck to celebrate her dazzling new story collection about love, life, and the anguish of becoming oneself in a time when it’s so easy to be someone else (especially when the U.S. government is injecting everyone with a perspective-altering drug, God is rebooting humanity, or your new cat is summoning the literal spirits of your exes).
In conversation with award-winning Belmont Books bookseller Audrey Huang, Rachel will discuss My Dear You, sharing her inspirations, her unique approach to blending the ordinary and the supernatural, dating in your thirties, race and belonging, and all the strange ways we try—and fail—to connect.
Feeling brave? Visit our “Ghosts of Exes” confessional to anonymously spill your most chaotic one-date disasters, long-lost loves, or mildly haunted situationships. A few may even be read aloud by Rachel herself!
To purchase your own hardcover copy of My Dear You, please select the ticket option at Eventbrite checkout that includes the book. Stick around for the signature and salutations portion of the evening, guests are welcome to bring the author’s other titles from home to have signed.
EVENT DETAILS
- 6:30 PM: Doors Open – Settle in, grab a drink from our cafe and wine bar, and get ready for a great discussion!
- 7:00 PM: Discussion Begins – Rachel will dive into My Dear You.
- 7:45 PM: Q&A Session – Your chance to ask the author anything!
- 8:00 PM: Signatures, Snapping Pics, and Salutations – Meet the author, get your book signed, and snap a photo.
- 8:30 PM: Last call - Grab your final pour from the wine bar.
- 9:00 PM: Event Wraps Up – Thanks for joining us!
Tickets are limited, so grab yours soon! If the event sells out, you can join the Eventbrite waitlist by selecting “Reserve a spot” followed by “Join Waitlist”. Should any spots open up, you’ll have 24 hours to register before we offer it to the next person.
ACCESSIBILITY
Check-in will take place at our front entrance on Brattle Street. If you have any accessibility needs, you're welcome to use our side entrance (located on the right side of the building), which is wheelchair accessible and has a ramp.
Guests who would benefit from priority seating or any additional assistance are encouraged to reach out in advance — just email us at [email protected]. We're more than happy to make arrangements to ensure you feel comfortable and supported.
We’re always learning and looking for ways to make our events more accessible. If you have suggestions or feedback, we’d love to hear from you!
BOOK PICKUP POLICY
If you purchased a book with your event ticket but can’t make it to the event—and don’t request a refund—we’ll happily hold your book for pickup for up to 30 days after the event date.
We’ll be in touch via the email you provided at checkout to help coordinate pickup. After 30 days, if we haven’t heard from you or made other arrangements, we’ll consider the book abandoned property and may donate it or return it to inventory so it can find a new home.
Thanks so much for your understanding and for supporting our events—we love doing this with you!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rachel Khong is the author of Goodbye, Vitamin, winner of the California Book Award for First Fiction. Real Americans, her second novel, was a New York Times bestseller. In 2018, Khong founded The Ruby, a work and event space for women and nonbinary writers and artists in San Francisco’s Mission District. With friends, she teaches creative writing as The Dream Side. She lives in Los Angeles.
ABOUT MY DEAR YOU
From the author of New York Times bestseller Real Americans, a brilliant short story collection about love, life, and the anguish of becoming oneself in a time when it’s so easy to be someone else.
The characters in My Dear You find themselves facing extraordinary choices in scenarios that range from the everyday to the absurd: The U.S. government injects all citizens with a drug that makes them see everyone else as members of their own race and gender. God does away with humans in favor of something much better. A woman adopts a cat who conjures the ghosts of her ex-loves. A factory worker decides to befriend a sex doll she is tasked with selling.
These stories go deep beneath the surface, touching on the particular awkwardness of dating in your thirties and asking: What does it mean to be an Asian woman in America? Or an American? Or a human? Along the way, the characters stop to consider interventions from the supernatural, the earthly, the robotic, and the immortal.
Playful, profane, and yet enveloped with profound compassion for life—however you define it—My Dear You takes on dating, marriage, and the pressures of having or not having children; intimacy, memory, race, and capitalism; living, dying, and being dead. At their very core, they are tales of love in its many forms: being in love when you’re not supposed to be, or not being in love but wishing you were; failing at dating apps or finding yourself in weird but wonderful lifelong friendships; struggling in heaven to remember your loved ones.
Ranging from the sinister to the tender, these witty and expertly paced stories will have you laughing out loud one minute and reaching for your best friend the next.
ABOUT THE CONVERSATION PARTNER
Audrey I-Wei Huang (she/her) is a frontline bookseller at Belmont Books in Belmont, MA. She served on a number of awards and bookselling committees, and was honored to be named Handseller of the Year by the Book Publisher Reps of New England in 2024.
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Start your day with expertly crafted espresso drinks, artisanal pastries, and more. In the evening, the bar comes alive with wine, cocktails, sweet treats, charcuterie plates, and more. Enjoy seating indoors or on our covered patio.
To stay in the loop, visit the and look for events listed under “George Howell Coffee & Wine Bar” at our Lovestruck Books & Cafe location!
Cafe Hours | 8:00am – 4:00pm
Bar Hours | Sunday – Wednesday: 4:00pm– 8:00pm, Thursday – Friday: 4:00pm – 10:00pm
PHOTOGRAPHY AND VIDEO
Your presence at the Lovestruck Books & Cafe event acknowledges that you have been informed of the potential to be documented as part of a video or photo release, and that you grant permission for your likeness to be included in publication of any footage.
Event Venue
Lovestruck Books & Cafe, 44 Brattle Street, Cambridge, United States
USD 7.18 to USD 38.12
