A Q&A With Three Authors Participating in East Hampton Authors Night 2024

Authors Night, an annual fundraising event that benefits East Hampton Library, has been an East End literary tradition for exactly 20 years. Each August, authors and readers gather together under a grand tent in East Hampton’s Herrick Park for an Authors Reception to celebrate the literary arts and the joy of new books by debut and beloved writers alike.

The 20th Annual Authors Night Fundraiser is Saturday, August 10, and begins with the Authors Reception portion of the literary evening at 5 p.m. in the park There, guests will have the opportunity to meet and mingle with their favorite authors, buy their books and have them personally inscribed while enjoying hors d’oeuvres and wine.

At 8 p.m., after the Authors Reception, some guests will move on to dine at private dinner parties at nearby homes in honor of one or more of the guest authors.

This year’s Author Reception includes exactly 100 authors representing an eclectic mix of local and nonlocal talent. Here are interviews with the authors of three of the books that will be represented at the event — Sophie Brickman, Sam Garonzik, and co-authors Audrey Belleza, Emily Harding who share insight into their newest novels, and their excitement for Authors Night.

Sophie Brickman

Brickman is the author of “Plays Well With Others,” a novel about a New York City mother who runs an advice column while exploring the trials and tribulations of getting her young children into a good school.

Q: Explain a little bit about your writing journey, I read that you were a chef when you were younger. How did you get to where you are now? Have you always had a passion for writing?

A: Yes, I’ve always wanted to be a writer — I come from a family of creative people, which I suppose means I felt like it was possible to pursue a writing career, and I’ve wanted to work in newspapers or magazines for as long as I can remember. That passion probably crystallized during high school after I read “The Things They Carried” during a segment on the Vietnam War in English class, which lead me to reading all of David Halberstam’s stuff, which lead me to want to be a war reporter … and while that dream never materialized, I guess food journalism has some similarities?

After college I attended culinary school at night while working an office job at a nonprofit during the day — something about using my hands and being able to complete something concrete within a few hours drew me to cooking — and then ended up working the line at a couple NYC restaurants and falling in love with the entire culinary underbelly of society. It was such a wonderful and cinematic environment — the characters! The pressure! The smells! — so I began writing a bit about food for The Atlantic and other places, and then followed my then-boyfriend, now-husband to San Francisco and happened to arrive just when a staff writer for the San Francisco Chronicle’s food section was going on maternity leave. They hired me as a fill in and that was my big break — I ran around the city writing stories about chefs and restaurants and worked with veteran editors and reporters and loved every minute of it.

But then I got homesick, and came back to NYC, where I freelanced and then edited on staff for different magazines including Saveur. When I became a mother, I found myself more interested in my child than anything else, so turned my reporting away from Brussels sprouts and towards her, which lead me to write my first book, “Baby, Unplugged,” which investigates the intersection of parenting and technology. “Plays Well With Others” came about on a whim, when I decided I’d try my hand at writing fiction for the first time since college, for fun. The story came incredibly easily and was enormously fun to write.

Q: Where did you get the idea for this story? How long has this story been in the works?

A: I have three young children, and found that for about the first year of each of their lives, I felt a little unmoored and at sea — the sleep deprivation and hormones certainly contributed to that, but so too did my uncertainty about what role I was now supposed to have, and this sinking feeling that everyone else knew what to do and I didn’t, that something supposedly innate had short circuited in me. I wanted to find a way to explore that feeling in a humorous way, and setting it in the high-pressured, slightly-to-very unhinged environment of kindergarten admissions worked for me. I suppose you could say the seed of the idea has been in the works since I first got pregnant about 9 years ago now, but the actual story and writing of it came about in a matter of feverish, very enjoyable months in the library, hunched over a school desk in the back corner of the stacks.

Q: You said this story was a little bit based on your life. How much of it is autobiographical? Is there, for you, a sort of catharsis in semi-autobiographical fiction?

A: There are surface level similarities between me and the main character — we both work in media, both have three children, and live in NYC — but I wanted Annie to be distinct from me, so that I could portray a woman who totally loses her mind (and don’t I sound incredibly sane in these answers? Thank you!). Satire is a form that works by cranking settings and media that people already know up to an 11, so the email blasts and WhatsApp chains I hope are recognizable to parents of young children, just portrayed in a crazier, loonier way.

Q: Is this your first time at Authors Night? Your first time on the East End? If so, what are you most looking forward to about it?

A: Yes, this is my first time at Authors Night, but my parents started coming out to the East End in the ’60s, and I spent summers up here as a kid. I basically lived at the East Hampton library in the summers growing up — the smell of the entryway is more effective than Xanax for me. I’m lucky enough now that I can share the beauty of the area with my three little kids, who spend much of their summers running around naked with ice pops.

Q: What’s coming up for you? Anything you can share?

A: I’m continuing to peck away on another project while making sure all of my children are fed and at least partially clothed each day.

Sophie Brickman’s debut novel, “Plays Well With Others,” will be publishing on August 6 from HarperCollins.

Sam Garonzik

Sam Garonzik is the debut author of “A Rough Way To Go,” which chronicles a beach-side mystery of a dead investor and the stay-at-home dad who decides to solve the case.

Q: You previously worked in finance before turning to writing. When did you start writing? What was the catalyst for that? Have you always loved writing or is this something new?

A: I started writing this book about six years ago and it was a pretty big departure from my previous life in finance. I was out of work at the time, and I think I needed an outlet of some sort. I’d done a very modest amount of writing in college and high school and always loved books but that’s about it.

Q: As a Bridgehampton resident, what do you bring to your novel that someone who isn’t local may not be able to?

A: Maybe a sense of the rhythms of a beach town when it’s a little quieter outside of the summer season.

Q: What was the best part about writing this novel for you? Is this something you plan to do in the future?

A: I think writing can be therapeutic if you’re able to get to a place when you’re doing it where you’re so focused that you’re not distracted by the other concerns of the day. That’s a nice feeling. And I’d like to do more of that kind of writing in the future, if I can.

Q: . Is this your first time at Authors Night? If so, what are you most looking forward to?

A: This is my first time at Authors Night and I’m very grateful to be invited. The chance to meet some new people, that’s always a nice thing, is probably what I’m looking forward to most.

“A Rough Way To Go” by Sam Garonzik was published on May 21 by Grand Central Publishing.

Audrey Belleza and Emily Harding

Audrey Belleza and Emily Harding are the authors of “Elizabeth of East Hampton,” a “Pride and Prejudice” retelling set amongst the beaches of East Hampton and Montauk.

Q: How long have you two been working as a pair? Have you written independently as well?

A: We’ve actually been working together for a lot longer than we’ve been writing together! We met a little over 10 years ago while working at a television production company in New York. Our first assignment was to shoot a pitch reel at a county jail in Pittsburgh, which was pretty intense, so even though we arrived barely knowing each other, we left best friends. Fast forward a few years, and the pandemic put the TV industry on an indefinite hold, so while we were quarantined, we ended up sending each other different short stories we were writing. One night, after a glass of wine or two, we were texting and decided to write something together. That’s when the concept for our first book, “Emma of 83rd Street,” was born.

Q: What gave you the idea to write modern adaptations, specifically of Jane Austen? Is this the plan to continue in the future as well?

A: Once we decided to write something together, adapting a classic seemed like the most logical choice. That way, no matter what ideas we each had about the direction or what should happen, we still had an original story to go back to. Jane Austen offered the perfect road map so all we had to do was follow it.

Q: How do you pick where to set your books? Are you both from New York?

A: We’re both New Yorkers but moved out of the city right before the pandemic, so these books are really our way of going home and revisiting some of our favorite moments and places. “Emma of 83rd Street” let us go back to Manhattan, while “Elizabeth of East Hampton” let us head out east. It was a different experience since neither of us lived out there, only visited, but thankfully the folks in Springs, East Hampton and Montauk treated us like family and really gave us that local insight.

Q: Is this your first time at Authors Night? What are you most looking forward to about this event?

A: This is our first Authors Night and we couldn’t be more excited. We’re still rather new to actually being authors, so the fact that people are reading our books, let alone want to meet us, is wild. And to be back in East Hampton the weekend our book is released will be a dream. But what we’re most looking forward to is seeing so many of our favorite authors there as well! It’s all very surreal.

Q: What’s coming up for you both? Anything you can share?

A: That’s a great question! We’re hoping we can continue living in Jane Austen’s world a bit longer, so fingers crossed there will be more books in the “For the Love of Austen” series. In the meantime, Emily has her solo debut novel coming out next summer from Gallery, so keep an eye open for that.

“Elizabeth of East Hampton” will be published on August 6 from Gallery Books.

Meet these and many, many more writers at the 20th Annual Authors Night in East Hampton this Saturday, starting with the Authors Reception (tickets $150) at 5 p.m. in Herrick Park, 67 Newtown Lane, East Hampton. Private author dinners begin at 8 p.m. and tickets start at $500. For information on all 100 participating authors and to purchase tickets, visit authorsnight.org or call 631-324-0222 during business hours.