Launch party photos & video

Every fall, PEN holds a New Members/New Books Party at Housing Works celebrating the work of the past year with those who have recently joined PEN and members who've just published new books.

This year, that party also served as a formal lauch for PEN America 9: Checkpoints. Several of our contributors—including Colum McCann, Anya Ulinich, and Joshua Furst—were there, and another, Wayne Koestenbaum, said a few words about the new issue, highlighting the poem by Joe Ricky Knight and the FBI surveillance on Andy Warhol (these excellent pieces are not online: you’ll just have to order the magazine).

Someone from mediabistro was there with a video camera: watch Nick Trautwein talk about the all-editor jazz band and Joshua Henkin (author of Matrimony and frequent guest-blogger at The Elegant Variation) talk about the writing life. And the talented Beowulf Sheehan was snapping photos: on the left, PEN members survey the new books; above, Jonathan Burnham, publisher of HarperCollins, plays the keys, and author Will Heinrich chats with publicist Lisa Weinert and agent Melissa Flashman.