BBF Bookends Opening Night: West Coast/East Coast Beef

Brooklyn Book Festival Bookends Opening Night Party: the event with a name so long it gets to be its own sentence. Electric Literature was tickled to play co-host with Tumblr, The New Inquiry, and the LA Review of Books. It all went down at Public Assembly, in all its dark and sprawling Williamsburg glory. The night’s theme was ‘East vs. West face off,’ although this could be observed nowhere except in endless cups of Brooklyn Lager (East Coast) and gin-‘n-juice (West Coast). Those cups might as well have been batteries and bottled water at the last bodega on earth on the eve of the apocalypse. It was that unhinged.

There were DJs (two!) instead of readers. There were bars (two!) instead of boxed wine or whatever brutal potable thing we’re used to finding at an event. And there was dancing. So much dancing. Full on, drunk-at-prom style dancing. And it was so good.

Rarely can such debauchery be found at a party where books are for sale. On a Monday, no less. Hats off to you, literary people. You’re animals.

More photos after the jump.

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— Kai Twanmoh is a sometimes contributor to The Outlet. You can find her here.