Morgan Thomas s+2
presents Mad Eden,
in conversation with Laura van den Berg
at McNally Jackson s+6
From a pathbreaking writer, a thrilling, form-bending novel about a trans healthcare worker whose carefully built life is suddenly imperiled.
Ro and Liam live in a ramshackle cabin in a secluded stretch of Florida. Neither their home nor their sometimes-tumultuous relationship is what the world would call perfect, but to Ro—newly diagnosed with autism and working as a patient navigator for people seeking gender-affirming care—their life, despite the deeply inhospitable political climate, is a kind of paradise.
It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what shatters their peace. There’s Quentin, the unpredictable teenager for whom Liam and Ro are quasi-parents, who visits on his way to college, where he plans to finally start T. There’s the appearance of “Mad Eden,” an online fantasy serial about heroic dragon riders that increasingly becomes Ro’s obsession. And then there’s a seemingly innocuous patient video call that results in consequences both unexpected and grave. This triad of circumstances sends Liam’s and Ro’s world spinning toward disaster—unless Ro can become the real-life hero their situation demands without betraying who they are and who they love.
With colossal heart and preternatural skill, Morgan Thomas crafts a deliciously destabilizing debut novel that challenges us to confront and reinvent questions of language, sex, prejudice, identity, and the shifting scales of morality. Playing with the possible relationship between autism and time to forge an ingenious new kind of storytelling, Mad Eden imagines, with exhilarating courage, how we might yet joyfully live in a precarious world.
Morgan Thomas is the author of the story collection Manywhere, which was a finalist for the PEN/Bingham Prize, the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction, the Lambda Literary Prize for Transgender Fiction, and the Publishing Triangle Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction. Their writing has appeared in The Paris Review, The Atlantic, The Kenyon Review, American Short Fiction, and The Yale Review. A graduate of the University of Oregon MFA program, they have also received fellowships from the MacDowell Colony, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and elsewhere.
Laura van den Berg was born and raised in Florida. She is the author of six works of fiction, including The Third Hotel, a finalist for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award; I Hold a Wolf by the Ears, which was one of Time Magazine’s 10 Best Fiction Books of 2020; and, most recently, State of Paradise. She is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, and a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. She has twice been shortlisted for the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. Her next novel, Ring of Night, is forthcoming from FSG. She is a Senior Lecturer on Fiction at Harvard University and is based in the Hudson Valley, with her husband, the writer Paul Yoon, and their dog, Oscar. Laura boxes competitively in the amateurs and can usually be found at the gym, training for her next fight. She writes a newsletter about boxing and writing called FIGHT WEEK.
Event Details
Monday, June 8, 2026
7:00pm
Price
$5
Location
McNally Jackson Seaport
4 Fulton St
New York, NY 10038
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About S+4
McNally Jackson Books
Books. Some 65 thousand of them. History. More than 200 years of it. NYC’s beloved McNally Jackson’s Seaport outpost spans two floors of the historic Schermerhorn Row building, built in 1811. Windows overlook the cobblestones and armchairs anchor each room. Browse the shelves. Bring the kids to explore the big children’s section. Chat to the McNally staff and find your next great read.
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