Wednesday Jun 24, 2026
7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
POWERHOUSE Arena
28 Adams Street (Corner of Adams & Water Street across from the Archway)
Brooklyn , NY
11201
About the Book.
New York City, East Village, 1984. A young woman with the power to see the ghosts of her friends is haunted by the one who refuses to return—a dazzling, big-hearted debut of friendship and community during a time of devastation and defiance.
Renata is a young dyke-about-town who can see ghosts, something she’s doing more and more of lately as too many of her friends are dying of a new, terrifying disease. When Renata’s best friend Mark dies of complications from AIDS, Renata is devastated by the loss of the person she loved most in the world. And to her disappointment and increasing despair, Mark seems unwilling or unable to return for the proper goodbye they both were denied.
While Renata waits anxiously for Mark, she must stay vigilant: a mysterious, police-like force has begun ridding their East Village neighborhood of anything abnormal or inexplicable. What first seems like a scam reveals itself to be far more sinister, targeting the soul of Renata’s community. With her band of lovably eccentric pals and lovers, Renata is determined to fight back against the erasure of her friends’ memories and the sanitizing of her beloved New York. But haunting her every step is Mark, the one ghost who stubbornly refuses to reappear.
Both heartbreaking and healing, tragic and triumphant, Waiting on a Friend is a magical retelling of queer history and a celebration of youth and camaraderie. With pathos and humor, empathy and an edge, Natalie Adler freshly reimagines the past for a new generation, reclaiming the spirit of resistance and determination that would become one of the era’s defining legacies.
About the Author.
Natalie Adler is an editor of Lux magazine and teaches at Sackett Street Writers. Waiting on a Friend is her first novel.
Dani Martineck (they/he) is an Audie Award-winning audiobook narrator with a background in experimental psychology and a passion for stories that help us feel less alone. Apart from their emotionally layered cross-genre narration, Dani acts and writes for film/TV/theater, visibly mends their clothes, notices birds, and is always exploring toward the next scary and beautiful thing. His next film is about rediscovering self-love from within chronic pain (@handlewithcare.film on IG).