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The Lemon by S. E. Boyd with guest Joe House

  • Lost City Books 2467 18th Street Northwest Washington, DC, 20009 United States (map)

About this event

ABOUT THE LEMON

Named a Most Anticipated Book of Fall 2022 by Entertainment Weekly • Vogue • AARP the Magazine • Eater • New York Post • LitHub • Publishers Lunch • and more!

Set in the intersecting worlds of fine dining, Hollywood, and the media, a darkly hilarious and ultimately affecting story about the underside of success and fame, and our ongoing complicity in devouring our cultural heroes.

While filming on location in Belfast, Northern Ireland, John Doe, the universally adored host of the culinary travel show Last Call, is found dead in a hotel room in an apparent suicide. As the news of his untimely demise breaks stateside, a group of friends, fixers, hustlers, and opportunists vie to seize control of the narrative: Doe’s chess-master of an agent Nia, ready to call in every favor she is owed to preserve his legacy; down-on-her-luck journalist Katie, who fabricates a story about Doe to save her job at a failing website; and world-famous chef Paolo Cabrini, Doe’s closest friend and confidant, who finds himself entangled with a deranged Belfast hotel worker whose lurid secret might just take them all down.

Bolstered by the authors’ insider knowledge of high-end restaurants and low-end media, The Lemon delivers a raucous examination of our culture with deliciously cutting prose, crackling dialogue, and an unpredictable plot that will keep you riveted to the last page.

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Joe House

DMV native and longtime DC resident Joe House is the host of two wildly popular Ringer podcasts on the Spotify network (Fairway Rollin' and the food podcast House of Carbs) as well as a recurring guest on the Bill Simmons podcast, the most popular sports podcast of all time. If that's not enough, House, who got his law degree at the Catholic University of America, is also a lawyer, which helps fund his real passion: eating glorious meals at restaurants with friends.

SE Boyd

S. E. Boyd is the creation of veteran journalists Kevin Alexander and Joe Keohane, and editor Alessandra Lusardi. All lightly damaged Catholics prone to extensive over-analysis, Alexander, Keohane, and Lusardi have between them authored four books, edited dozens more, and written for Esquire, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker, among others. Alexander also won a James Beard Award for food writing, a fact Keohane and Lusardi are both tired of hearing about. This is their first novel.

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Accessibility note: This event will be held up two flights of stairs. Lost City Books does not have an elevator. This event will be simultaneously live streamed on our YouTube page!

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