Kristin Harmel (center) is flanked by fellow chick-lit authors Lauren Lipton, Brenda Janowitz, Alison Pace, and Sarah Mlynowski at the book party mediabistro.com threw Monday night at Touch to celebrate the publication of Harmel's latest two novels, The Art of French Kissing for adults and When You Wish for YA readers.

Carolyn Turgeon and Jeanine Cummins join Anton Strout at the party for his debut urban fantasy, Dead to Me, with a special cake Cummins had made for the occasion. The three Queens-based authors are longtime friends and supported each other while they all wrote their first books (Turgeon's Rain Village and Cummins's memoir, A Rip in Heaven).

Simon & Schuster publicists Jessica Krakoski and Kristin Dwyer flank Jessica Morgan and Heather Cocks, the creators of Go Fug Yourself, recently named one of 27 "Ultimate Blogs," as they celebrate the publication of The Fug Awards. I couldn't actually make it to this party, but Folio marketing director Ami Greko assures me "everyone was dressed glamorously and managed to look pretty darn good, particularly for a publishing party."

And I've been meaning to swap this next photo out of my inbox since last week, when Rachel Kramer Bussel (left) told me about a reading from her "In the Flesh" series that featured the new erotic anthologies Succulent: Chocolate Flava II and Sex for America: Politically Inspired Erotica. Readers included Michelle Robinson, Jonathan Ames, and Zane. (Thanks to Stacie Joy for the photo.)

Meanwhile, an interesting question came in through the anonymous tip line. "A lot of the readings/events you go to seem really good, but we usually hear about them after the fact," a reader observes. "Would you have time to post a weekly 'upcoming events' entry, or a google calendar widget?" That's a possibility mediabistro.com might consider when the site acquires an assistant editor, but in the meantime, you should definitely have Lauren Cerand's weekly "Smart Set" listings at Maud Newton's blog bookmarked, or if you want the whole spectrum of book events in New York in one place, there's Stilljohn.com.