Date Night with Alyssa Cole

Our Date Night series with host Alyssa Cole and a diverse group of Romance writers continues for 2021 and will be happening quarterly! This event is free to attend and will be held digitally via Crowdcast. Click here to rsvp for the event. You can buy our dates' books on our website below and there will be a link for purchase during the event.

Our Spring Date Night is an evening with the fabulous romance authors Uzma Jalaluddin, Courtney Milan, N.G. Peltier, Erica Ridley, and Naima Simone. We'll chat about writing during Covid-19, our favorite tropes, the TV getting us through, and whatever else comes to mind during this free flowing chat with host Alyssa Cole. 

ABOUT THE HOST

Alyssa Cole is a New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author of romance (historical, contemporary, and sci-fi) and thrillers. Her Civil War-set espionage romance An Extraordinary Union was the American Library Association’s RUSA Best Romance for 2018, and A Princess in Theory was one of the New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2018. She’s contributed to publications including Bustle, Shondaland, The Toast, Vulture, RT Book Reviews, and Heroes and Heartbreakers, and her books have received critical acclaim from The New York Times, Library Journal, BuzzFeed, Kirkus, Booklist, Jezebel, Vulture, Book Riot, Entertainment Weekly, and various other outlets. When she’s not working, she can usually be found watching anime or wrangling her pets.

ABOUT THE GUESTS

Uzma Jalaluddin grew up in a diverse suburb of Toronto, but her favourite place in the world is the nearest bookstore or library. Her debut novel, AYESHA AT LAST (2018), is a retelling of Pride and Prejudice set in the Toronto Muslim community. The novel was a Goodreads Choice Award Finalist, was featured on The Today Show, and was a Cosmopolitan UK Book of the Year. AYESHA AT LAST has been optioned for film by Pascal Pictures. Her second novel, HANA KHAN CARRIES ON (April 2021), was an instant Canadian bestseller. The novel is a reimagining of ‘You’ve Got Mail’ set in rival halal restaurants. Uzma writes a culture and parenting column for The Toronto Star, and has written for The Atlantic. She lives in Toronto, Canada, with her husband and two sons, where she also teaches high school.

Courtney Milan writes books about carriages, corsets, and smartwatches. Her books have received starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, and Booklist. She is a New York Times and a USA Today Bestseller. She lives in the Rocky Mountains with her husband and an exceptionally perfect dog. Before she started writing romance, Courtney got a graduate degree in theoretical physical chemistry from UC Berkeley. After that, just to shake things up, she went to law school at the University of Michigan and graduated summa cum laude. Then she did a handful of clerkships. She was a law professor for a while. She now writes full-time.

N.G. Peltier is an anime watching, book reading, video-game playing, story writing kinda girl. A devourer of words and books from a young age, she enjoys writing romance and creeping people out with the Caribbean folklore stories she grew up hearing.A Trinidadian born and raised, she currently lives in Trinidad with her mountain of ideas and characters battling each other for whose story get told next.

Erica Ridley is a New York Times and USA Today best-selling author of of witty, feel-good historical romance novels. When not reading or writing romances, Erica can be found riding camels in Africa, zip-lining through rainforests in Costa Rica, or getting hopelessly lost in the middle of Budapest.

Published since 2009, USA Today Bestselling author Naima Simone loves writing sizzling romances with heart, a touch of humor and snark. Her books have been featured in The Washington Post and Entertainment Weekly, and described as balancing “crackling, electric love scenes with exquisitely rendered characters caught in emotional turmoil.” She is wife to Superman, or his non-Kryptonian, less bullet proof equivalent, and mother to the most awesome kids ever. They all live in perfect, sometimes domestically-challenged bliss in the southern United States.

Please note Loyalty has a zero tolerance policy for harassment or intimidation of any kind during this virtual event.