Born in Syria, moving to Detroit as a child, and running away to New York in her twenties to become a rock star: Rayya Elias built up a lifetime of stories by the time she was 25, and a few more in the decades after.

Her brash, brutal memoir Harley Loco – probably the only book you’ll read this year titled after the author’s prison nickname – doesn’t stop there. Elias’s book stomps through a lifetime’s worth of self-discovery: identity in migrant communities, an addiction story with a happy ending, and how to support yourself as an amateur hairdresser in the old, dirty anddangerous NYC. She’ll be joined by her friend Elizabeth Gilbert, who encouraged Elias to tell her story. 

Rayya Elias is a hair stylist, filmmaker, musician and most recently, author. Her first book is Harley Loco: A Memoir of Hard Living, Hair, and Post Punk, from the Middle East to the Lower East Side.

Elizabeth Gilbert is an author and journalist, best known for her international bestselling memoir Eat, Pray, Love, which has sold over 10 million copies worldwide. Time Magazine named her as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. She went on to write two other books, Committed and The Signature of All Things, which also became widely acclaimed bestsellers.

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