What’s New in Corona City

Corona City book cover, with an image of the usually bustling interior of New York’s Grand Central Station almost deserted due to the pandemic
You can read more about the book on our Corona City page, or buy a copy on Amazon.com.

Winter 2023-24—Corona City: Voices from an Epicenter (Magic Dog Press), edited by Lorraine, is an anthology of first-person writings chronicling life in New York and New Jersey when these two states were the nation’s first coronavirus epicenter. All royalties go to hunger relief.

Audiobook Producer Wins Voice Arts Award

Congratulations to Walker Vreeland, who accepted a Voice Arts Award for Best Audiobook Producer at the Society for Voice Arts and Sciences gala in Hollywood on December 10, 2023. He won for his work on Corona City! This is the anthology’s fourth international award. Employing multiple art forms, we’ve clearly captured something essential about COVID-19 and the indomitable human spirit it evoked.

Audiobook Wins IPPY Award

Corona City, the audiobook, available here on Audible.com, won a 2023 IPPY (Independent Publisher Book Award) for Outstanding Audiobook of the Year. The IPPYs is one of the largest and most recognized book awards in the world. Congrats to the audiobook team: Walker Vreeland of Walker Vreeland Productions, producer; Margie Lenhart of Margie Voiceovers, casting director; and William Antoniou, composer who wrote the original soundtrack.

• Listen to a demo of the audiobook here.

Traveling Reading Series Continues

The Suffern Free Library will host Corona City on April 14, 2024. At the event Lorraine will highlight the anthology’s remarkable journey. Also, Hudson Valley / Rockland area contributors will read their first-person works from the book. For more information, visit the Events & Appearances page.

On Thursday night, June 22, Lorraine kicked off a traveling Corona City Reading Series with Meet the Authors: Corona City at the Lee Memorial Library in Allendale, New Jersey. The event featured a talk about the anthology’s remarkable journey and featured Bergen County writers reading their first-person works from the book. The series will move to different venues in New Jersey and New York. Stay tuned for more information.

Authors signing books at a Corona City event

Lorraine and Jan Barry, author of “Memorial Day 2020,” sign copies of Corona City at Meet the Authors: Corona City at Lee Memorial Library in Allendale, NJ, June 22. (Photo by Lauren Kidd Ferguson)

Five-Star Review Calls Book a ‘Time Capsule’

IndieReader gave Corona City a five-star review earlier this month, calling the book “an intimate, deeply affecting time capsule of the early pandemic that is likely to become even more emotionally resonant in the coming years, as people’s memories of the experience begin to fade.”

So Far 65,000 Meals Served

As of this writing, Corona City, in all three editions—paperback, ebook, and audiobook—has served up over 32,000 meals. Since we’re matched by the Tony Robbins 1 Billion Meals Challenge, make that almost 65,000 meals.

“Lorraine is one of those rare writers who can make any scene come alive. She has understanding and a wisdom born of experience, and she can see into the heart of a story perhaps better than anyone I know. The details she chooses when she describes or narrates are always the right ones for the piece and for the emotions involved. She's a fine journalist, a fine memoirist, and, simply put, a really fine writer.”

Pat Carr, PhD
author of The Women in the Mirror and One Page at a Time: On a Writing Life
winner of the Iowa Short Fiction Award and the PEN Southwest Book Award