East Quogue, NY—on Saturday, July 24, 2010 from 5-7 PM, author, poet, Ann Karen Dowd celebrates the release of her fiction novella, How Did She Get There? and launches her cross country book tour with a cocktail party at the Dockers Waterside Restaurant.

A Virgo, born on September 13, Ann Karen Dowd grew up in New Jersey, but has travelled extensively and lived internationally over the years. Currently, Dowd makes New York state the base of operations for her writing and speaking career. A National Poetry Award winner for New Millennium Writing in 2004, Dowd has written two books: Echoes of the Heart (New York: Leisure Books, 1988) and How Did She Get There? (New York: White Ink Press, 2010) which became available for purchase in June 2010.

With her story, How Did She Get There? set in the Hamptons, Dowd has chosen Dockers Waterside Restaurant and Marina as the perfect location to host the launch party celebrating her book’s release and subsequent book tour. Those attending will be transported into the very world in which Dowd has placed her story and will enjoy the overall “Hamptons” experience that the author has captured so eloquently in her book. Dockers Waterside Restaurant and Marina is located at 94 Dune Road, East Quogue, NY 11942. The release party is open to the public and the author will be giving away signed copies of her book.

How Did She Get There? (White Ink Press 2010, ISBN: 978-0615335308,) is a story of acclaimed poet Caro Barrone’s journey of exploration, self discovery, and ultimately transformation. As Caro’s personal life in middle-age eclipses her professional one, Caro abandons the city for the windswept beaches of the Hamptons. There she meets beautiful thirteen-year-old Livia Valdez. Shy, serious, and only just beginning to reveal her poetic genius, Livia is everything Caro once was. All begins innocently, but their relationship takes a disquieting turn when Caro becomes obsessed with finding ideal love. What does the author have to say about her unlikely heroine and about the passion which fuels her writing?

“Unlike so many female characters in fiction, Caro is neither pure victim nor villain. Rather, she is a woman whose capacity for transgression is countered only by her capacity for transformation.”

“For me as a writer, it’s the fissures and splits, the broken, undefined images that ignite my imagination . . . but it’s not only the search, in filling the gap . . . it’s the excavation of the narratives, deep within the fissures and chiasms of our sub-conscious that are already there and most people never unearth.”

Already a sought after featured guest on the Internet, Dowd is making her first Web radio appearance about How Did She Get There? on Writers in the Sky Podcast June 25, 2010. This interview will be available for download through iTunes and at http://writersinthesky.com/writing-podcast.html.

Dowd will be following the launch of her book on July 24, 2010 with a cross-country book tour visiting major cities including Charlotte and Raleigh NC; Charleston, SC; Savannah, GA; Austin, TX; San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego, CA, with radio interviews and live speaking engagements. On her tour Dowd will be addressing audiences most interested in and affected by her themes: women age 30 and up; social workers, therapists, and psychologists; people in academia, particularly in Women’s Studies & Comparative Literature departments; and readers who like authors to “push the envelope” and address taboo or unconventional material.

Passionately unafraid, Dowd speaks candidly on topics including issues of objectification of women's bodies; girl's/women's self-image; addictions and eating disorders; women's, British & American, Third-world, feminist literature & theory; language and women; tattoos and women; women's history; ageism; and women's roles overseas.

Ann Karen Dowd, holds a Bachelor of Arts and a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of Hong Kong. She spent two years in Saudi Arabia, and upon her return held teaching positions in Virginia, Massachusetts, and Arizona. As a conference speaker, Ann has presented papers and hosted forums at major cultural and literary conferences in the US, the UK, and Hong Kong.

Learn more about the author and her up-coming book tour from her website at www.annkarendowd.com or by following her on http://twitter.com/annkarendowd, and at http://bit.ly/facebookannkarendowd.