(GALLOWAY, NJ) -- Jane Wong, whose debut memoir "Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City" has received rave reviews, will be the first speaker for this academic year at Stockton University's Stephen Dunn Reading Series. The 2023 book is an incandescent, exquisitely written memoir about family, food, girlhood, resistance and growing up in a Chinese American restaurant on the Jersey shore.

Wong, who now lives in Seattle, will speak and read from her book at 12:45pm on Wednesday, September 27 in Campus Center Meeting Room 5. The appearance will also be streamed over Zoom. Admission is free, and the public is welcome to attend.

Here are just some of the comments from reviews of Wong’s newest book:

“Her story is a love letter to Atlantic City and the Asian American working class.” — The Los Angeles Times

“Wong’s memoir invites those who have been overlooked in America to hold up their verses, accolades and solidarity in a collective rejoinder to their detractors.” — The Washington Post

“With a poet’s ear for language and a satirist’s eye for human foibles, Wong masterfully marries her personal story with larger questions about Chinese America identity.” — Publishers Weekly

In addition to her memoir, Wong is also the author of two books of poetry — “Hot to Not Be Afraid of Everything” (Alice James, 2021) and “Overpour” (Action Books, 2016). She holds an MFA in Poetry from the University of Iowa, a Ph.D. in English from the University of Washington and is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Western Washington University.

The Stephen Dunn Reading Series was named after the late Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and distinguished professor emeritus of Creative Writing at Stockton. The series is sponsored by Murphy Writing of Stockton University; the William T. Daly School of General Studies; The Literature program in the School of Arts & Humanities; and Board of Trustee member Madeleine Deininger, '80.

Stockton University is ranked among the top public universities in the nation. The university's more than 9,000 students can choose to live and learn on the 1,600-acre wooded main campus in the Pinelands National Reserve in South Jersey and at their coastal residential campus just steps from the beach and Boardwalk in Atlantic City. The university offers more than 160 undergraduate and graduate programs.