AQ’s 15th Yearbook Reading Enjoyed By Enthusiastic ABC Audience

AQ’s 15th Yearbook Reading Enjoyed By Enthusiastic ABC Audience

[AMSTERDAM] On Friday, 6 February, 2026, an enthusiastic audience of approximately 35 gathered to celebrate Amsterdam Quarterly’s (AQ) 15th Yearbook launch party and reading in the American Book Center’s (ABC) White Room in Amsterdam. Speakers included editor/publisher Bryan R. Monte, essayist Rebecca Heath Anderson, and poets Simon Brod, Hollis Kurman, Monique van Maare, Pat Seman, and Marcus Slingsby. The reading also featured the work of A.S. Williams, an AQ Writers’ Group member, who died last month, and a pre-retirement thanks to Maria Minaya, who has printed all fifteen issues of the AQ Yearbook on the ABC’s Espresso Book Machine (EBM).

Amsterdam Quarterly 2025 Yearbook Launch Party and Reading. L. to r. Rebecca Heath Anderson, Hollis Kurman, Marcus Slingsby, Bryan R. Monte, Simon Brod, Monique van Maare, and Pat Seman, 6 February 2026. Photo by Michael T. Green. Used with permission.

Amsterdam Quarterly is an international online and print literary journal. The AQ 2025 Yearbook features work from 51 writers living in 10 countries on four continents in eight genres: art, essay, fiction, memoir, news, photography, poetry, and reviews. AQ can be found at https://amsterdamquarterly.nl, its original website and at https://amsterdamquarterly.org, its main website. The online journal is published online on the 21st of March, June, and September. AQ also has a monthly writers’ group, which meets virtually September through June, on the third Sunday of the month. Writers and artists, previously published in AQ, are eligible to join.

AQ Congratulates Maria Minaya on 15 years of printing AQ, photo, Hollis Kurman. Used with permission.

AQ has just finished reading for its forty-fifth online issue, theme Climate Overshoot. AQ45 is due out online on 21 March 2026. During the month of April 2026, submissions will be open for AQ46, whose theme is Summer, and during July 2026 for AQ47, whose theme is Culture. For AQ46, send pieces related to holidays, travel, romance, etc. For AQ47, send work related to tribes, cities, civilizations, music, art, rituals, or even germs or yoghurt. These themes are deliberately quite broad to encourage a variety of perspectives.

AQ 2025 Reading Poster in ABC Window, 6 February 2025, photo, Monique van Maare

During its 15 years, AQ has published work by internationally-known writers such as American Academy of Poets Chancellor and multi-award winning writer, editor, and educator Naomi Shihab Nye, NPR personality and Louisiana State University MacCurdy Distinguished Professor of English emeritus, Andrei Codrescu, NPR and BBC personality and humourist David Sedaris, 2009 T. S. Eliot Poetry Prize winner Philip Gross, 2000 National Book Award finalist poet and writer Kim Addonizio, and physician, bioethicist, and 2012 Dundee International Book Award winner Jacob M. Appel.