The book arrives with praise from David Simon, Alex Borstein, and Mayim Bialik, refusing the inspiration story its author has spent her life being handed
WEST HEMPSTEAD, NY, UNITED STATES, September 9, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — Peri R. Finkelstein, founder and CEO of the Team Peri Foundation, has published her debut memoir, The Velvet Bow, available now on Amazon from Lucky Book Publishing. The book is a funny, unsparing account of building a career, a company, and a public voice while living with a rare form of muscular dystrophy, and it opens by rejecting the framing its author has been offered her entire life.
Finkelstein, who holds a bachelor’s degree and an MBA from Adelphi University, has raised more than $1 million for charity. She was featured in Forbes in 2022. Her TEDx talk, “Always Wanting More & Stepping Out of Line,” was narrated by actor and neuroscientist Mayim Bialik, who lent Finkelstein her voice for the talk. Finkelstein speaks in her own voice, supported by AI voice technology from ElevenLabs that she uses for prepared remarks. She has participated in twelve half marathons, and she produces and co-hosts the Team Peri Step Out of Line podcast with her mother, Lori Finkelstein, which has run for more than 125 episodes.
The memoir arrives with advance praise from author and television producer David Simon, whose credits include Homicide, The Corner, and HBO’s The Wire and Treme.
“With The Velvet Bow as much a manifesto as a memoir, Peri Finkelstein has delivered a narrative of endurance and triumph with wit and honesty, a clear argument for those living life with even the most dramatic and exhaustive disabilities to be seen as the people they are. This is a blunt but welcoming story, inviting readers not to pity or gloss the physical realities of disability, but to instead engage in a coming-of-age tale for a young woman finding confidence and purpose.”
Actors Alex Borstein and Mayim Bialik also provided advance praise, which appears on the book’s cover. The phrase that recurs throughout the book comes from Borstein’s 2019 Emmy acceptance speech, in which she urged women to “step out of line.” Finkelstein named her podcast after it, then her foundation’s programming, and eventually the Fox 5 New York segment about her, “Step Out of Line with Peri Finkelstein,” which won a 2025 New York Emmy Award for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in News.
“I may not have control over what my body does,” Finkelstein writes, “but I do have control over how I show up.”
An audiobook edition is planned and will be narrated by Danielle Monaro, co-host of Elvis Duran and the Morning Show.
The Velvet Bow is available now at amazon.com/dp/1996944215, and at Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, and other major retailers. To learn more about the Team Peri Foundation, visit teamperi.org.
About the Team Peri Foundation
The Team Peri Foundation is a 501(c)(3) founded in 2022 to amplify marginalized voices, challenge societal norms, and combat ableism. Its programming includes the Step Out of Line podcast, speaking engagements, and partnerships supporting organizations including Runway of Dreams and child life programs across Long Island and New York City. For more information, visit: https://www.teamperi.org/
Melinda Jackson
Melinda Jackson Public Relations
melinda@melindajacksonpr.com
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