At a party Thursday at World Bar in Midtown, the editor in chief of Glamour magazine, Cynthia Leive, toasted Paris-based writer Mariane Pearl on her new book, “In Search of Hope: The Global Diaries of Mariane Pearl.”

In 2006, Ms. Pearl journeyed more than 100,000 miles to meet with 12 women who work as change agents in Cambodia, Liberia, Colombia, and elsewhere. Five of the book’s subjects attended the party: a woman who rescues sex slaves in Cambodia, Somaly Mam; a Mexican journalist who exposed a pedophile ring, Lydia Cacho; a woman who runs an anti-violence group in Colombia, Mayerly Sanchez; a medical doctor working in an AIDS-ravaged community in Uganda, Julian Atim, and a Bronx-born physician who heads the Mount Sinai Adolescent Health Center here in New York, Angela Diaz.

“We traveled together, and the traditional boundaries between journalist and subject were not there,” Ms. Pearl, who is the widow of slain Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, told The New York Sun.

In the forward, actress Angelina Jolie writes that the book’s message “seems to be that heroes are everywhere, and we should look to them and listen.” Ms. Jolie, who was not at the party, played the role of Ms. Pearl in the film version of “A Mighty Heart,” Ms. Pearl’s 2004 memoir about her husband.

The essays in the book, published by power House, first appeared last year in Glamour magazine. Charities featured in the book will receive 100% of proceeds from its sales at the magazine’s Web site, www.glamour.com.

Gabrielle Birkner

Museum Director Is Unscathed After Stint in Wrestling Ring

Miniature tamales and tarts filled with guacamole and shredded beef were some of the thousands of hors d’oeuvres chef Luz Marina Rodriguezof Jackson Heights, Queens, made Friday for El Museo del Barrio’s Dia de Los Muertos party. Ms. Rodriguez turned out the delicious nourishment in front of guests in an improvised kitchen consisting of a microwave and a few round tables.

Her operation seemed calm in comparison to the joyous chaos of the rest of the party which, true to the origins of the holiday, remembered the dead with an altar of marigolds, watermelons, and giant skeletons.

The director of El Museo del Barrio, Julián Zugazagoitia, found himself in the middle of a wrestling ring, as referee of a mock contest between the masked wrestlers, the luchadores.

Later, the ring was filled with dancing guests dressed in their cocktail best, including Mr. Zugazagoitia, who said he’d be happy to return to his ongoing tasks as museum director: overseeing exhibits of Latin American and Caribbean art, and also the construction of a new entrance and lobby.

The museum’s Young International Circle, whose chairwomen are Jana Pasquel, Samantha Thompson, and Mayra Hernández, organized the event at the Angel Orensanz Foundation.

agordon@nysun.com

For additional photos of this event visit nysun.com and click the photo gallery link.