BOOK CLUB | SUNDAY, MAY 4 | 11 AM–1 PM | FREE
Illiterati: Gen X Book Club
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
Illiterati: Gen X Book Club will meet at FUSION | The Cell on Sunday, April 6, from 11 AM–1 PM. The May discussion will be on Station Eleven (National Book Award Finalist) by Emily St. John Mandel.
An audacious, darkly glittering novel set in the eerie days following civilization's collapse, Station Eleven tells the spellbinding story of a nomadic group of actors roaming the scattered outposts of the Great Lakes region, risking everything for art and humanity.
It is fifteen years after a flu pandemic wiped out most of the world's population. Kirsten is an actress with the Traveling Symphony, a small troupe moving over the gutted landscape, performing Shakespeare and music for scattered communities of survivors. But when they arrive in the outpost of St. Deborah by the Water, they encounter a violent prophet who digs graves for anyone who dares to leave. Spanning decades, moving back and forth in time, and vividly depicting life before and after the disaster brought everyone here, this suspenseful, elegiac novel is rife with beauty, telling a story about the relationships that sustain us.
This book club is FREE and open to the public!
All are welcome. The club will be discussing books related to Generation X. You're welcome to BYO snacks and drinks. Later in the season Novel Point Coffee will also be open next door. Look in the photos section on Meetup.com for the current reading list. If you have reading suggestions please send them to genxbookclub@gmail.com, and keep in mind:
Authors should be born between 1960 and 1980. Outliers will want good reasons to be included. Any books over 400 pages may be discussed over multiple months.
Folks are welcome to attend even if they haven't finished the book, and audio versions are fair game.
Gen X Book Club is looking for discussion above agreement, but being mean will not be tolerated. Disagreement can be lovely as long as it remains respectful.
ABOUT ILLITERATI: GEN X BOOK CLUB
“Things are weird. The adults are all gone. We've been left to fend for ourselves by the light of an empty fridge.
Gen X was made for this. We got ourselves to the mall food court, looking for each other without appearing to care. Let's read Gen X literature. Let's discuss it as if it's real. As our ultimate rebellious act in a dying world we'll make it so.
Now that we've found a couple of interested slackers we'll crack open Eggers, Wurtzel, Safran Foer. Hewlett & Martin. If all goes well and follows in reasonable order we'll start with early Gen X authors and move to the later. Maybe rinse occasionally with something hopeish from outside the timeline, like Allie Brosh.
But when does it all go well and follow in reasonable order?”