Wed. Sept.15

Carl Hiaasen calls him one of his favorite satirical novelistst of the day, and we're down with that. The satirist's need is to create a reality that's just a few degrees more awful that reality and that Gary Shteyngart, author of "Absurdistan," has done again with "Super Sad True Love Story." Shteyngart reads Wed. Sept. 15 at 6 at the Coolidge Corner Theatre, sponsored by the Brookline Booksmith. “Super Sad" is a "1984" for our times. It takes place in the near future, and everything's gone bad, or perhaps everything we know now as bad or potentially bad is taken to extreme. The Chinese control our economy our national debut is so bad they're threatening to pull the plug. Because we're a nation constantly at war, we're now in a war with Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. At home, the national guard is out on patrol. Books are clunky things, regarded as a papery-smelling relics by the young-uns who can only text-scan for data. In the post-"Facebook" world, privacy is bye-bye. Everyone carries around a device which, as the NY Times review put it, "can live-stream its owner’s thoughts and conversations, and broadcast their 'hotness' quotient to others. People are obsessed with their health — Lenny [the protagonist] works as a Life Lovers Outreach Coordinator (Grade G) for a firm that specializes in life extension — and shopping is the favorite pastime of anyone with money." Well, that latter line isn't really too much about the future now, is it?  Go to the reading for $5, and go to the Booksmith across the street, and buy your own signed, printed, bound media artifact.

270 Harvard St., Brookline, 617-566-6660 www.brooklinebooksmith.com