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X-ORIGINAL-URL:http://bookclub.meetup.com/430/calendar/10126029/ical/East+V
 alley+Book+Club+May+Meetup/
X-WR-CALNAME:Events - East Valley Book Club May Meetup
BEGIN:VEVENT
SUMMARY:East Valley Book Club May Meetup
DESCRIPTION:The East Valley Book Club\n\nWell\, for May we have switched pa
 ces again.  After a series of "serious" books\, we decided to lighten it up
  again.  We have chosen "Boomsday" by Christopher Buckley for this month's 
 read.  Here is what Pulisher's Weekly has to say:\nIn his latest novel\, Bu
 ckley imagines a not-so-distant future when America teeters on the brink of
  economic disaster as the baby boomers start retiring. Buckley takes on suc
 h pressing (however boring) topics as Social Security reform and fiscal sol
 vency\, as does his protagonist. And get this: she's a blogger.Buckley's he
 roine is "a morally superior twenty-nine-year-old PR chick" who blogs at ni
 ght about the impending Boomsday budget crisis. Of course\, "she was young\
 , she was pretty\, she was blonde\, she had something to say." She has a la
 rge\, doting audience that eagerly awaits her every blog entry. And her nam
 e? Cassandra. And the name of her blog? Also Cassandra. Of course\, Buckley
  doesn't let his allusion get by us:"She was a goddess of something\," anot
 her character struggles to remember\, which gives his heroine the opportuni
 ty to educate us about the significance of her namesake."Daughter of the ki
 ng of Troy. She warned that the city would fall to the Greeks\," she explai
 ns. "Cassandra is sort of a metaphor for catastrophe prediction. This is me
 . It's what I do." So Cassandra\, doing what she does\, starts by calling f
 or "an economic Bastille Day" and her minions take to destroying golf cours
 es in protest. Cassandra grabs headlines and magazine covers\, and the pres
 ident starts wringing his hands over what she might blog about next. Her fo
 llow-up: a radical but tantalizingly expedient solution to that most vexing
  of issues\, the Social Security problem—Cassandra proposes that senior cit
 izens kill themselves in exchange for tax breaks. Buckley\, author of Thank
  You for Smoking\, shows great imagination as he fires his pistol at the fe
 et of his straw women and men. In 300-plus pages\, though\, it would be nic
 e if he had found a way to endear us to at least one of his characters. Yes
 \, we know that Washington is "an asshole-rich environment\," as one puts i
 t\, but some Tom Wolfe–style self-loathing might be good for characters who
  use the word touché. Full disclosure: I'm a blogger of Cassandra's generat
 ion\, and at times the totally over-the-top\, relentlessly us-against-them 
 scenario reminded me that I was reading a book written by someone not of th
 e blogging generation\, someone who Cassandra would want put down. Oh\, the
  irony in these generationalist feelings. Then again\, maybe that's exactly
  Buckley's point.\nI hope that this gets us on to another great discussion 
 track\, and I look forward to seeing you there!\n\n\nShelly Y. Hughes\n\nMe
 sa\, AZ  85210 - USA\n\nWednesday\, May 20 at 7:00 PM\n\nPhoto: http://phot
 os1.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/e/5/0/2/event_6658626.jpeg\n\nAttending: 
 24\n\nDetails: http://bookclub.meetup.com/430/calendar/10126029/
LAST-MODIFIED:20090625T030504Z
UID:event_10126029@meetup.com
CLASS:PUBLIC
CREATED:20090406T143645Z
DTSTAMP:20091215T165258Z
DTSTART:20090521T020000Z
DTEND:20090521T040000Z
GEO:33.44;-111.71
LOCATION:Chevy's Mexican Restaurant - 1335 S. Alma School Rd. - Mesa\, AZ  
 85210 - USA
URL:http://bookclub.meetup.com/430/calendar/10126029/
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