Douglas Coupland and Chuck Palahniuk: Right here, right soon, right awesome.

Few writers consistently deliver that special grab-your-heart-and-juice-it epiphany of, "Oh my god, that's my life!" When they do, however, hold on to it, and read voraciously.

Such was the case for me and Vancouver's Douglas Coupland , starting with an initial foray in his fiction with Girlfriend in a Coma on a summer roadtrip after graduating from high school. Perhaps it was the short-term nostalgia for high school that was quickly sinking in, or growing up in the same city and suburb that Coupland's characters lived, or the fact that at that age, it was the sharpest, most touchingly relevant novel I'd read. Nonetheless, my fascination spiralled into an all-out personal Coupland reading festival, curried with the grittier, south-of-the-border prose of Chuck Palahniuk.

Best known for 1990s time capsule Generation X (Coupland) and novel-turned-feature film Fight Club (Palahniuk), Coupland and Palahniuk's wit, incisiveness, and zeitgeist commentary has shaped the aesthetic of a contemporary fiction that pinpoints the anxieties of a generation.

Coupland and Palahniuk will be giving a talk at Frederic Wood Theatre,
University of British Columbia on Monday, February 27th
Tickets are $12, available at the Frederic Wood box office (6354 Crescent Road), or by phone: 604-822-2678. Call 604-682-4066 for more information. The discussion starts at 7:30pm.

More
About Douglas Coupland's Jpod - coming in May 2006
Interview with Chuck Palahniuk on Bookslut
Interview with Douglas Coupland on The Morning News