“Now you young twerps want a new name for your generation? Probably not, you just want jobs, right? Well, the media do us all such tremendous favors when they call you Generation X, right? Two clicks from the very end of the alphabet. I hereby declare you Generation A, as much at the beginning of a series of astonishing triumphs and failures as Adam and Eve were so long ago.”
— Kurt Vonnegut, Syracuse University commencement address May 8, 1994


A brilliant, timely and very Couplandesque novel about honey bees and the world we may soon live in. Once again, Douglas Coupland captures the spirit of a generation….

In the near future bees are extinct — until one autumn when five people are stung in different places around the world. This shared experience unites them in a way they never could have imagined.

Generation A mirrors 1991’s Generation X. It explores new ways of looking at the act of reading and storytelling in a digital world.

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FINALIST 2009 - Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize

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‘With this exceptional sequel to Generation X, Douglas Coupland may be one of the smartest, wittiest writers around… He is a terrifically good writer…Generation A is set in the near future… Bees have become extinct, but then five people are stung…It is the attempt to get to the bottom of this mystery that brings the five together on an Alaskan island [actually BC island!] where they are made to tell stories to one another. Coupland weaves common elements across these tales and into the main narrative: large themes… comic themes… existential themes… There is a compelling plot… Coupland scatters his smartly satirical observations throughout…This is a clever, brilliant book — and it’s loads better than Generation X…funny and profound.’
—Esquire UK

‘Eighteen years on from Generation X, Coupland still satirises pop culture better than anyone. This globe-spanning tale, set in the near future, is masterfully told and often hilarious.’
—GQ UK

I know I’m not alone in thinking that Douglas Coupland is one of our finest chroniclers of modern life…. He’s funny, though, and maybe that’ s his ‘problem.’ Memo to the Custodians of CanLit: Big Ideas can be delivered with humour and wit.”
— National Post

"Douglas Coupland is the greatest Canadian ironist of his time. . . . A far-fetched and enjoyable romp. . . . If he lives long enough, he could go through the alphabet of generations and entertain us thoroughly in the process. . . . A world without bees is hard to imagine. It's almost as hard to imagin[e] a Canada without Coupland."
— The Globe and Mail

"As you're revelling in Coupland's wit and political acumen, a knockout section offering a trenchant commentary on storytelling suddenly hits you: how the best tales work, what inspires us and how stories can change the world. Don't miss it."
— NOW

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Visit Douglas Coupland's website

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Douglas Coupland was born on a NATO base in Germany in 1961. He is the author of the number-one international bestseller JPod and nine other novels including The Gum Thief, Hey Nostradamus!, All Families Are Psychotic and Generation X. His books have been translated into 35 languages and published in most countries around the world. He is also a visual artist and sculptor, furniture designer and screen-writer. He lives and works in Vancouver.

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