All Brooklyn news
Neighborhood Map
Bay Ridge
  • Bensonhurst, Dyker Heights
Brooklyn Heights
  • Downtown, DUMBO
Carroll Gardens
  • Cobble Hill, Red Hook, Boerum Hill
Fort Greene
  • Clinton Hill, Crown Heights
North Brooklyn
  • Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Bushwick
Park Slope
  • Prospect Heights, Windsor Terrace, Greenwood Heights
GO Brooklyn
Dining Guide
Where to GO
Events calendar
Classifieds
The Brooklyn Wire
Not Just Nets
Police Blotter
Perspective
Parenting
Politics
Transit
Podcasts
Brooklyn Cyclones
Special sections
About The Paper
Mobile site
Twitter
Facebook
RSS Feeds

Y2K FLASHBACK

By Lisa J. Curtis
The Brooklyn Paper

Tools

Print this story
Facebook this
Tweet this
Digg this
Del.icio.us

As New Year’s Eve approaches, Park Slope author Kevin Shay reminds us that during a more innocent time - a time before 9-11 - some folks feared a catastrophic breakdown of civilization on Dec. 31, 1999.

His debut novel, "The End As I Know It: A Novel of Millennial Anxiety," which will be available in local bookstores on Tuesday, is set in 1998. The former McSweeney’s Web site editor focuses his now-hilarious premise on a panicked 25-year-old’s attempts to save himself and his family by attempting to move them all off "the grid," free of the shackles of public utilities and the internet.

Randall Knight’s efforts to rouse his friends’ and kin’s fears fail, just as their attempt at an intervention to get him "off" Y2K fails.
Yet Knight manages to get taken in by a sympathetic Texas family, who are indeed living safely - if not sanely - off-the-grid. A Thanksgiving visitor to their home from Brooklyn offers Knight an alternative to the madness with her offer of a ride back to reality.

Shay, who lives in the Slope with his wife Gabria and their Pembroke Welsh Corgi, will be celebrating New Year’s Eve and the publication of his new book in Sunset Park. His advice: "Spend the holiday with people you actually like and stay out of Manhattan."

"The End As I Know It" (Doubleday, $23.95) goes on sale on Dec. 26 at, or can be ordered through, these local bookstores: The Bookmark Shoppe [6906 11th Ave. at 69th Street in Dyker Heights (718) 680-3680], BookCourt [163 Court St. at Dean Street in Cobble Hill, (718) 875-3677] and Barnes & Noble [267 Seventh Ave. at Sixth Street in Park Slope, (718) 832-9066].

©2006 Community Newspaper Group

→A very Marty Xmas

Reader Feedback

Enter your comment below

By submitting this comment, you agree to the following terms:

You agree that you, and not BrooklynPaper.com or its affiliates, are fully responsible for the content that you post. You agree not to post any abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, hateful, threatening or sexually-oriented material or any material that may violate applicable law; doing so may lead to the removal of your post and to your being permanently banned from posting to the site. You grant to BrooklynPaper.com the royalty-free, irrevocable, perpetual and fully sublicensable license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform and display such content in whole or in part world-wide and to incorporate it in other works in any form, media or technology now known or later developed.

First name
Last name
Your neighborhood
Email address
Daytime phone

Your letter must be signed and include all of the information requested above. (Only your name and neighborhood are published with the letter.) Letters should be as brief as possible; while they may discuss any topic of interest to our readers, priority will be given to letters that relate to stories covered by The Brooklyn Paper.

Letters will be edited at the sole discretion of the editor, may be published in whole or part in any media, and upon publication become the property of The Brooklyn Paper. The earlier in the week you send your letter, the better.

Packer Summer Day Camp
B&R Electronics
East River Ferry

Links