Douglas Coupland is my favourite author. The way I experience his works, he writes two kinds of books. Some that I just really enjoy to read. And then there is another kind - books that almost immediately touch something deep inside of me, in a beautiful, yet at times painful (in a good sense) way that few others things can. Hey Nostradamus belongs to this second group.

Coupland has an incredible feeling for Zeitgeist. This story - published in 2003 - which has a school shooting at its outset (a topic that is still very much with us today) illustrates that. But that is only part of it. In any of Couplands books I find gems - be it surprising observations, or the accuracy, with which he can describe experiences or feelings, that all or some of us share in this day and age, or many other things - that are part of what makes his works so special to me.

On a park bench at the riverbank, at the foot of the pedestrian bridge west of Roberts Center