Autumn newsletter
September 2024
After a brief summer hiatus, LAX LAB 2.0 is getting back into the swing of things. Hope that you are all feeling rested and ready to immerse yourself in the stories and worlds of climate fiction.
Firstly, I would like to welcome all new followers, members, and subscribers to the LAX LAB 2.0 school of climate fiction. I am so pleased with how many have joined in a short period of time. We are already approaching 200 members!
Special thanks to those of you who have opted for a paid subscription. Your contribution goes a long way to supporting the project. With time, my plan is that these funds can be put towards arranging author talks and other events. Until then, my goal for this autumn is to meet some of you and begin assembling a regular (or at least somewhat regular) group of people to participate in the book club. The book club is a great way to meet diverse people from all over the world, so I hope that some of you are keen to participate.
What do you have to look forward to this autumn?
There are plenty of exciting things to look forward to this autumn.
Thank you to everyone who participated in the discussions of our first book: The Future by Catherine Leroux. Soon you will receive a summary of our discussions. This is part of what makes LAX LAB special. Compiling a summary of our conversations is a kind of collective analysis that reveals how many different ways there are to read, interpret, and experience literary works. This is how we co-create knowledge. It is also one of the ways that LAX LAB works to build community.
Next up will be a sneak preview and then the announcement of our second book.
I am busy working on some short essays on climate fiction for the LAX LAB Substack, which I hope will be helpful and inspiring. I am also in the process of writing a paper about the original LAX LAB climate fiction book club, which was active between 2020 and 2023. This will be published in a Special Issue on Grounding Knowledge in Community, edited by Jennifer Markides, Liisa-Rávná Finbog, and Beth Cross for the journal Education in the North. You can read the abstract here.
If you were a participant in the original book club and would like to contribute some text to the article, please reach out and let me know. For example, I would love to include some direct quotes from former participants about their experiences of the book club or something about their favourite books.
As this is a community-building project, I would appreciate if you got in touch and let me know if you have any books that you would like to read together or if you have any thoughts on what kind of events you are hoping for and how you would like to participate in LAX LAB. Would you like to promote your own book? Would you like to give a talk to the community? Are you interested in exploring any specific authors, sub-genres, or titles? Would you like to collaborate on something?
I am looking forward to hearing from you, and hopefully meeting more of you in our next book club discussion.
Warm wishes from autumnal Oslo,
Emma, also known as the LAX LAB librarian
