Join us at Book Passage for an author event celebrating Monte Schulz and his new book, Undercity: A Novel! A warning on the consequences of inattention and apathy.
In an uncannily prescient novel eerily relevant to our contemporary political moment, Undercity unfolds across 16 interconnected vignettes, as author Monte Schulz charts the lives of two dozen characters desperately trying to survive and retain their humanity in a civil order that has tumbled into totalitarianism.
ABOUT THIS EVENT
This event will be hosted by Book Passage at our Corte Madera store.
Free Admission/ Open Seating
Following the presentation, there will be a signing line or a meet-and-greet.
If you are unable to attend the event, you can still get your copy by clicking the “BUY THE BOOK” link here. If you would like a signed or personalized book, please note that in the order comment field.
For any questions regarding our events, please contact us at books@bookpassage.com.
“My name is Marco Grenelle, and I’m probably insane. It troubles me, though I’ve learned to adapt. I’m here to tell you my story. It’s a fine tale, I promise. So, listen closely.”
Once there was a republic of boundless wonder and achievement whose bright horizon had gone dark, soiled by a populace it imagined as undisciplined, unhealthy, feebleminded, and whose very existence stained and subverted a great society. A solution appeared in the furious logic of Biological Dominion that named the ineffectual and weak, the criminally deformed and unwell, as the root cause of this decline. Now, imagine laws conceived in the high halls of government to rid this society of millions deemed infected by a curious disease supposedly responsible for that poverty of health and morality. Next, imagine those millions considered to be unfit and unworthy for daily life, loaded onto freight trains and ushered away to perish in distant woods and fields. Imagine thousands more chased into the vast underground of labyrinthine caves and dark catacombs beneath vibrant city streets and lovely city parks to wither away and die.
Undercity collects the voices of brave survivors, of those who’ve refused to submit to the indignities of eugenical persecution, the horror of gas chambers, and relentless warfare in rural provinces. Some of these stories demonstrate the moral disaster of eugenics, while others tell of courage and love and that indomitable magic of the human spirit that refuses to be silenced in the face of unspeakable crimes. Perhaps Undercity is a warning to us, as well, that what we might think is unimaginable needs only apathy and inattention to arise.
Monte Schulz received his M.A. in American Studies from University of California, Santa Barbara. He published his first novel, Down by the River, in 1990, and spent the next twelve years writing a novel about the Jazz Age, Crossing Eden. Monte is also a composer, songwriter and producer whose most recent album is titled “Seraphonium.” In 2010, he became the owner of the Santa Barbara Writers Conference. Monte is endlessly curious and well versed in world history and theology. He is fascinated by the style and use of innovative language, and can be caught engaging in provocative, philosophical conversations about big, far-reaching, imaginative, ideas and worldly perspectives. His father is the late cartoonist Charles M. Schulz. He lives in Santa Barbara, CA.
