Sunday 28 November 2021 13:00
Our Teen Reading Club, hosted by the author Stella Kasdagli, comes together once again in November. The book we’ll be reading this month is My brother chases dinosaurs by Giacomo Mazzariol.
For this session, 30 members between 12 and 16 years old make a date for the last Sunday in November, at 13:00, to discover alternative worlds waiting to be created by the readers themselves – that’s us!
Don’t worry if you don’t have time to get through the whole book, or if you didn’t make it to our previous meeting: in any case, Stella will give the signal each month, announcing the book we’ll all be reading over the next few weeks. At the end of the month, the gang that has read the book (or half of it, at least!) will get together to share thoughts, impressions, feelings and concerns inspired by what we read – whether we liked it a lot, or not so much!
A bit more on November’s book With his book My brother chases dinosaurs, Mazzariol wrote a novel of apprenticeship, where he had to make nothing up. A novel that surprises, moves, entertains and makes you think. It has, in fact, been made into a film of Italian-Spanish production, which received the European Film Academy Young Audience Award.
The plot: You're five years old, you have two sisters and you long for a brother to play with, like all little boys. Until one night, when your parents tell you you'll finally get a little brother, but he will be different. You're overjoyed: to you, being different means to be a superhero. You even go as far as giving him a name: Giovanni. And then he comes into the world and you gradually understand that, yes, he truly is different to other children. Eventually you learn the word Down, and your excitement turns into denial and then into shame. You'll have to go through adolescence to come to the realization that, ultimately, your first impression wasn't wrong. And once you finally let Giovanni's vitality carry you away, you will come to the conclusion that he is, indeed, a superhero. And that, in any case, he is your best friend.
A bit more on StellaStella Kasdagli is an author, translator, co-founder of the non-profit organization Women On Top, and educator to teenagers and adults. She completed her degree (only God knows how) in French Philology in Athens, and went on to study Media Theory in London. She worked as an editor on Cosmopolitan magazine for a number of years, while also writing for other Greek and English-language publications and sites. She now designs and implements actions to empower women, writes on topics she’d like to see discussed more widely, translates foreign literature, and runs workshops for teenagers on body image, the internet and social change. She is also (phew!) co-founder of the Mentorkids network and the Bookworm online book club. She has written the books Koilitsa.com [Belly.com], Ithela mono na horeso [I only wanted to fit], 30 gynaikes pou allaksan ton kosmo (kai pos boreis na ton allakseis ki esi) [30 women who changed the world (and how you can change it, too)], and the Princess Athena series. She has two daughters, and they grow up together in Athens.
Sunday 28/11 | 13.00-14.30 Zoom
For boys and girls aged 12-16 years oldFree participation by online pre-registration
Preregistration starts on Monday 01/11 at 12.00
To take part in the Reading Club, those who register must have read the book of the month (or half of it, at least). My brother chases dinosaurs by Giacomo Mazzariol is available in Greek translation from Patakis Publications.
As part of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center's collaboration with the National Library of Greece, the teen book for October's Reading Club has been chosen by NLG staff members.
