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Kids in America: A Gen X Reckoning
Squeezed between the Baby Boomers and Millenials, Generation X was all but written off as cynical, sarcastic, slackers. Yet this generation profoundly impacted American culture--and were impacted by it--in ways that are only now being understood. In her revealing and provocative collection, KIDS IN A GEN X RECKONING , Liz Prato reveals a generation deeply affected by terrorism, racial inequality, rape culture, and mental illness, in an era when none of these issues were openly discussed.
Examined through the lens of her high school and family, Prato reveals a small, forgotten cohort shaped as much by Sixteen Candles and Beverly Hills, 90210 , as it was by the Rodney King riots and the threat of nuclear annihilation. Prato is unflinching in asking hard questions about what behavior was then acceptable or overlooked, and how we reconcile those sins today. KIDS IN AMERICA illuminates a generation that is often cited, but rarely examined beyond the gloss of nostalgia.
Examined through the lens of her high school and family, Prato reveals a small, forgotten cohort shaped as much by Sixteen Candles and Beverly Hills, 90210 , as it was by the Rodney King riots and the threat of nuclear annihilation. Prato is unflinching in asking hard questions about what behavior was then acceptable or overlooked, and how we reconcile those sins today. KIDS IN AMERICA illuminates a generation that is often cited, but rarely examined beyond the gloss of nostalgia.
- GenresNonfictionMemoirEssays
210 pages, Paperback
Published June 14, 2022
21 people are currently reading
275 people want to read
About the author
Liz Prato
7 books61 followersLiz Prato is the author of Volcanoes, Palm Trees, and Privilege: Essays on Hawai‘i (Overcup Press), baby's on fire (Press 53), and editor of The Night, and the Rain, and the River: 22 Stories (Forest Avenue Press). Her newest book, Kids in America: Essays on Gen X will be published by SFWP in June 2022.
Liz lives with furry feline friends and her best friend/husband, who is a bookseller, musician, and writer. And, yes, she dreams of palm trees. Every day.
Liz lives with furry feline friends and her best friend/husband, who is a bookseller, musician, and writer. And, yes, she dreams of palm trees. Every day.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 33 reviews
August 9, 2022
It felt like this book couldn't quite decide what it was. It's full of good writing, but I think the project would have been better served with a different title, or different marketing, or different something. I was expecting some kind of overarching commentary about the Gen X cohort, of which I am a young member, or some kind of clear thread connecting the otherwise very different essays that I can only describe as being consistently creative non-fiction. (I also would have appreciated a consistent spelling of "Beverly" in the Beverly Hills 90210 chapter, a few periods that were missing, etc.)
On their own the essays show interesting breadth, but I was just expecting a different kind of connectedness. Instead, I got a connectedness I really did not want when I discovered the author was dealing and using coke (that story was still non-fiction, right?) at the college where we both went to school. (My brain: "Maybe she went to Reed, I hope she went to Reed... DAMMIT!") We attended about a decade apart, I'm guessing, but I am fairly confident we have acquaintances in common.
At any rate, I wouldn't have discovered this book or have read it had it not been for the author event at Annie Bloom's Books in Multnomah Village. Where the author's husband apparently works. It's feeling increasingly awkward to be honest here—but it's not the writing, the writing was grand—I think if the book had been packaged a bit differently it would have been a project more worthy of the writing inside.
Personal highlights: First, an essay that opens with a discussion about Magnum P.I. but transitions into a damning personal tale about reverse mortgages, an issue I am watching my parents struggle with right now. Second, a quirky piece about watching a roller skating competition at Oaks Park, apparently on a Sunday given it's June and the amusement park area sounds as empty and desolate as a tumbleweed-infested ghost town.
On their own the essays show interesting breadth, but I was just expecting a different kind of connectedness. Instead, I got a connectedness I really did not want when I discovered the author was dealing and using coke (that story was still non-fiction, right?) at the college where we both went to school. (My brain: "Maybe she went to Reed, I hope she went to Reed... DAMMIT!") We attended about a decade apart, I'm guessing, but I am fairly confident we have acquaintances in common.
At any rate, I wouldn't have discovered this book or have read it had it not been for the author event at Annie Bloom's Books in Multnomah Village. Where the author's husband apparently works. It's feeling increasingly awkward to be honest here—but it's not the writing, the writing was grand—I think if the book had been packaged a bit differently it would have been a project more worthy of the writing inside.
Personal highlights: First, an essay that opens with a discussion about Magnum P.I. but transitions into a damning personal tale about reverse mortgages, an issue I am watching my parents struggle with right now. Second, a quirky piece about watching a roller skating competition at Oaks Park, apparently on a Sunday given it's June and the amusement park area sounds as empty and desolate as a tumbleweed-infested ghost town.
September 8, 2022
I was born at the very end of the Baby Boomers era -- several years before author, Liz Prato, but everything she wrote feels absolutely familiar and true.
Yes, we were the latch-key generation, the unsupervised generation, the TV generation, the drug abusers, and particularly, we were the girls who were naive about sex, rape, and predators. How disastrously that naivete blossomed throughout our lives.
Prato has written about so many instances that were sexually inappropriate, and it's with such precision that she shows how the 80s-90s informed that. Looking back on that time, and being astonished by what passed for normal and acceptable then, I spent a lot of reading time shaking my head.
Prato absolutely nails this act of wading into the riptide of generation X, and the excavation she reveals is brilliant, indeed.
Yes, we were the latch-key generation, the unsupervised generation, the TV generation, the drug abusers, and particularly, we were the girls who were naive about sex, rape, and predators. How disastrously that naivete blossomed throughout our lives.
Prato has written about so many instances that were sexually inappropriate, and it's with such precision that she shows how the 80s-90s informed that. Looking back on that time, and being astonished by what passed for normal and acceptable then, I spent a lot of reading time shaking my head.
Prato absolutely nails this act of wading into the riptide of generation X, and the excavation she reveals is brilliant, indeed.
November 23, 2021
Liz Prato's Kids in America is a reckoning, a deep look into the smallest, least parented generation. Prato reexamines what we went through, being one of those kids, with humor and sharp observation, balancing the experience with how our views have changed over time. From rape culture and mental illness to a deep dive into Beverly Hills, 90210, Kids in America is an insightful and moving education— essential reading on the slacker generation.
December 16, 2021
Liz Prato writes with clear vision about the generation that followed the Baby Boomers, the generation that today moves into the spaces created by that older generation. This book is a long-overdue examination and reconciliation of the people and the era.
July 13, 2022
The blend of memoir, documentary and thoughtful questioning is Prato’s forte. She did it in her previous essay collection about Hawaii and does it here with Gen X. If you prefer a deeper examination of what made this generation over a simple stroll through nostalgia, you will not be disappointed.
May 29, 2022
A smart and personal collection of essays that will take you to a time whether your are part of GenX or not, you will recognize this time, the truths in this collection. Liz Prato takes us there in a conversational journey with a personal lens and a view to all the things that can shape a generation.
September 16, 2023
This book was read by several of my friends before I got to it and I read their reviews. But it still was not what I was expecting – not really an academic assessment of the world in which Gen X or 80s kids lived and the ramifications in today’s world. Rather, it is a memoir and a reflection on that world by someone who was there, and it captures the universal experiences in ways that were unexpected. Or at least, it reflects the world of 80s kids who were white. There are few minorities in the stories/memories and most of those are arms-length at best encounters. I don't know if that is how others experienced that time period -- I grew up mostly in Utah and the author mostly in Colorado, so our experiences were likely similar as a result -- but that is what it was like for me. There is the impact of the latchkey generation, where we had to fend for ourselves and figure out our world by ourselves with little input or guidance from our elders in ways that were more extreme than today’s generation. That is not an accusation of our parents, only a statement of fact about life as we experienced it.
Some of the darkest discussions in the books deal with the sexual realities of growing up female in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. “Women had forgotten – or blocked or minimized – so many of the sexual transgressions made against us. Then came the 2016 election . . .” That chapter/essay is called Reckoning and deals with looking back on the ways in which we encountered sexual transgressions then and are forced to deal with their echoes now. I do not know a single woman who grew up in that era who doesn’t have at least one story to tell – and sadly, I think that is true for every generation. There is also a whole chapter discussing teachers who sexually abused their students. I balked at using the word “abused” in the preceding sentence because I was thinking of the incident in my own high school where the drama teacher ended up marrying my classmate within a few months of our graduation. But it was abuse and we knew it then and we said it then, although we didn’t use the word “abuse” – but we knew it was not the romantic fairy tale that some people implied in the gossip that went through the school. It was difficult to grasp the wickedness of it, though, when it was an open secret known to all of the adults and those in authority at the school and never acknowledged or addressed. Somehow that fact is an echo of the atmosphere of that entire period of my life.
The chapter entitled Scenes From My Youth encapsulates more clearly than any analysis could the messages that permeated the lives of young women when I was growing up. The echoes are still so profound and I am only in my late 40s and early 50s unlearning some of these lessons. The movies and pop culture icons were clear examples of the way it was. Rocky Balboa is physically aggressive with Adrian, who tries (and fails) to get out of the situation with the politeness we were taught was appropriate for young women. Similar scenes unfold in Meatballs, Sixteen Candles, and St. Elmo’s Fire, with true love simply being a matter of the hero imposing his sexual will on the female lead until she realizes it is what she actually wanted. I never watched any of those movies and was unaware of the repeated message. I knew of, but didn’t personally witness, when Luke and Laura became the greatest love story of a television generation, despite it all starting off with Laura being violently raped by her ‘friend’ Luke, who is ‘going through some stuff.’ (This one particularly resonated for me because I was a devoted watcher of General Hospital in December 1997 when my grandmother was brutally sexually assaulted. In February 1998, Luke and Laura’s son Lucky finds his friend Liz after she has been raped and the unfolding of that story line on GH was like group therapy for me – and the telling of the story included an attempt to come to terms with the 1979 rape of Laura by Luke and its repercussions.) The author does not address the skewed reflection of this message that I recognized from that time period – that if there was a drama series with leading male and female characters, at some point the female would be sexually attacked. See Hunter, Reasonable Doubts, J.A.G. to name 3 series that I was a fan of. Those instances, too, are echoes of the world we lived in as women. Of course, it would be helpful if these storylines were not still quite dominant in pop culture, especially pop culture marketed to women, but it will never change while the industries and interests behind pop culture are controlled by men.
I did not watch Beverly Hills 90210 as a teenager or young adult and until I read the chapter dealing with the show, I had not realized how much it had shaped the world I lived in. But I realized that I knew the names of most of the characters and the actors associated with the show and that it was in many ways an echo not of the world that existed but of the one that we were told existed and raised to believe in. “Which brings us the primary problem with 90210 and many of the issues they tried to tackle: It was a show about Gen X kids, written by late Baby Boomers, and produced by The Greatest Generation. It created a discordance between the stories they wanted to tell, the way they wanted to tell them, and who they were telling them to.” “We watched from our TV screens – something we’d been trained to do since early childhood. . . For better or worse, we’d been condition to learn through watching. But we hadn’t been taught to act.”
This book of essays also captures some of the other uglier aspects of reality that the 1980s liked to pretend never existed. Like terrorism. And drug and alcohol abuse by seemingly everyone around us. And mental illness and neurodivergence that went unrecognized and stigmatized and unaddressed. And, of course, racism. The commentary on racism captures as well as anything else the point of the book, the reckoning with the past and its implications for the future: “It was the fall of 2017 and a racism that apparently been lurking in the shadows was now walking in bright daylight. People of color weren’t as surprised as white liberals. They were like, “Yeah, we know people are unrelentingly racist, you dumb-dumbs.” White liberals were more whiplashed. We assumed that kind of racism only existed in a small number of underground niches that could be contained, like an annoying game of Whack-a-Mole where the prize for winning was a false sense of security.” In many ways I miss the sense of security of those times, but the truth is better and facing it is the best way to build the world we thought we lived in.
Some of the darkest discussions in the books deal with the sexual realities of growing up female in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. “Women had forgotten – or blocked or minimized – so many of the sexual transgressions made against us. Then came the 2016 election . . .” That chapter/essay is called Reckoning and deals with looking back on the ways in which we encountered sexual transgressions then and are forced to deal with their echoes now. I do not know a single woman who grew up in that era who doesn’t have at least one story to tell – and sadly, I think that is true for every generation. There is also a whole chapter discussing teachers who sexually abused their students. I balked at using the word “abused” in the preceding sentence because I was thinking of the incident in my own high school where the drama teacher ended up marrying my classmate within a few months of our graduation. But it was abuse and we knew it then and we said it then, although we didn’t use the word “abuse” – but we knew it was not the romantic fairy tale that some people implied in the gossip that went through the school. It was difficult to grasp the wickedness of it, though, when it was an open secret known to all of the adults and those in authority at the school and never acknowledged or addressed. Somehow that fact is an echo of the atmosphere of that entire period of my life.
The chapter entitled Scenes From My Youth encapsulates more clearly than any analysis could the messages that permeated the lives of young women when I was growing up. The echoes are still so profound and I am only in my late 40s and early 50s unlearning some of these lessons. The movies and pop culture icons were clear examples of the way it was. Rocky Balboa is physically aggressive with Adrian, who tries (and fails) to get out of the situation with the politeness we were taught was appropriate for young women. Similar scenes unfold in Meatballs, Sixteen Candles, and St. Elmo’s Fire, with true love simply being a matter of the hero imposing his sexual will on the female lead until she realizes it is what she actually wanted. I never watched any of those movies and was unaware of the repeated message. I knew of, but didn’t personally witness, when Luke and Laura became the greatest love story of a television generation, despite it all starting off with Laura being violently raped by her ‘friend’ Luke, who is ‘going through some stuff.’ (This one particularly resonated for me because I was a devoted watcher of General Hospital in December 1997 when my grandmother was brutally sexually assaulted. In February 1998, Luke and Laura’s son Lucky finds his friend Liz after she has been raped and the unfolding of that story line on GH was like group therapy for me – and the telling of the story included an attempt to come to terms with the 1979 rape of Laura by Luke and its repercussions.) The author does not address the skewed reflection of this message that I recognized from that time period – that if there was a drama series with leading male and female characters, at some point the female would be sexually attacked. See Hunter, Reasonable Doubts, J.A.G. to name 3 series that I was a fan of. Those instances, too, are echoes of the world we lived in as women. Of course, it would be helpful if these storylines were not still quite dominant in pop culture, especially pop culture marketed to women, but it will never change while the industries and interests behind pop culture are controlled by men.
I did not watch Beverly Hills 90210 as a teenager or young adult and until I read the chapter dealing with the show, I had not realized how much it had shaped the world I lived in. But I realized that I knew the names of most of the characters and the actors associated with the show and that it was in many ways an echo not of the world that existed but of the one that we were told existed and raised to believe in. “Which brings us the primary problem with 90210 and many of the issues they tried to tackle: It was a show about Gen X kids, written by late Baby Boomers, and produced by The Greatest Generation. It created a discordance between the stories they wanted to tell, the way they wanted to tell them, and who they were telling them to.” “We watched from our TV screens – something we’d been trained to do since early childhood. . . For better or worse, we’d been condition to learn through watching. But we hadn’t been taught to act.”
This book of essays also captures some of the other uglier aspects of reality that the 1980s liked to pretend never existed. Like terrorism. And drug and alcohol abuse by seemingly everyone around us. And mental illness and neurodivergence that went unrecognized and stigmatized and unaddressed. And, of course, racism. The commentary on racism captures as well as anything else the point of the book, the reckoning with the past and its implications for the future: “It was the fall of 2017 and a racism that apparently been lurking in the shadows was now walking in bright daylight. People of color weren’t as surprised as white liberals. They were like, “Yeah, we know people are unrelentingly racist, you dumb-dumbs.” White liberals were more whiplashed. We assumed that kind of racism only existed in a small number of underground niches that could be contained, like an annoying game of Whack-a-Mole where the prize for winning was a false sense of security.” In many ways I miss the sense of security of those times, but the truth is better and facing it is the best way to build the world we thought we lived in.
January 6, 2023
This book had a great introduction, but the intro and title seemed a little disjointed from the rest of the book. Even the chapters seemed quite a bit disjointed from each other. As a collection of short articles it was interesting and often very entertaining. There as also a good amount of contemplating with contemporary moral issues. Though that part of trying to determine a good person versus a bad person seems to overlook the human trait that all people have capacity for good and bad actions and weather an individual feeds there better angels or their inner demons is often a product of bigger situational forces, was not a level of depth of this discussion. There was also a whole chapter to Beverly Hills 90210. I am a Gen Xer and never watched a single episode because the show looked stupid. Oddly, I thought the ruminating over this show was amusing and affirmed my decision that the show was garbage. Anyway, lots of weird stuff and being from Portland I enjoy the home town references. Cheers!
October 11, 2022
So, I’m a Gen Xer. Was a latchkey kid. Ignored and minimized a lot of the themes in this book (drug use, sexual assault, etc) but man this is a bleak look. I know she’s trying to draw some conclusions about hey, maybe we should examine some of this stuff more closely, but I just don’t think it worked. Lots and lists and lots of death and dying and depression. I think there may be less negative way to approach these topics which I agree are real and should be examined.
January 6, 2024
Generation X has always been in the shadows. When we were younger, baby boomers grabbed the spotlight and never let go. They still seem to dominate media, business, and politics, especially, politics.
Okay, for a brief moment, sometime in the 1990s, Generation X had a moment to shine. We had grunge, the TV show “Friends,” and that Gap khakis swing commercial. But this moment didn’t last long, and once again, we were in the shadows. Nipping at the heels of our Doc Martens were the more noisy and populous millennials. Raised on Lunchables and participation trophies, millennials wanted to be noticed, and noticed they were. Most of us Gen X-ers went back into the shadows with misty memories of a time when MTV showed actual musical videos. Whatever.
Now for the most, Generation X accepts being ignored, and just goes about doing their thing, whatever that may be. Most of us hate to be defined and we certainly hate to be pigeonholed. No wonder marketers and the workplace ignore us. They just can’t figure us out.
But lately I’ve noticed a lot of Generation X-ers are saying, “Hey, we do exist!” and are creating podcasts, TikTok videos, and Gen X groups on social media. And I think it’s wonderful. Generation X-ers may be hard to figure out, but we have lived unique lives. Maybe it’s time for our stories be heard.
One of those Gen X-ers is writer Liz Prato whose voice should be heard, and she writes about her Generation X experiences in her book Kids in America: A Generation X Reckoning. Kids In America is a very personal collection of essay about coming of age at a particular time (1980s-1990s), and how it affected her as a Gen X-er.
Liz Prato grew up in Denver and graduated from Kent Denver Country Day in 1985, a private prep high school. She admits she grew up with privileges denied others, but that doesn’t mean she hasn’t faced any challenges or strife.
In Kids in America, Prato examines issues that were considered verboten when Gen X-ers were kids and coming of age, and writes about them with more clarity and the wisdom that comes with age. These issues include race, rape and sexual assault, mental health, family strife, and the odd messages we got from the pop culture we consumed.
In two separate chapters Prato relays the stories of two of her former classmates, Mina, who is Native American, and Alicia, who is Black. Years after graduation, Prato reconnects with both women and learns what it was like for both of them to be young women of color at a school most filled with upper class white kids. Though both Mina and Alicia admit they received good educations, they always felt like “other” at Kent Denver County Day.
Prato also examines the issues of rape, sexual assault, and the often murky communication between men and women when it comes to romance and consent. In “Sixteen Candles,” the geek allegedly had sex with a passed out drunk girl who couldn’t give permission, and at the time it was considered just teenage hijinks. And let’s not forget how so many of us swooned when Luke and Laura got married on “General Hospital.” Somehow the fact that Luke raped Laura on the floor of a disco didn’t necessarily put the kibosh on all the romance. We thought it was true love. We thought wrong. Prato also calls out a teacher who groomed, manipulated, and had sex with several of his female students in another chapter.
Mental illness and family strife is also observed in Kids in America. In one heartbreaking chapter, Prato describes in painful detail about her brother’s battles with mental illness. When Gen X was growing up, mental health issues were something whispered about and people rarely got the treatment they needed and deserved. Prato also talks about a friend’s brother getting caught up with a group of racist skinheads. Was he racist himself? Perhaps, but maybe what he was looking for the most was acceptance, which he got from these people. As awful as racist skinheads can be, I think a lot of us can relate to wanting to find a sense of belonging.
But not all essays are totally serious. Prato talks a walk down memory lane when it comes to the iconic TV Show Beverly Hills 90210. For one hour, viewers were immersed in the trials and tribulations of Minnesota transplants, Brandon and Brenda Walsh, and their friends at West Beverly High School. In issues of race, the West Beverly gangs attempts to be “woke” was both cringeworthy and very simple-minded. And the topic of sex was usually handled with double-standards. It was maddening when the Walsh parents gave Brandon an “Atta, boy!” when Brandon lost his virginity to his old Minnesota girlfriend, and how Mom and Pop Walsh branded Brenda a fallen women because she slept with her boyfriend, Dylan. It didn’t matter she was in love with him and they used protection. Brenda Walsh. What a slut!
Perhaps not all of Prato’s essays will totally connect with Gen X readers. A lot of us didn’t go to prep schools, and many never saw an episode of Beverly Hills 90210. But the issues she writes about are probably issues quite a few Gen X-ers have contemplated. Maybe it’s time to have a conversation about these matters.
Originally published at the Book Self:
https://thebookselfblog.wordpress.com...
Okay, for a brief moment, sometime in the 1990s, Generation X had a moment to shine. We had grunge, the TV show “Friends,” and that Gap khakis swing commercial. But this moment didn’t last long, and once again, we were in the shadows. Nipping at the heels of our Doc Martens were the more noisy and populous millennials. Raised on Lunchables and participation trophies, millennials wanted to be noticed, and noticed they were. Most of us Gen X-ers went back into the shadows with misty memories of a time when MTV showed actual musical videos. Whatever.
Now for the most, Generation X accepts being ignored, and just goes about doing their thing, whatever that may be. Most of us hate to be defined and we certainly hate to be pigeonholed. No wonder marketers and the workplace ignore us. They just can’t figure us out.
But lately I’ve noticed a lot of Generation X-ers are saying, “Hey, we do exist!” and are creating podcasts, TikTok videos, and Gen X groups on social media. And I think it’s wonderful. Generation X-ers may be hard to figure out, but we have lived unique lives. Maybe it’s time for our stories be heard.
One of those Gen X-ers is writer Liz Prato whose voice should be heard, and she writes about her Generation X experiences in her book Kids in America: A Generation X Reckoning. Kids In America is a very personal collection of essay about coming of age at a particular time (1980s-1990s), and how it affected her as a Gen X-er.
Liz Prato grew up in Denver and graduated from Kent Denver Country Day in 1985, a private prep high school. She admits she grew up with privileges denied others, but that doesn’t mean she hasn’t faced any challenges or strife.
In Kids in America, Prato examines issues that were considered verboten when Gen X-ers were kids and coming of age, and writes about them with more clarity and the wisdom that comes with age. These issues include race, rape and sexual assault, mental health, family strife, and the odd messages we got from the pop culture we consumed.
In two separate chapters Prato relays the stories of two of her former classmates, Mina, who is Native American, and Alicia, who is Black. Years after graduation, Prato reconnects with both women and learns what it was like for both of them to be young women of color at a school most filled with upper class white kids. Though both Mina and Alicia admit they received good educations, they always felt like “other” at Kent Denver County Day.
Prato also examines the issues of rape, sexual assault, and the often murky communication between men and women when it comes to romance and consent. In “Sixteen Candles,” the geek allegedly had sex with a passed out drunk girl who couldn’t give permission, and at the time it was considered just teenage hijinks. And let’s not forget how so many of us swooned when Luke and Laura got married on “General Hospital.” Somehow the fact that Luke raped Laura on the floor of a disco didn’t necessarily put the kibosh on all the romance. We thought it was true love. We thought wrong. Prato also calls out a teacher who groomed, manipulated, and had sex with several of his female students in another chapter.
Mental illness and family strife is also observed in Kids in America. In one heartbreaking chapter, Prato describes in painful detail about her brother’s battles with mental illness. When Gen X was growing up, mental health issues were something whispered about and people rarely got the treatment they needed and deserved. Prato also talks about a friend’s brother getting caught up with a group of racist skinheads. Was he racist himself? Perhaps, but maybe what he was looking for the most was acceptance, which he got from these people. As awful as racist skinheads can be, I think a lot of us can relate to wanting to find a sense of belonging.
But not all essays are totally serious. Prato talks a walk down memory lane when it comes to the iconic TV Show Beverly Hills 90210. For one hour, viewers were immersed in the trials and tribulations of Minnesota transplants, Brandon and Brenda Walsh, and their friends at West Beverly High School. In issues of race, the West Beverly gangs attempts to be “woke” was both cringeworthy and very simple-minded. And the topic of sex was usually handled with double-standards. It was maddening when the Walsh parents gave Brandon an “Atta, boy!” when Brandon lost his virginity to his old Minnesota girlfriend, and how Mom and Pop Walsh branded Brenda a fallen women because she slept with her boyfriend, Dylan. It didn’t matter she was in love with him and they used protection. Brenda Walsh. What a slut!
Perhaps not all of Prato’s essays will totally connect with Gen X readers. A lot of us didn’t go to prep schools, and many never saw an episode of Beverly Hills 90210. But the issues she writes about are probably issues quite a few Gen X-ers have contemplated. Maybe it’s time to have a conversation about these matters.
Originally published at the Book Self:
https://thebookselfblog.wordpress.com...
June 11, 2022
Wow! This book contains very powerful and thought-provoking essays—each one examining a different serious facet of the age of the Generation Xers. As changes were happening throughout the years, not each of us were equally aware or as immersed in what was happening so I think it personally did me good to have this opportunity to read in depth about these changes.
The essay about Native Americans was gruesome and sad. The essay about date rape was truly something over which to become enraged. The essay about the author Liz’s black friend Alicia whose single mom died while she was in high school had me in tears. The letter to Frederic Lyman, teacher who for years was sexually assaulting his students but never really held accountable, was an exposure of an outrageous situation.
The essay “Change in Altitude” was the story of the author Liz and friends during a break from school and the end of her relationship with her boyfriend Leon. I liked hearing about what eventually happened to her friends later in their lives.
As a hard of hearing Baby Boomer, I never watched Beverly Hill 90210 but I enjoyed and laughed through this author’s description of the TV series and how thoroughly she tore it apart because of what it was and what it was not. Glad I missed the whole thing.
This is a very sharply-written book with so much to talk about in it. I kept having to stop reading (while I was devouring it very quickly) so I could talk to others about its contents. I’ve frequently thought about how hard it would have been for me, shy as a child, to have been born a Generation Xer as opposed to the Baby Boomer I am. I guess all ages have their advantages and disadvantages, but this book helped me understand the Generation Xers in a way that I wouldn’t be able to do in a casual conversation with them. It dealt with some hard issues that I’m not sure l'd feel comfortable discussing with young people I know.
Liz Prato is an excellent writer. In this book, she does incredibly sharp and beautiful essays about tough subjects.
I found the essay “Flights of Two” very different in tone from all other essays in this book. However just one line made me laugh out loud and love it. The line was...”The word of Robert’s disqualification spread quickly, whispered about in the bleachers and in the bathrooms and by the potato salad.”
I found the last essay the most powerful one in the book. It gave me chills as I started to read it and left me in tears. Rather than tell you what it’s about, I’ll tell you it’s title: “Falling Off Radar”. Now you go read it. Read the whole book and leave this story for last, though.
The essay about Native Americans was gruesome and sad. The essay about date rape was truly something over which to become enraged. The essay about the author Liz’s black friend Alicia whose single mom died while she was in high school had me in tears. The letter to Frederic Lyman, teacher who for years was sexually assaulting his students but never really held accountable, was an exposure of an outrageous situation.
The essay “Change in Altitude” was the story of the author Liz and friends during a break from school and the end of her relationship with her boyfriend Leon. I liked hearing about what eventually happened to her friends later in their lives.
As a hard of hearing Baby Boomer, I never watched Beverly Hill 90210 but I enjoyed and laughed through this author’s description of the TV series and how thoroughly she tore it apart because of what it was and what it was not. Glad I missed the whole thing.
This is a very sharply-written book with so much to talk about in it. I kept having to stop reading (while I was devouring it very quickly) so I could talk to others about its contents. I’ve frequently thought about how hard it would have been for me, shy as a child, to have been born a Generation Xer as opposed to the Baby Boomer I am. I guess all ages have their advantages and disadvantages, but this book helped me understand the Generation Xers in a way that I wouldn’t be able to do in a casual conversation with them. It dealt with some hard issues that I’m not sure l'd feel comfortable discussing with young people I know.
Liz Prato is an excellent writer. In this book, she does incredibly sharp and beautiful essays about tough subjects.
I found the essay “Flights of Two” very different in tone from all other essays in this book. However just one line made me laugh out loud and love it. The line was...”The word of Robert’s disqualification spread quickly, whispered about in the bleachers and in the bathrooms and by the potato salad.”
I found the last essay the most powerful one in the book. It gave me chills as I started to read it and left me in tears. Rather than tell you what it’s about, I’ll tell you it’s title: “Falling Off Radar”. Now you go read it. Read the whole book and leave this story for last, though.
July 25, 2022
Somehow, after reading the blurb on the back cover, I formed an expectation that this was a broad overview of Gen X, and I was curious about how well I would fit into that overview. But after reading this book, which is a collection of essays rather than a single narrative, it was not quite what I was expecting. But that isn't a bad thing.
So, what exactly is this book? Really, it is a call to reckoning for Gen X members. It is a reflection, from the author's own experiences and those of her peers, of our attitudes about a number of issues and the influences that framed those attitudes. From race relations to sexual assault, it is disturbing to look back and realize how casually we dismissed these issues, or worse, were simply blind to their existence. I found myself cringing at the memories that surfaced while I was reading this. In particular, my personal blind spot was the sexual abuse that was occurring to some of my peers in my Catholic high school while I was there. While I was never a victim myself, I can't help wondering how I could have been so completely oblivious to what was happening to people I considered friends.
I have never fully understood the stereotypes that are commonly applied to my generation. Certainly, I never felt that they applied to my friends. But after reading this book, I do have to admit that self-absorption might well be a label that fits for me and many of my friends. We were so focused on ourselves and our "problems" that we were blind to the bigger issues around us. I can only hope that we have matured beyond that and are now more fully involved in recognizing and addressing the injustices around us.
So, what exactly is this book? Really, it is a call to reckoning for Gen X members. It is a reflection, from the author's own experiences and those of her peers, of our attitudes about a number of issues and the influences that framed those attitudes. From race relations to sexual assault, it is disturbing to look back and realize how casually we dismissed these issues, or worse, were simply blind to their existence. I found myself cringing at the memories that surfaced while I was reading this. In particular, my personal blind spot was the sexual abuse that was occurring to some of my peers in my Catholic high school while I was there. While I was never a victim myself, I can't help wondering how I could have been so completely oblivious to what was happening to people I considered friends.
I have never fully understood the stereotypes that are commonly applied to my generation. Certainly, I never felt that they applied to my friends. But after reading this book, I do have to admit that self-absorption might well be a label that fits for me and many of my friends. We were so focused on ourselves and our "problems" that we were blind to the bigger issues around us. I can only hope that we have matured beyond that and are now more fully involved in recognizing and addressing the injustices around us.
August 4, 2022
The title of Liz Prato's collection of essays got me humming the Kim Wilde song. "We're the kids in America. (Woah.) Everybody live for the music-go-round." I was expecting a light-hearted trip down memory lane, and some nostaglia was delivered, but mostly, I was left thinking about the reckoning.
How are the times in which a person lives reflected in their own experiences? It's a great lens to view a personal essay collection. It got me thinking about my own time.
Prato's capable and straight-forward writing interweaves essays about her struggles in youth with cultural critiques and interviews with classmates. There are deep dives into latchkey kids, Beverly Hills 90210, the Rodney King beatings, and rape via 90s pop culture. One essay is written in the form of a letter to a teacher who was a sexual predator. It's powerful and heartbreaking. This is an interesting style for an essay collection. It held my attention.
After I'd finished the book, I went online and read the lyrics to the song Kids In America. Without the upbeat dance music, it's just: "You know life is cruel. Life is never kind. Kind hearts don't make a new story. Kind hearts don't grab any glory." By offering the space for her classmates to share the truth of their experiences, Liz Prato gives them a kindness they might not have received. The kindness to make a new story. She does this for herself, also.
There is much to be faced here, and though some is left unresolved, like in real life, the author reckons with her past and finds a way to move forward.
How are the times in which a person lives reflected in their own experiences? It's a great lens to view a personal essay collection. It got me thinking about my own time.
Prato's capable and straight-forward writing interweaves essays about her struggles in youth with cultural critiques and interviews with classmates. There are deep dives into latchkey kids, Beverly Hills 90210, the Rodney King beatings, and rape via 90s pop culture. One essay is written in the form of a letter to a teacher who was a sexual predator. It's powerful and heartbreaking. This is an interesting style for an essay collection. It held my attention.
After I'd finished the book, I went online and read the lyrics to the song Kids In America. Without the upbeat dance music, it's just: "You know life is cruel. Life is never kind. Kind hearts don't make a new story. Kind hearts don't grab any glory." By offering the space for her classmates to share the truth of their experiences, Liz Prato gives them a kindness they might not have received. The kindness to make a new story. She does this for herself, also.
There is much to be faced here, and though some is left unresolved, like in real life, the author reckons with her past and finds a way to move forward.
June 19, 2022
I devoured this book from beginning to end, and I just loved it. It is a book of essays; essays that overlap, with ongoing themes. As a Gen X-er myself, this was all totally relatable. Every last essay was 100% relatable.
Here is what I learned from reading this: as we Gen X-ers look back on our lives with great nostalgia about the 80’s, 90’s; the fashion, the music, the TV, the fact of the matter is, we’ve been exposed to, and have gone through some heavy shit! Magnum PI and Madonna, against a backdrop of nuclear war threats and drug abuse. Themes that are discussed in this collection include date rape, racism, mental health, weird cultural appropriation that seems so bizarre now, and some of the troublesome themes that were widely accepted in mainstream media. We consumed a LOT of Tv, a lot of music and movies. We loved it, but some of it just didn’t age well, lol!!
Partially autobiographical, part social commentary, part nostalgia, and all awesome. Liz Prato is a great writer, who has produced a thought provoking, interesting, fun and important book, which I loved reading.
Here is what I learned from reading this: as we Gen X-ers look back on our lives with great nostalgia about the 80’s, 90’s; the fashion, the music, the TV, the fact of the matter is, we’ve been exposed to, and have gone through some heavy shit! Magnum PI and Madonna, against a backdrop of nuclear war threats and drug abuse. Themes that are discussed in this collection include date rape, racism, mental health, weird cultural appropriation that seems so bizarre now, and some of the troublesome themes that were widely accepted in mainstream media. We consumed a LOT of Tv, a lot of music and movies. We loved it, but some of it just didn’t age well, lol!!
Partially autobiographical, part social commentary, part nostalgia, and all awesome. Liz Prato is a great writer, who has produced a thought provoking, interesting, fun and important book, which I loved reading.
December 4, 2024
Reading Prato’s excellent essays is like stepping into a way-back machine and, if you’re Gen X like me, revisiting your high school / college days. Luke and Laura! Magnum! Cocaine! That teacher sleeps with his students! Not to mention the everyday, casually-pervasive racism and sexism. And let’s not forget the “date” rape. Yes, many of these things are with us today, but in the pre-internet / pre-cell phone / pre-consent days of yore they felt—at least to me—more persistently woven into the fabric of young adult life. Highly recommend for Gen-Xers interested in a smart take on the culture and mores that shaped our youth. And also for Millennials and Gen Zers interested in understanding why their parents are like that.
August 24, 2025
Liz Prato cuts through the rose-colored nostalgia and provides a thought-provoking reflection of how what once felt "normal" to Generation X was, in reality, an ecosystem of shared trauma and personal tragedies that polite society in the 1980s just did not want to talk about. Deeply personal but universal in its insights, "kids in america" explores the lasting impact that rape culture, racism and terrorism had on millions of young adults 40, 45 years ago. Back then we called it "the evening news." Today, Prato reminds us, it was kind of an upsetting shit-show. Still, we had our music, our friends and our drugs to help us though. A really powerful read. The extended "90201" essay and the reminder that Luke actually raped Laura on "General Hospital" is worth the price of admission alone.
June 12, 2024
I’m not sure this collection of essays is what I expected based on the cover—an examination of Gen X youth via the pop culture of the time—but it is an often harrowing and always relatable reckoning with the past and how it echoes in the present. As an elder millennial whose older brother was basically the same age as the author, the cultural touch points were very familiar and made the autobiographical sections hit hard. If I can be so crass as to twist the book into the thing I was initially expecting, Jim Carroll’s Gen X punk tribute to fallen friends, “People Who Died,” played in my head more and more as the book went on. They were all our friends, and they died. And we keep going.
November 12, 2022
Interesting, thought-provoking collection of essays
I read this book for a gathering (we’re refusing to call it a book club), and I’m very glad I did. I felt an immediate connection to the topic, and the early coming of age essays take place in my hometown. I really appreciated the linking between the growing reliance starting in our generation on TV, and the linking between entertainment content and real life issues like rape culture. It’s not necessarily an easy read with regard to the content to digest, but it is a very good one.
I read this book for a gathering (we’re refusing to call it a book club), and I’m very glad I did. I felt an immediate connection to the topic, and the early coming of age essays take place in my hometown. I really appreciated the linking between the growing reliance starting in our generation on TV, and the linking between entertainment content and real life issues like rape culture. It’s not necessarily an easy read with regard to the content to digest, but it is a very good one.
November 11, 2022
Remarkable, personal, and universal
This is the kind of book you read and then immediately need to find someone else who has read it because you *have* to talk about it now. I’ve already had multiple conversations with
multiple friends about it and I’m pretty sure we’ll need a happy hour to round it out. The writing is exceptional, and Liz Prato’s ability to tell deeply personal stories in ways that speak to the experiences of a generation are a testament to her dedication to the craft. Highly, highly recommended.
This is the kind of book you read and then immediately need to find someone else who has read it because you *have* to talk about it now. I’ve already had multiple conversations with
multiple friends about it and I’m pretty sure we’ll need a happy hour to round it out. The writing is exceptional, and Liz Prato’s ability to tell deeply personal stories in ways that speak to the experiences of a generation are a testament to her dedication to the craft. Highly, highly recommended.
November 15, 2022
Hits extremely close to home, to the point of feeling that finally someone else put into words and published some of my own experiences. The first essay, which was also sent to the Oldster Substack, is one of the most gorgeous pieces of writing I've read in a long time, capturing what it felt and feels like to be the first and last generation of so much. Another essay calls out sexual predators in private high schools, naming several teachers, including those that I grew up with at a tiny private school in Portland. Again and again, it was a constant feeling of being understood.
October 8, 2022
One of the most thought-provoking, well-written essay collections I’ve read in a long time. “We are the first generation in modern history to make less money than our parents” to “We are the last generation to live without fear of being gunned down in school”—this is a deep dive examination into how life shaped the attitudes and choices of Gen X. A fascinating, compelling, and essential book.
November 17, 2022
I loved this series of essays so much. I don’t think you need to be Gen X to appreciate the topics, but it does piece together a very particular place and time in America, and paints a picture of why our tiny generation of “slackers” is who we are today.
January 14, 2024
This book popped around like a pinball game, but what I understand more about Gen X is that there were many things we didn't know, didn't understand. Help wasn't available and we survived - imperfectly.
It was worth the read and gives a lot to ponder.
It was worth the read and gives a lot to ponder.
September 20, 2022
This Gen-Xer loved it, but anyone will appreciate Liz Prato's incisive, beautifully written, heartfelt essay collection.
Full review TK
Full review TK
October 9, 2022
Startling in places, dorky in others; fully realizing the 1980s without the trash. Or with the trash you love.
October 17, 2022
Not what I expected from the synopsis.
March 2, 2023
Not quite what I expected but okay.
August 12, 2023
Very interesting and enjoyable.
June 14, 2022
Undertaking some daunting topics, Liz Prato writes poetically and at times songlike (especially seen in “Long and Thin” from Part II) as she unearths a generation that deserves to be remembered, while educating the world on the parts where they failed to avoid being repeated, in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, the next generation won’t have to live through some of these things.
This essay collection also made me teary eyed at several times, and that's not something a lot of books do to me.
This essay collection also made me teary eyed at several times, and that's not something a lot of books do to me.
June 14, 2022
Liz Prato is one of my favorite essayists, and this Gen X collection is a testament to her unflinching honesty, literary craft, and her ability to move fluidly between the impact of pop culture hits and intense subjects such as date rape and racism. The essays brought me back to my teen years, to all the things left unsaid, all the things that were part of a bigger cultural movement but felt intensely personal.
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