The Atmospherians

A Novel

By: Isle McElroy

Narrated by: Emily Tremaine

Best Book of 2021 by Esquire
Book You Need to Read in 2021 byHarper’​s Bazaar

“Darkly funny and glitteringly satirical, The Atmospherians unforgettably takes aim at wokeness, wellness, and toxic masculinity.” —Esquire

This “edgy, addictive” (Kirkus Reviews, starred) satire about two best friends who form The Atmosphere—a cult designed to reform problematic men—is “a book to be devoured” (Vanity Fair).

Sasha Marcus was once the epitome of contemporary success: an internet sensation, social media darling, and a creator of a high-profile wellness brand for women. But a confrontation with an abusive troll has taken a horrifying turn, and now she’s at rock bottom: canceled and doxxed online, isolated in her apartment while men’s rights protestors rage outside.

Sasha confides in her oldest childhood friend, Dyson—a failed actor with a history of body issues—who hatches a plan for her to restore her reputation by becoming the face of his new business venture, The Atmosphere: a rehabilitation community for men. Based in an abandoned summer camp and billed as a workshop for job training, it is actually a rigorous program designed to rid men of their toxic masculinity. Sasha has little choice but to accept. But what horrors await her as the resident female leader of a crew of washed up, desperate men? And what exactly does Dyson want?

Explosive, dazzling, and wickedly funny, The Atmospherians is “a book written with this exact cultural moment in mind” (Oprah Daily).

wow !

the narrator was great and the story was unique , interesting, and dare I say artistic !

I couldn’t finish it.

Got 3 chapters in and the narrator’s reading became unbearable. It sounded like a kid reading their book report. It was a shaping up to be a good story. Maybe worth a read instead.

The Grievancers would be a better title

The word that keeps ringing around my head after 10+ hours of listening I won't get back is "tedious." Atmospherians thinks it has a lot to say but ends up saying nothing. The characters are wooden and awful, but can't even bother being an interesting kind of awful. I don't care about what happens to any of them, especially when the book veers into lengthy flashbacks that accomplish, and tell you, absolutely nothing other than to reinforce how tediously awful everyone is. I picked this book thinking it would be an interesting takedown of toxic masculinity and ended up with a story, by its own admission, about cults. Why cults? I have no idea. The book doesn't earn any of the control exerted over the members of the cult. It doesn't earn any of the massive amounts of telling it uses with little if any showing. The description promises a look into toxic masculinity but ends up just making the base, unchallenged assumption that absolutely all men, without exception, are awful, are to be feared and tricked and avoided.