Rebel Book Club Manchester x Distracted

Welcome to the RBC Manchester event, where we'll be diving into January's theme, DISTRACTED, through this month's read, "Stolen Focus: Why We Can't Pay Attention", by Johann Hari

“A brilliant book about one of the most important topics of our time” - Dr Rangan Chatterjee

“A beautifully researched and argued exploration of the breakdown of humankind's ability to pay attention” - Stephen Fry

Inspired by our monthly non-fiction reads, our mix of part cocktail party, part creative classroom is a recipe that builds your reading habit while connecting with like minded people.

Delicious drinks are included, as well as engaging storytelling and space for conversations and sharing your own journeys across countries and continents.

Try out the club with Eventbrite - new customers only. Ticket price includes access to the Manchester Rebel Book Club event plus a welcome drink (alcoholic + non-alcoholic options available).

Omar Latif

Omar is the founder of an AI startup and also pursuing a PhD in Behavioural AI. One big reason Omar joined RBC is to get away from academic literature, gain knowledge in areas outside of his interests and to have engaging conversations with the awesome community.

There is a clear alliance with the philosophy and taste of RBC as Omar has already read 70% of the books from the Rebel Book Club library!

We think our inability to focus is a personal failing—a flaw in each one of us. It is not. This has been done to all of us by powerful external forces. Our attention has been hijacked. The author interviewed leading experts on attention and learned that everything we think about this subject is wrong. He discovered there are 12 deep cases of this crisis, all of which have robbed some of our attention. He shows us how in a thrilling journey that ranges from Silicon Valley dissidents, to a favela in Rio where attention vanished, to an office in New Zealand that found a remarkable way to restore our attention.

Crucially, he learned how we can get our focus back, if we are determined to fight for it.

Host or Publisher Rebel Book Club