Is this you? As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.
Claim your profile
Articles by Ben Singleton
"Klara and the Sun"
One would expect that a story told from the perspective of a robot would be dull and lifeless, but that is not so in Kazuo Ishiguro’s “Klara and the Sun.” In fact, the book is often full of life and heartbreaking. The story’s narrator, Klara, is a solar-powered android — or “AF,” for artificial friend — who is tasked with being a companion to a family. We meet Klara in a retail shop for AFs. There, she and the other AFs eagerly wait to be picked by a child to be a new friend.
The Book Breakdown: The history of work
“No arts; no letters; no society; and which is worse of all, continual fear and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” That is how the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes described our earliest ancestors in their “state of nature” in his 1651 work “Leviathan.” This pessimistic view of human nature and the trade offs necessary to overcome it and enter into a social contract have been expressed elsewhere.
The Book Breakdown: Little ditty about Jack and Della
You don’t know “Jack.” Or you don’t at first. Marilynne Robinson’s newest book tells the story of the courtship of Jack Boughton and Della Miles in 1950s St. Louis. There’s one giant snag in their relationship – it’s illegal. Jack is white and Della is Black. Both are children of preachers, but while Jack has fallen away from the straight and narrow path, Della has stayed on it.
The Book Breakdown: The 1,000-page novel that's mostly one sentence
Most of “Ducks, Newburyport” is only one sentence. However, fans of brevity will be disappointed – the work is more than 1,000 pages long. Lucy Ellmann’s 2019 novel is an encyclopedic stream-of-conscious narrative inside the head of a middle-aged married mother of four living in Newcomerstown, Ohio. The unnamed narrator is an adjunct history professor from the fictional Peolia College. Since she has been in remission from cancer she has been on leave from her job.
The Book Breakdown: Nature and nurture
We are more complex than we realize. Or at least neuroscientist David Eagleman thinks so. In “Livewired: The Inside Story of Our Everchanging Brain,” Eagleman hammers home one overarching message: “Our machinery isn’t preprogrammed, but instead shapes itself by interacting with the world.” We humans, unlike most other mammals, are extremely helpless the first few years of our lives. When a foal is born, it doesn’t require a whole lot more development to become a horse.
The Book Breakdown: The history of the cigarette
One of America’s most popular products over the last century gets a biography in Sarah Milov’s “The Cigarette: A Political History.” What one finds in Milov’s book is almost a bell curve in Americans’ cigarette usage through the 20th century. Just over 100 years ago, not many Americans smoked cigarettes, accounting for only 7 percent of tobacco consumption in 1914.
The Book Breakdown: 'Alice Knott' will leave you tied up
“From where Alice sits, after all, nothing has changed: the walls are still walls … no one and nothing but her inside herself again, alone.” After months of quarantine, too many people can relate to the feelings of the eponymous character in Blake Butler’s novel “Alice Knott,” published in July.
The Book Breakdown: A Don Quixote for today
“Don Quixote” gets an update in Salman Rushdie’s “Quichotte.” But instead of chivalric romances that obsess the protagonist, it’s mindless television. Instead of the heroic exploits of Amadis of Gaul taken as the hero’s guide, Rushdie’s modern-day Quixote, Quichotte, recites various seasons of “The Bachelor.” Quichotte is a 70-year-old traveling salesman for a fentanyl spray company who, due to the lonely and transient nature of his job, consumes way too much television in motels.
The Book Breakdown: Meaning is found in the struggle in Michel Houellebecq’s ‘Serotonin’
“It isn’t the future but the past that kills you, that comes back to torment and undermine you.” So goes one of the many melancholic reflections of Florent-Claude Labrouste in Michel Houellebecq’s 2019 novel “Serotonin.” Labrouste is definitely haunted by his past. He is a middle aged, depressed agricultural scientist living in Paris with his wife half his age, Yuzu, who is promiscuous and shows little interest in him.
The Book Breakdown: 'The Fire Next Time'
By Ben Singleton “To accept one’s past — one’s history — is not the same thing as drowning in it; it is learning how to use it.” This quote is among the many outstanding observations in James Baldwin’s seminal text “The Fire Next Time.” And while it’s possible to drown in Baldwin’s righteous indictment of race relations in America, the goal of the text is to learn and grow from history. The book, first published in 1963, comprises two essays – a short one and a long one.
The Book Breakdown: Divisions and connections
“It was the worst of times, it was the worst of times.” A beginning many people can relate to right now. The twist off of Dickens’ famous lines from his strife-torn novel is the opener of Ali Smith’s 2016 “Autumn.” Set in an England straight off the results of Brexit, the work is an exploration of divisions. Floating throughout the work are snippets of fevered arguments on the BBC, neighbors posting inflammatory signs in their yards, people rejoicing and people who feel dejected.
"Station Eleven" shows what remains constant
By Ben Singleton Some books are seeing a second life as many people remain cooped up indoors. Among these is “Station Eleven” by Emily St. John Mandel. Published in 2014 and slated to be an HBO Max series this year or in 2021, the book has experienced a revival among readers due to its subject matter. “Station Eleven” tells the story of characters coping with the aftermath of the Georgia Flu, a vicious type of SARS.
The past is present
History is alive and felt in Margaret Wilkerson Sexton’s “The Revisioners.” The novel tells the story of two African-American women, Ava and her ancestor Josephine. It takes place in three distinct periods. Ava navigates moving her son, King, to a new school while taking care of her ailing white grandmother, Martha, in 2017. While Ava’s new job of caring for Martha is a step up financially, she has to endure racist slights from her grandmother while performing her job.
The Book Breakdown: A review of Margaret Wilkerson Sexton’s “The Revisioners"
History is alive and felt in Margaret Wilkerson Sexton’s “The Revisioners.” The novel tells the story of two African-American women, Ava and her ancestor Josephine. It takes place in three distinct periods. Ava navigates moving her son, King, to a new school while taking care of her ailing white grandmother, Martha, in 2017. While Ava’s new job of caring for Martha is a step up financially, she has to endure racist slights from her grandmother while performing her job.
The Book Breakdown: Thought in Action
Jonathan Rée has written a different kind of book with “Witcraft: The Invention of Philosophy into English.” The work is unique as a history of philosophy because Rée takes the intellectual contributions of the many people he chronicles and places it as major biographical drama. We’re introduced to the ideas of G.E. Moore and Bertrand Russell by how much they stung William James. “James managed to like nearly everyone, but Russell and Moore defeated him.
The Book Breakdown: “The Ghost Clause” tells how to hold on — and let go
There are no spooks in Howard Norman’s “The Ghost Clause.” The prolific writer’s latest novel turns the genre of the ghost story on its head – the point of view is the ghost himself. Absent are the eerie, creaking floorboards and slamming doors made by some malevolent spirit frightening recent homeowners. Rather, what takes up the story are the often comical reflections of the novel’s protagonist, Simon Insecort.
The Book Breakdown: Memoir tells story of schizophrenia
Marin Sardy’s “The Edge of Every Day: Sketches of Schizophrenia” is a gripping family memoir of coping with severe mental illness. The debut book from the author recounts her childhood in Anchorage, Alaska, where her mother succumbed to schizophrenia. The anecdotes of Sardy’s mother’s delusions are scattered snapshots of paranoia and abnormal behavior, replicating the drifting and inconsistent nature of the mother’s illness and lifestyle.
The Book Breakdown: Fits and starts - the beginnings of modern science
At a 1661 meeting in London, Sir Robert Southwell was said to have produced something remarkable: the horn of a unicorn. The attendees drew a circle with the powder made from the horn and placed a spider in the middle. The arachnid quickly scurried away. Such were the experiments carried out by the oldest scientific society in the world, the Royal Society of London. The organization has counted as its members Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking and nearly 300 Nobel laureates.
Book Breakdown: The weight of care
The weight of caring is great in Lila Savage’s “Say Say Say.” The debut novel tells the story of a young caregiver, Ella. She helps a married couple, Jill and Bryn, each around the age of 60. Jill suffered from a car accident several years before that has left her with brain damage that is getting worse. She can barely speak or perform simple tasks and we’re unsure if she even recognizes her husband.
Finding the soul of wit
By Ben Singleton bsingleton@newspost.com James Geary’s “Wit’s End: What Wit Is, How It Works and Why We Need It” is a multifaceted work that explores an ill-defined but instantly recognizable subject.
From Puritans to postmodernists: The ideas that made America
Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen’s short book, “The Ideas That Made America: A Brief History” is a broad, if short, survey of the major intellectual currents that have shaped the ideas of American academics. While Ratner-Rosenhagen traces the genealogy of such ideologies from transcendentalism to pragmatism to postmodernism, her work is an intellectual history instead of a work of sociology.
A "Lot" to say about Houston - and its people
Bryan Washington’s debut collection of short stories, “Lot,” is arguably just as much about Houston as the variety of characters that populate this book. All of the stories take place in the city and Washington writes with a Joycean familiarity of his hometown that is captivating. Poverty, romance, not-so-romantic flings and the struggles and effects of racism and homophobia are unflinchingly told in this collection by the various residents of Houston.
The Book Breakdown: The history of walls
In today’s increasingly tribal political environment, it would seem tempting for even the most fair-minded historian to literally dig around and unearth some artifact that can be turned into a polemic.
Celtic festival aims to help veterans
Expect to see people clad in kilts, chowing down on haggis, cranking up bagpipes and competing in traditional Scottish Highland games this weekend at the annual Mid-Maryland Celtic Festival in Mount Airy.“It’s a way to enjoy Scotland and Celtic culture without the air travel,” said Kathryn Darling, an organizer for the event who originally hails from Scotland.Children under 12 years old are admitted to the festival for free, and activities cater to all ages.The festivities will be held May...
Show More
loading
Actions
Is this you?
As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.Get in touch with Ben
Contact Ben, search articles and posts on X, monitor coverage, and track replies from one place.
Learn more about Muck Rack