The Singularity, Balsam Karam
The Singularity, Balsam Karam
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The Singularity

Author: Balsam Karam, Saskia Vogel

Narrator: Mara Wilson

Unabridged: 3 hr 24 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 03/26/2024

Synopsis

In an unnamed coastal city filled with refugees, the mother of a displaced family calls out her daughter’s name as she wanders the cliffside road where the child once worked. The mother searches and searches until, spent from grief, she throws herself into the sea, leaving her other children behind. Bearing witness to the suicide is another woman—on a business trip, with a swollen belly that later gives birth to a stillborn baby. In the wake of her pain, the second woman remembers other losses—of a language, a country, an identity—when once, her family fled a distant war. Balsam Karam weaves between both narratives in this formally ambitious novel and offers a fresh approach to language and aesthetic as she decenters a white European gaze. Her English-language debut, The Singularity is a powerful exploration of loss, history, and memory—an experience akin to “drinking directly from a flood of tears” (Aftonbladet).

About Balsam Karam

Balsam Karam (b. 1983) is of Kurdish ancestry and has lived in Sweden since she was a young child. She is an author, librarian, and university lecturer, and made her literary debut in 2018 with the critically acclaimed Event Horizon, which was shortlisted for the Katapult Prize. The Singularity was shortlisted for the August Prize and is her second novel, published in Sweden in 2021.

About Saskia Vogel

Saskia Vogel is the author of Permission and the translator of over twenty Swedish-language books. She was awarded the Berlin Senate Endowment for Non-German Literature and was a finalist for the PEN Translation Prize. She worked on The Singularity as part of her translation residency at Princeton University. From Los Angeles, she now lives in Berlin.

About Mara Wilson

Mara Wilson is a professional writer, playwright, actor, narrator, and storyteller best known for her roles in Mrs. Doubtfire, Miracle on 34th Street, and Matilda. A graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, she regularly appears at live storytelling and comedy shows, including her own, What Are You Afraid Of?. A voice actor on the podcast Welcome to Night Vale, she maintains a blog, MaraWilsonWritesStuff.com, and her writing can be found on sites such as Jezebel, The Toast, and McSweeney’s.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Robert on August 13, 2024

The Singularity tells the story of one man’s journey through the multitude of universes, only to watch them die. It’s also part of a multimedia endeavor by noted TV/movie composer, Bear McCreary. There is a soundtrack that you can listen to that is pretty good. The graphic novel itself is written fa......more

Goodreads review by Aquila on August 29, 2024

Thank you to NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read The Singularity by Mat Groom in exchange for my honest feedback. Blue Eyes has a difficult journey through grief and loss to understanding and acceptance. He travels through countless worlds and lifetimes, trying to find answers about who h......more

Goodreads review by Peter on August 12, 2024

So this is the official graphic novel to accompany a concept album composed by Bear McCreary with a myriad of collaborators, many of whom lean towards the hard metal scene. If there is a coherent throughline here, it's some chugging riffage. Some of these are in different languages, some are retelli......more

Goodreads review by Soph ♡ on July 06, 2024

The artwork of this graphic novel was absolutely STUNNING. As for the story honestly I did struggle to get into it at first but ended up really enjoying it and was surprised by how touching it ended up being. Thank you so much to Netgalley for the ARC.......more

Goodreads review by Shane on December 27, 2024

Listening to the companion album as you read really enhances this experience. At first I found it a little hard to concentrate on the reading when the music had lyrics, but as I settled into the book, it became less of an issue. I really loved the sections where you could read and listen to a monolo......more

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