Ben Brabyn: Entrepreneur and Community Builder

Robert B. Marks, "Deep Time in the Mono Lake Basin: Nature and History Over the Last 10,000 Years" (U California Press, 2026)

"Deep Time," a way of understanding the distant past popularized in the late 20th century by the writer John McPhee, changes our perspective on history. When looked at in the context of tectonic movements long-term climate shifts, human affairs can seem small, even insignificant. However, in Deep Time in the Mono Lake Basin: Nature and History Over the Last 10,000 Years [https://bookshop.org/a/12343/9780520428577] (U California Press, 2026), Whittier College professor emeritus Bob Marks explains that people still matter, even within the long sweep of deep time. Rather than shrink human affairs down to nothing, deep time helps us contextualize the places where humans live, die, build societies, and destroy one another. Geology, hydrology, and climate change (anthropogenic and otherwise) are all part of the human story, and vice versa, in Marks' telling. The Mono Lake Basin, as a fragile and unforgiving environment that has been peopled for many centuries, is a perfect place to tell this story of environmental change, environmental degredation and, ultimately, hopeful ecoloigical restoration. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices] Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network [https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network]

Kristian Williams, "Policing the Progressive City: Portland, Oregon, from Settlement to Uprising" (AK Press, 2026)

Kristian Williams, longtime activist and writer, joins Michael Stauch to discuss his new book Policing the Progressive City: Portland, Oregon, from Settlement to Uprising" [https://bookshop.org/a/12343/9781849354288] (AK Press, 2026) about police reform in Portland. Billed as perhaps the nation’s most “progressive” city, Williams explores how “law and order” in Portland has been shaped for over two hundred years by business interests, political climbers, and social campaigners — as well as its history of mass resistance to police brutality. Highlights include: * The contrast between image and reality in Portland’s history of policing; * Portland’s role as an experimental site of police reform in the 20th century; * When community policing arrived in Portland and how it shaped the city’s progressive image; * How the city’s history of activism against both police brutality and fascism influenced events during the George Floyd Summer in 2020. Guest: Kristian Williams has been writing about and organizing against the police since the mid 1990s. He is the author of seven books, including Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power in America, and lives in Portland, Oregon. Host: Michael Stauch [https://www.michaelstauch.com/] is an associate professor of history at the University of Toledo and the author of Wildcat of the Streets: Detroit in the Age of Community Policing [https://www.pennpress.org/9781512827996/wildcat-of-the-streets/], published by the University of Pennsylvania Press in 2025. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices] Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network [https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network]

Joshua Comaroff, "Spectropolis: The Enchantment of Capital in Singapore" (U Minnesota Press, 2025)

In Singapore, the financial center of Southeast Asia, hyperurbanization and commercial development exist alongside enduring belief in the economic power of ghosts: in their ability to control the flows of money and value and to determine the outcome of investments and wagers. Spectropolis: The Enchantment of Capital in Singapore [https://bookshop.org/a/12343/9781517919344] (U Minnesota Press, 2025) explores the unlikely collusion of these two systems, demonstrating both the productive role of popular beliefs in the modern world and the surprising correlations between “late” capitalism and the workings of the spirit realm. Detailing the logic and practices of Singapore’s ghost economy—from performing exorcisms on real estate development sites to offering money and commodities to the dead as a hedge against precarious real-world transactions—Joshua Comaroff shows how speculative finance, largely governed by chance and volatility, is understood via its inherently spectral qualities. Based on detailed case studies and years of extensive fieldwork, Spectropolis argues for the power of popular belief systems to theorize contemporary socioeconomic conditions and to give form to collective affect as well as shared aspirations and anxieties, often in deeply hopeful, horizontal and empowering ways. Joshua Comaroff is the assistant professor of architecture at the National University of Singapore. He is coauthor of Horror in Architecture: The Reanimated Edition (Minnesota, 2024). Alyssa Kee recently finished graduate studies at the University of Vienna. Her research interests lie in urban geography, multispecies ecologies, and urban food assemblages. She is currently in the field of Geographical Education. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices] Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network [https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network]

Ben Brabyn: Entrepreneur and Community Builder

This episode of the New Books Network’s Entrepreneurship and Leadership channel features Richard Lucas in conversation with entrepreneur and community builder Ben Brabyn about Walkabout, a global movement that brings people together for monthly walks and open conversations. Walkabout began in Green Park, London, in June 2023 as a low‑friction alternative to venue‑based events and now runs in about 37 locations worldwide, welcoming anyone who wants to join a friendly, curiosity‑driven walking group. Ben explains how Walkabout’s simplicity—free, open, lightly structured—attracts a high proportion of multidisciplinary participants, many with PhDs, and how emergent collaborations have led to startups, investment, hiring, and pro bono work on “thorny” challenges like non‑compressible haemorrhage and electric vehicle battery fires. Inspired by Richard Feynman’s habit of carrying a dozen long‑term problems in his back pocket, Walkabout offers participants an evolving set of shared challenges they can keep in mind and revisit whenever they learn something new, effectively serving as a living, collective version of “Feynman’s 12 problems. A recurring theme is serendipity: Richard and Ben discuss how Walkabout exemplifies the kind of designed chance encounters that David Cleevely describes in his book “Serendipity: It Doesn’t Happen By Accident,” and how Cleevely himself both influenced and later joined Walkabout events. Lessons learned include the power of radical welcome, the importance of not over‑optimizing for scale or vanity metrics, and the value of formats where multidisciplinary dialogue and unexpected connections can flourish. Ben and Richard also touch on Walkabout’s business structure within Amitypath Limited, its use of platforms like Mighty Networks and LinkedIn, and Ben’s broader journey from the Royal Marines and JP Morgan to founding crowdfunding platform BmyCharity and leading Level39. Links * Ben Brabyn Linkedin [https://www.linkedin.com/in/benbrabyn/] * Amitypath [https://amitypath.com/] * Interview with David Cleevely on the NBN [https://newbooksnetwork.com/david-cleevely-on-engineering-serendipity-and-entrepreneurial-success] about his book Serendipity * About Richard Feynman’s 12 problems [https://fortelabs.com/blog/12-favorite-problems-how-to-spark-genius-with-the-power-of-open-questions/] * Walkabout [https://walkabouts.mn.co/] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices] Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network [https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network]

Sarah M. Cushman et al eds., "The Routledge Handbook to Auschwitz-Birkenau" (Routledge, 2026)

The Routledge Handbook to Auschwitz-Birkenau [https://bookshop.org/a/12343/9781032202440] (Routledge, 2026) examines Auschwitz-Birkenau as both a site and a symbol of Nazi genocide. Scholars from a range of disciplinary perspectives consider Auschwitz’s history by engaging with Holocaust historiography and its place in Holocaust memory and representation, illustrating their mutual influence. The chapters bring new insights to topics that other studies of Auschwitz have explored before, such as the Sonderkommando, the Czech family camp, and literary representations of Auschwitz. Other chapters cover recent developments and more neglected areas, such as the experience and memory of Romani prisoners, the fate of Soviet prisoners of war, and Auschwitz’s presence on social media. The handbook also responds to a number of recent trends and new paradigms in Holocaust Studies, including contributions from the fields of Environmental Studies, Spatial Studies, and Gender Studies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices] Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network [https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network]