AI's Societal Impact: Dreams and Nightmares

Do we get the nonfiction we deserve? LATimes book critic Bethanne Patrick wrestles with this question through five new books that both mirror and address our fractured psyche. From Melissa Fibos’ choice of celibacy over toxic sexual romance to a lone wolf crossing impossible borders, all these works expose a world grappling with isolation, AI empires, and the collapse of meaningful discourse. Whether it's Thomas Chatterton Williams's critique of wokeness, Damon Young's biting anthology of new black comedy, or Karen Hao’s disturbing portrait of OpenAI as our new imperial reality ( Tomorrow’s show features a full interview with Hao), each book reflects our deeper crisis: the inability to connect authentically in our age of social isolation and anxiety.

The Dry Season: A Memoir of Pleasure in a Year Without Sex - Melissa Fibos. Melissa Fibos, a writer with a history of intense romantic fixations, realizes she's addicted to the chase rather than genuine connection. She embarks on a year-long celibacy experiment, allowing masturbation and fantasies but avoiding all dating and partnered sex. It’s a transformative journey of empowerment as Fibos discovers authentic pleasure in solitude, food, and simple experiences, ultimately meeting her future wife before completing the full year.

Summer of Our Discontent: The Age of Certainty and The Demise of Discourse - Thomas Chatterton Williams. This multiracial critic argues that America's obsession with racial categories perpetuates the very divisions we claim to fight, insisting that race is purely a social construct with no biological basis. Writing from his perspective as an American expat in France, Williams contends that woke discourse and "correct" language distract from addressing real structural problems. His book challenges readers to move beyond tired black-versus-white frameworks toward more nuanced conversations about power and identity.

That's How They Get You: An Unruly Anthology of Black American Humor - Edited by Damon Young This collection features sharp satirical pieces from top Black American writers who skewer everything from Karen culture to Disney's racial blindness to tech company exploitation. Contributors include Mateo Askaripour (who wrote the acclaimed "Black Buck") offering biting commentary on workplace racism and cultural appropriation. The anthology demonstrates how humor serves as both weapon and shield, allowing writers to expose systemic absurdities while maintaining their sanity in an often hostile world.

Lone Wolf: Walking the Line Between Civilization and Wildness - Adam Weymouth In 2011, a wolf named Slavc traveled over 1,000 miles from Slovenia to the Italian Alps, becoming the first wolf in that region for decades and eventually establishing a pack of over 100. Weymouth follows this remarkable journey to explore how artificial barriers—from the Iron Curtain to Trump's border wall—prevent both wildlife and human refugees from reaching safety. The book uses the wolf's migration as a lens to examine what happens when the wild refuses to respect human boundaries and how life persistently seeks ways to thrive despite our attempts to control it.

Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI - Karen Hao. Based on 90 interviews with current and former OpenAI executives plus dozens more from competing tech companies. Hao argues that without proper regulation and transparency, AI could evolve into a modern version of the British East India Company—a technological monopoly that serves elite interests while reshaping global power structures. Tomorrow’s show features a full interview with Hao.

Bethanne Patrick maintains a storied place in the publishing industry as a critic and as @TheBookMaven on Twitter, where she created the popular #FridayReads and regularly comments on books and literary ideas to over 200,000 followers. Her work appears frequently in the Los Angeles Times as well as in The Washington Post, NPR Books, and Literary Hub. She sits on the board of the PEN/Faulkner Foundation and has served on the board of the National Book Critics Circle. She is the host of the Missing Pages podcast.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting the daily KEEN ON show, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy interview series. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

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