Books

Hamish Hamilton's colophon.

This was a dream come true, to publish with a major house and experience the support of the generous professionals who got behind my work. Professor Willy Maley at Glasgow University took a liking to the story I submitted in application for the school's MLitt in Creative Writing program; he acted with keen and friendly interest in my development as a writer in his role as Advisor; and well before it had earned one, he gave Javascotia a recommendation to an editor.

Willy also enjoyed a pint, and kept me alert with great jokes such as his claim that he'd sang backup on some Rod Stewart songs. Unbelievably, when I grew discouraged he had Alasdair Gray sign 4 or 5 editions of his books, and he shipped them to me, with no provocation. This was a few years after I'd graduated from the program. Remarkable. When he came to Minneapolis for a conference, of course, we met up at Nye's Polonaise Room.

For more about my first novel, Javascotia, follow the button.

This revised and corrected 2026 edition brings greater clarity of vision to a bold, darkly comic literary thriller that asks, When suffering becomes social currency, who really profits?

From novelist Benjamin Obler comes a bold, darkly comic literary thriller that asks: When suffering becomes currency, who really profits?

The Foundation for the Advancement of Inclusivity and Recognition (F.A.I.R.) has spent nine years celebrating activists, survivors, and advocates from every marginalized community imaginable. Now, in the autumn of 2018, they’re hosting their biggest event yet—an awards gala at the Winslow family townhome, where 155 “worthy” guests will gather to vie for the ultimate prize: public recognition for their unique plights.

Candace Winslow hosts—the foundation’s impassioned leader who watches her baby become her nightmare. Attending are: Monti Taylor, a troubled outsider who crashed the party and finds the trophy in an attic; Evonne Sorenstam-Finch, a kidnapping survivor building a yoga practice in Pittsburgh; and Christine Wong, an Asian-American theater director conceptualizing a play about death as a commodity.

These guests and dozens more—from NFL concussion victims to human trafficking survivors—are each convinced they deserve the award most. But as the night progresses, oxygen thins and tempers fray. Bodies press into bodies. Voices grow quieter. And what begins as a celebration of inclusivity becomes a suffocating tragedy of epic proportions.

The Exploding Fete is a daring work of meta-fictional satire that employs interactive storytelling via Outcome Branch Narrative Technology ™, allowing readers to shape character fates; sharp social commentary on performative activism, wealth inequality, and the politics of suffering; and dark literary comedy in the tradition of Mark Leyner, with echoes of Jonathan Franzen’s social precision.

The novel splits into multiple narrative paths: Will Monti Taylor escape into the night, trophy in hand? Will the Winslows face legal reckoning—or walk away unscathed? Does Candace build a memorial or bury her guilt?

Set in Minneapolis/St. Paul against a backdrop of corporate influence and celebrity philanthropy, this is a novel about intention versus consequence, the commodification of pain, and what happens when turning no one away becomes deadly.

Perfect for readers of: The Overstory, Normal People, and fans of literary satire that dares to ask uncomfortable questions about social justice, class, and accountability.

THE EXPLODING FETE

The Mombaccus Expansion is a polyphonic exploration of recovery, capitalism, and the commodification of consciousness. From the gentrified neighborhoods of upstate New York to the Moroccan desert to a surreal purgatory populated by Baldwin, Angelou, and Asimov, the novel interrogates what we owe to literature, to each other, and to our own selves.

In a literary marketplace where narratives are routinely weaponized and politicized, Benjamin Obler’s fourth novel asks whether liberation is possible in a post-factual era—or whether we are all merely characters in someone else’s manuscript, waiting to be rewritten.

The Mombaccus Expansion is a polyphonic exploration of recovery, capitalism, and the commodification of consciousness.

Wolfgang Lewis, a recovering addict newly employed by tech visionary Ogawa Jun, finds himself caught between salvation and corruption. Hired to manage a division of Jun’s philanthropic company, UBS, Wolf secretly embezzles corporate funds to launch Dos Muchachos Press—a small, idealistic literary imprint devoted to fiction in an age of algorithms. But Wolf’s publishing venture becomes entangled with something far darker: Project Celadon, Jun’s clandestine research into non-invasive genetic manipulation through a mysterious purple energy source discovered in an Ohio print shop.

As Wolf navigates his embezzlement scheme and his affair with scientist Regina Dancemere, parallel storylines transect. His best friend Damon, whose fashion empire has collapsed, struggles with the end of his relationship with model Marla Harrington, who is transitioning to male. Journalist Joyce Murray, Wolf’s ex-girlfriend, investigates the financial irregularities at UBS while grappling with her own career ambitions. And a mysterious literary consortium called Synthetic Prophetic intervenes to protect Dos Muchachos Press from both corporate absorption and cancellation culture.

The novel climaxes at “DMP Goes Wild,” a literary festival in the Allegheny Mountains where protesters converge to condemn DMP for publishing a rewrite of David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest. Amidst accusations of sexism, cultural appropriation, and corporate complicity, Wolf and Damon make a desperate choice: they dive into the Jun’s mysterious invention, entering a purgatorial state where their identities dissolve and literary ghosts materialize.

LOVE & THEFT

There are those who play at theft, like actress Sylvie Virgule. Those who accuse others of theft, like Nolan Pilcrow. Those who protect corporations from theft, like Paul Boustrophedon. Filmmaker D. A. Chimister views theft as entertainment, and in Fort Green, Brooklyn, under his direction on the set of Love & Theft, the lives of Virgule, Pilcrow and “Bou” begin to intertwine. The new streaming series is the much-anticipated follow-up from the hit indie auteur, the mentor who launched Sylvie’s career.

In the Catskills, underemployed Hank Delaney steals to survive—not entertaining at all. And his one-time criminal partner, musician Ray Ramirez, gave up theft. But when the vintage muscle car belonging to Delaney’s high school nemesis, John Segal, becomes vulnerable, all bets are off. Delaney convinces Ramirez to con the sister. Shelby Segal is minding the car while her brother recovers, and her ambition to sing professionally sends Ray to his storage locker to retrieve his dusty keyboard and sheet music as he prepares for the role of manager Ray Toledo, Intimacy gained, he’ll seek access to Segal’s shop keys.

Meanwhile In Nova Scotia, five-year-old prodigy Walter Chamaran gains the attention of Buddhist monks, who seek to bring the boy to their monastery for observation. Walter is the glue that binds the lives of the NYC actors, the upstate thieves, and the car owners. His heroic act unites and reconciles the disparate American cliques with the sublimity of two maxipad-shaped strips of rubberized felt joining to form a tennis ball. A little unity, just what this country needs.

“The journey metaphor, the psychic landscape stuff, the Omnibus itself, is a form...to truly play with the form is to be free enough to abandon the form.”

Benjamin Obler’s OMNIBUS is a genre-defying memoir that refuses to be categorized—a literary work as ambitious as it is honest. Drawing on Ram Dass teachings, pop culture references from Highway 61 Revisited to QAnon conspiracy theories, and a decade of personal archives, Obler guides readers, at times recklessly, on a trek out of the familiar and into an examination of what it means to be a writer in an era of identity politics, political division, and spiritual seeking.

Board the bus and take a road trip like no other, across meta-fictional frameworks and through imagined monument parks, arriving at the “Purple Convention,” where the book stages competing versions of itself—one conciliatory, one defensive—before transcending both to arrive at genuine reconciliation.

At its heart, this is a story about a son reconciling with his father’s legacy, about finding grace in failure, and about the people who shape us—even (especially) those we misunderstand. THE LIAR'S CLUB meets CONSIDER THE LOBSTER with the spiritual depth of BE HERE NOW. Ideal for writers navigating rejection and identity; readers of literary memoirs who crave intellectual rigor; anyone who has ever wondered whether their story deserves to be told.