Singer, Nathan 1976-

(Nathan Michael Singer)

PERSONAL:

Born March 6, 1976, in Cincinnati, OH. Education: Northern Kentucky University, B.A.; Antioch University, M.A.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Cincinnati, OH. Office—Raymond Walters College, University of Cincinnati, 9555 Plainfield Rd., Blue Ash, OH 45236-1096. E-mail—nathan.singer@uc.edu

CAREER:

Musician, performance artist, and author. University of Cincinnati, Blue Ash, OH, writing instructor.

WRITINGS:

A Prayer for Dawn (novel), Bleak House Books (Madison, WI), 2004.

Chasing the Wolf (novel), Bleak House Books (Madison, WI), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS:

A multitalented artist, Nathan Singer has had success as a university instructor, composer, singer, guitarist, and experimental performance artist. After cold-mailing the manuscript of his novel A Prayer for Dawn to numerous publishers, he added "published author" to his list of creative accomplishments. A Prayer for Dawn follows a group of Cincinnatians—a publicist, a prisoner, an artist, a drug-addicted runaway, and a writer—as their chaotic lives swirl around the book's central character: an eight-year-old girl. The book was described as "a crackling, darkly comic debut" and "a raging, rollicking ride through the underbelly of American society" by a Publishers Weekly reviewer. Brandon Brady, a contributor to CityBeat, called the book "a thrash novel that's in-your-face, edgy and fast. Every word, Singer says, is exactly how he wants it: fractured sentences, nonsense verse and all."

Chasing the Wolf was actually Singer's first novel, but it remained unpublished until 2006. It tells the story of Eli, a New York City artist who suffers a mental breakdown after the death of his wife. He is subsequently transported back sixty years in time to the blues-infused world of Mississippi. Eli's life becomes more complicated by a burgeoning interracial relationship and the appearance of a "time walker" who knows the secret to sending Eli home. A contributor to the Herald Standard wrote that the novel has "so many levels of subtle action that you will want to savor each one…. Chasing the Wolf is a book worth chasing down." A Publishers Weekly reviewer also appreciated how "Singer's freewheeling prose style moves the story at a brisk pace."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Herald Standard (Uniontown, PA), May 15, 2006, review of Chasing the Wolf.

Publishers Weekly, May 23, 2005, review of A Prayer for Dawn, p. 58; January 9, 2006, review of Chasing the Wolf, p. 34.

ONLINE

CityBeat,http://www.citybeat.com/ (July 7, 2004), Brandon Brady, "Dawn Patrol: Cincinnati Novelist Is a Creative Multi-Tasker."

Nathan Singer Home Page,http://www.nathansinger.net (October 10, 2006).