To commemorate Martin Luther King Day, I decided to read Eugene Robinson’s insightful Disintegration: The Splintering of Black America. You may have seen Eugene Robinson’s appearances on MSNBC. Robinson strikes me as an intelligent, incisive commentator. And his book reflects Robinson’s thoughtfulness when considering the issue of race. Robinson suggests Black America has been broken into four parts: the Mainstream (basically the black middle class), the Abandoned (the black poor), the Transcendents (Oprah, Jay-Z, Barack Obama, etc.), and the Emergents (basically two groups: black immigrants from Africa and the Caribbean, and mixed race individuals). Robinson illustrates his points with examples of his Katrina reporting, his analysis of the movie Precious, and his interview with Barack Obama. If you want a Reality Check on race relations in the U.S., read Disintegration. GRADE: A