Between my upbringing and my personal flavors of mental health, I spent a good portion of my adult life trying to perfect myself, whether by suppressing my queerness or by going to extremes with the facets of my personality that others liked best. The last five or six years have been devoted to unpacking those thought processes, and reclaiming a life guided by kindness towards myself and others. I believe books are crucial to the introspection, expansion, and connection we all crave so much; I know they’ve been indispensable to me in rediscovering my own heart.
The Story of the Hundred Promises is “a deconstructed fairy tale in which the pieces have been taken apart, examined, and put back together in surprising and healing ways.” Trans sailor Darragh Thorn has made a comfortable life for himself among people who love and accept him. Ten years after his exile from home, though, his sister asks him to reconcile with their ailing father. Determined to resolve his feelings rather than just survive them, Darragh sets off on a quest to find the one person who can heal a half-dead man: the mysterious enchanter who once gave him the magic he needed to become his true self.
I read Humankind in the summer of 2021, a year into the pandemic and at a point when I wasn’t sure what the future looked like—all I knew was that the present seemed pretty bleak. Rutger Bregman’s book provided a counterweight to my fears and weariness, revitalizing my commitment to my fellow humans. It reminded me of my personal motto, a quote from the Roman writer Terence: “I am human; no human thing is alien to me.” If we try, there’s almost no human experience we can’t find a way to relate to.
THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER A Guardian, Daily Telegraph, New Statesman and Daily Express Book of the Year
'Hugely, highly and happily recommended' Stephen Fry 'You should read Humankind. You'll learn a lot (I did) and you'll have good reason to feel better about the human race' Tim Harford 'Made me see humanity from a fresh perspective' Yuval Noah Harari
It's a belief that unites the left and right, psychologists and philosophers, writers and historians. It drives the headlines that surround us and the laws that touch our lives. From Machiavelli to Hobbes, Freud to Dawkins, the roots of this belief have…
This beautiful trans allegory features some of the most honest, subtle handling of heartbreak I’ve ever read, presented in a way that feels like commiseration with a friend. The narrative voice exudes love. I saw myself in Owen and ached for both him and my younger self; the ending brought both catharsis and joy. This book captures the journey to being vulnerable and compassionate with yourself perfectly.
Longlisted for The Center for Fiction 2022 First Novel Prize
"A modern coming-of-age full of love, desperation, heartache, and magic" (Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize-winning author) about "the ways in which family, grief, love, queerness, and vulnerability all intersect" (Kristen Arnett, New York Times bestselling author). Perfect for fans of The Perks of Being a Wallflower and The Thirty Names of Night.
Though Owen Tanner has never met anyone else who has a chatty bird in their chest, medical forums would call him a Terror. From the moment Gail emerged between Owen's ribs, his mother knew that she had to…
This book became an instant favorite for the way it zeroes in on each of the four titular cities—only one of which I’d ever heard of—and sifts its layers in a way that makes it feel alive from top to bottom. Reading through it was a beautiful reminder of how little we know about the past, and yet, how similar our ancestors are to us in the things that are important to them. The gift of this book is its curiosity and tenderness towards its subjects, and it inspires the same open-mindedness.
In Four Lost Cities, acclaimed science journalist Annalee Newitz takes readers on an entertaining and mind-bending adventure into the deep history of urban life. Investigating across the centuries and around the world, Newitz explores the rise and fall of four ancient cities, each the centre of a sophisticated civilisation: the Neolithic site of Catalhoeyuk in Central Turkey, the Roman town of Pompeii on Italy's southern coast, the medieval megacity of Angkor in Cambodia and the indigenous American metropolis Cahokia, which stood beside the Mississippi River where East St. Louis is today.
Newitz travels to all four sites and investigates the…
This was the second book I read by Charlie Jane Anders, who is one of my living literary idols. This book is a feat of world-building, but what I find most compelling about it is its examination of what it means to be alien, what it means to belong. The story is unexpected in many ways, but it was deeply comforting for me. Even if it’s frightening, letting yourself be vulnerable can lead to magical and enlightening experiences.
"If you control our sleep, then you can own our dreams... And from there, it's easy to control our entire lives."
From the brilliant mind of Charlie Jane Anders ("A master absurdist"-New York Times; "Virtuoso"-NPR) comes a new novel of Kafkaesque futurism. Set on a planet that has fully definitive, never-changing zones of day and night, with ensuing extreme climates of endless, frigid darkness and blinding, relentless light, humankind has somehow continued apace-though the perils outside the built cities are rife with danger as much as the streets below.
But in a world where time means only what the ruling…
I picked this book up as research for a manuscript, and it had a profound effect on me even beyond the information I needed. It taught me that nature’s cycles are more complex than I ever imagined, and that it’s practically impossible to look at anything in an ecosystem—a biological one, or even our human social and technological ones—isolated from everything else. The interdependencies and relationships just run too deep. It’s a good reminder to remember what might be unseen.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A “brilliant [and] entrancing” (The Guardian) journey into the hidden lives of fungi—the great connectors of the living world—and their astonishing and intimate roles in human life, with the power to heal our bodies, expand our minds, and help us address our most urgent environmental problems.
“Grand and dizzying in how thoroughly it recalibrates our understanding of the natural world.”—Ed Yong, author of I Contain Multitudes
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR—Time, BBC Science Focus, The Daily Mail, Geographical, The Times, The Telegraph, New Statesman, London Evening Standard, Science Friday
As a trauma therapist and dedicated researcher, I love uncovering valuable insights within lesser-known books. There are hidden gems, free from the pressure of commercial success, crafted by authors deeply committed to research, understanding, and the art of writing itself. Their dedication resonates with me, as I believe in the profound value of information and the power of critical thinking. Through my own book, Traumatization and Its Aftermath, I aim to emphasize that psychological concepts often lose their depth in translation and my mission is spreading awareness and fostering a deeper understanding of trauma and its intricate facets. With that idea in mind, I chose these five titles.
A fresh take on the difference between trauma and hardship in order to help accurately spot the difference and avoid over-generalizations.
The book integrates the latest findings in brain science, child development, psycho-social context, theory, and clinical experiences to make the case that trauma is much more than a cluster of symptoms to be tamed, but instead best understood as development gone off course, away from growth and towards (only) survival.
This book prompts a profound shift in perception, inviting to view trauma as an intricate and diverse experience, a point of view that ultimately leads to sharper treatment and, hopefully, more healing. It encourages a transition from asking, "What happened to you?" to the deeper question, "What is your relationship with what happened to you?"
Traumatization and Its Aftermath: A Systemic Approach to Understanding and Treating Trauma Disorders
The book is comprehensive, bold, and practical-a much-needed resource for the assessment and treatment of trauma. Instead of the traditional focus on the overall importance of healing, Traumatization and its Aftermath decodes why some people don't heal as easily as others, analyzes the various failures of diagnosis, and explains how to make therapeutic interventions truly effective.
This book offers a systemic deep dive into traumatization that clarifies myths and misinformation about the entire spectrum of trauma and provides both clinicians and non-clinicians with the right level of validation, preventive measures, conceptualization methodology, assessment tools, and healing facts that have not…
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