Lost Connections

From the New York Times bestselling author of Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs, a startling challenge to our thinking about depression and anxiety.

Award-winning journalist Johann Hari suffered from depression since he was a child and started taking anti-depressants when he was a teenager. He was told – like his entire generation – that his problem was caused by a chemical imbalance in his brain. As an adult, trained in the social sciences, he began to investigate this question – and he learned that almost everything we have been told about depression and anxiety is wrong.

Across the world, Hari discovered social scientists who were uncovering their real causes – and they are mostly not in our brains, but in the way we live today. Hari´s journey took him from a life-threatening experience in Vietnam, to an Amish community in Indiana, to an uprising in Berlin – all showing in vivid and dramatic detail these new insights. They lead to radically different solutions to the ones we have been offered up to now.

Just as Chasing The Scream transformed the global debate about addiction, The Lost Connections will lead us to a very different debate about depression and anxiety – one that shows how, together, we can end this epidemic.

If you have ever been down, or felt lost, this amazing book will change your life. Do yourself a favour – read it now Elton John
A brilliant, stimulating, radical take on mental health Matt Haig
A wonderful and incisive analysis Hillary Clinton
The more people read this book, the better off the world will be Naomi Klein
This book is a game changer Davina McCall
This is a bold and inspiring book that will help far more than just those who suffer from depression. As Hari shows, we all have within us the potential to live in ways that are healthier and wiser Arianna Huffington
This is an extraordinary, elegant exploration of a timely problem. It is written with wit and elan and provides a devastating analysis of our society that is both shocking and profound Dr Max Pemberton of the Daily Mail
As with his book on drugs, Johann Hari has delivered a remarkable tour de force on a difficult, complex and controversial subject and made the reader think anew Alastair Campbell
An exquisitely lucid treatise on why no person is, has been or ever should be an island. This book is the most exciting thing I’ve read this year. From slightly seedy to suicidal – however you are feeling – read this book and it will honestly help you to understand which roads we must walk if we want to see true, lasting change Emma Thompson
A vital, compelling and eye-opening examination of the myths we have been taught to believe about depression and anxiety ... Hari again proves that he is one of the world’s most important and most enlightening thinkers and social critics Glenn Greenwald
A bold call for a complete re-evaluation of what is causing the western epidemic of mental illness -- Isabel Hardman Sunday Times
A compassionate, common-sense approach to depression and anxiety … His book brings with it an urgency and rigour that will, with luck, encourage the authorities to sit up and take note -- Fiona Sturges Guardian
Extraordinary ... A highly personal book, written with humility, humour and candour, it nonetheless heralds a crucial new discussion about our mental health — and health of the world we’ve created for ourselves … I honestly couldn’t put it down. What a stunning piece of work Brian Eno
This is an astonishing book, that transforms our understanding of one of the crucial issues of our times. Johann Hari asks the big questions and provides the big answers – answers that have been neglected for far too long. You cannot fully understand this great curse of our age until you have read it George Monbiot
Johann Hari has written a book that could actually make us happy. It is very important everyone read this book and do what he says as quickly as possible Simon Amstell
A beautiful book from the person that brilliantly once said “the opposite of addiction is connection” and who now explores and offers some solutions to our disconnection Jemima Khan
You might think Lost Connections is a self-help title but in reality it’s a book that aims to change society, not individuals … Lost Connections is an important and controversial book because it asks questions about the biggest problems we have in the world Attitude Magazine
Brilliant -- Liz Jones Mail on Sunday
Thought-provoking ... His comprehensible and penetrating study features extensive research and interviews with everyone from leading scientists and medics to members of the Amish community. This heartening book reveals the mutual social benefits of reconnecting with others and helping them to help yourself Western Mail
Lost Connections isn't as much about science and mental health as it is about society, and the stories we tell around mental illness ... This book's value lies in its attempt to change the stories we tell about the depressed and anxious, and perhaps help some of those suffering change how they think about themselves -- Barbara Speed Independent i

Johann Hari is the New York Times bestselling author of Chasing the Scream. He was a columnist for the Independent in London for nine years and was twice named Newspaper Journalist of the Year by Amnesty International UK.

He has written for the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Guardian, Le Monde, Slate, the New Republic and the Nation.

He has been awarded the Comment Award for Cultural Commentator of the Year by Editorial Intelligence, and has been named Journalist of the Year by Stonewall. Hari lives in London.

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