Showing results by publisher "Canongate Books" in Relationships, Parenting & Personal Development

For centuries, travellers would stare up at the stars to guide them. Constellations of shining lights would offer a path forward or a way through, delivering courage and hope on long, difficult voyages. Throughout her life, Gemma Cairney has pieced together her own constellation, one which is made up of inspirational women - artists, activists, musicians, writers, mathematicians, mystics - who guide her, fill her creative cup and provide a sense of solace and selfhood.

All of us are familiar with this unsettling sensation of acceleration - the feeling that there's ever more to do, and ever less time in which to do it. This is overwhelm: that persistent feeling that you can't cope, that the demands on you are excessive, that you can't see a way out. In this liberating new book, award-winning writer and presenter of BBC Radio 4's All in the Mind Claudia Hammond helps us to take the pressure off with a psychological toolkit that is both practical and evidence-based.

In Breadwinners, award-winning science journalist Melissa Hogenboom interviews dozens of female breadwinners, stay-at-home dads and same-sex couples, comparing their stories to the latest research to demonstrate the consequences of changing dynamics. She reveals how pursuing and maintaining power is a key part of every human interaction, affecting every area of our lives. Breadwinners shows how, the closer we look, the easier it is to see the influence of power structures all around us.

When Max Dickins decided to propose to his girlfriend, he realised there was no one he could call on to be his best man. He quickly learned that that he wasn’t the only man struggling with friendships. For decades, countless studies from across the world have confirmed that men have fewer close friends than women–and the problem gets worse the older men get. But what goes wrong? And what can men do about it? Dickins is going to find out. His funny and charmingly candid search takes him to the doors of world-leading experts.

Wishing to leave behind the quiet isolation of her Orkney island life, Amy Liptrot books a one-way flight to Berlin. Searching for new experiences, inspiration and love, she rents a loftbed in a shared flat and looks for work. She explores the streets, nightclubs and parks and seeks out the city’s wildlife—goshawks, raccoons and hooded crows. She looks for love through the screen of her laptop. Over the course of a year, Amy makes space, hoping for the unexpected. And it comes with an erotic jolt, in the form of a love affair that obsesses her.

Tim Clare has suffered from extreme anxiety and panic attacks for a decade. This was something the couple just got used to and were able to manage, until they became parents. With the arrival of Tim's daughter came a new wave of extreme anxiety, triggered by the knowledge that his own mental ill-health could be negatively impacting his child. It was at this point that Tim made a promise to himself—that he would try everything he could to get better. In Coward, Tim explores all the possible treatments for anxiety, from SRIs to hypnosis, from running to extreme diets.

When Kent Nerburn received a letter from Jennifer, a young woman questioning her calling to spend her life in the arts, the writer and artist was struck by how closely her questions mirrored the doubts and yearnings of his own youth. Nerburn resolved that he would write his own letter: a letter of welcome and encouragement to all young artists setting out on the same strange and magical journey, sharing the wisdom of a life spent working in the arts.

Using the latest research from psychology and neuroscience and working in collaboration with the University of Sussex's world-leading Kindness Institute, Claudia Hammond takes us on a eye-opening tour of kindness: what constitutes kindness (it's not just one thing), effective strategies to build more of it into our lives and the benefits of being kind. The audiobook is structured around the seven keys of kindness.

Liz Jensen's son, a zoologist, conservationist and ecological activist, was twenty-five when he collapsed and died unexpectedly. She fell apart. As she grieved, forest fires raged, coral reefs deteriorated, CO2 emissions rose and fossil fuels burned. Your Wild and Precious Life is the story of how a mother rebuilt herself, reoriented her life and rediscovered the enchantment of the living world. Set against the backdrop of climate and ecological catastrophe, it's an argument for agency, legacy and the wild possibility of hope after devastation.

John Niven's little brother Gary was fearless, popular, stubborn, handsome, hilarious and sometimes terrifying. In 2010, after years of chaotic struggle against the world, he took his own life at the age of 42. Hoping for the best while often witnessing the worst, John, his younger sister Linda and their mother, Jeanette, saw the darkest fears they had for Gary played out in drug deals, prison and bankruptcy.

To everyone else, Terri White appeared to be living the dream, named one of Folio's Top Women in US Media and accruing further awards for the magazines she was editing. In reality, she was rapidly skidding towards a mental health crisis that would land her in a locked psychiatric ward as her past caught up with her. As well as growing up in a household in poverty, Terri endured sexual and physical abuse at the hands of a number of her mother's partners.

Gina Miller came to prominence when she brought one of the most significant constitutional cases ever to be heard in the British Supreme Court. Gina successfully challenged the UK government's authority to trigger Article 50 - the formal notification to leave the European Union - without parliamentary approval. For standing up for what she believed was right, Miller became the target of not just racist and sexist verbal abuse but physical threats to her and her family.