LIMITED EDITION E-BOOK EXCLUSIVE! A Crowded Loneliness documents the thoughts of one mind in isolation and may mirror the emotions of many others.

Set in Havana during the Cuban Revolution and in the Deep South before and during the Civil Rights Movement, A Crowded Loneliness, is based on the true story of Bienvenida Catalina Miranda. Her family worked closely with Fidel Castro to overthrown the dictator Fulgencio Batista, until Castro announced that he was a communist. After her brother’s arrest and her father’s death, 9-year-old Catalina and her 11-year-old brother, Mario, took part in Operation Peter Pan—a mass exodus of over 14,000 unaccompanied Cuban children to the United States between 1960 and 1962. They boarded a plane to Miami with little more than the clothes on their backs. A week later, the dark-skinned Catalina and Mario found themselves separated and shipped off to orphanages in New Orleans—in the Jim Crow South. A Crowded Loneliness is a moving story about a family torn by politics and about a young girl’s struggle to adapt and her courage to never let go of her dreams.

There is a particular flavor to the loneliness that comes from living in a city, surrounded by thousands of strangers. This roving cultural history of urban loneliness centers on the ultimate city: Manhattan, that teeming island of gneiss, concrete, and glass. How do we connect with other people, particularly if our sexuality or physical body is considered deviant or damaged? Does technology draw us closer together or trap us behind screens? Laing travels deep into the work and lives of some of the century's most original artists in a celebration of the state of loneliness.

In a city high-rise, sitting in the balcony on the 25th floor, sipping tea, you look out into the horizon, city lights glimmering in the distance, cars fading away as they rush across the highway. You are surrounded by silence though you can hear the faint noises of the horns honking on the road. You look across at the building angularly adjoining yours and see shadows move across the large expansive windows. You wonder what they would be doing-their conversations, their actions, the scuttling and scurrying movements. You can feel the melancholy, the lonesomeness. You reflect how it was never like this before. As people navigate their way towards growth and success, they find themselves 'busy' and others around them 'unavailable'. This urban existence with its multidimensional challenges has led to an upsurge in the experience of loneliness and taking stock is a matter of pertinent significance. This book explores the spaces from which the problem of urban loneliness arises. It portrays in detail the facets of our lives which are contributing towards the emergence of this scenario. In Alone in the Crowd, the authors go beyond highlighting the existence of the problem to enlisting ways in which this pandemic, in the midst of the current pandemic, can be tackled. Encouraging readers to concurrently focus on the need to live mindfully, this book also highlights key learnings from the pandemic.

“What does it mean to be lonely?” Thomas Dumm asks. His inquiry, documented in this book, takes us beyond social circumstances and into the deeper forces that shape our very existence as modern individuals. The modern individual, Dumm suggests, is fundamentally a lonely self. Through reflections on philosophy, political theory, literature, and tragic drama, he proceeds to illuminate a hidden dimension of the human condition. His book shows how loneliness shapes the contemporary division between public and private, our inability to live with each other honestly and in comity, the estranged forms that our intimate relationships assume, and the weakness of our common bonds. A reading of the relationship between Cordelia and her father in Shakespeare’s King Lear points to the most basic dynamic of modern loneliness—how it is a response to the problem of the “missing mother.” Dumm goes on to explore the most important dimensions of lonely experience—Being, Having, Loving, and Grieving. As the book unfolds, he juxtaposes new interpretations of iconic cultural texts—Moby-Dick, Death of a Salesman, the film Paris, Texas, Emerson’s “Experience,” to name a few—with his own experiences of loneliness, as a son, as a father, and as a grieving husband and widower. Written with deceptive simplicity, Loneliness as a Way of Life is something rare—an intellectual study that is passionately personal. It challenges us, not to overcome our loneliness, but to learn how to re-inhabit it in a better way. To fail to do so, this book reveals, will only intensify the power that it holds over us.

From the acclaimed author of Imagine Wanting Only This—a timely and moving meditation on isolation and longing, both as individuals and as a society. There is a silent epidemic in America: loneliness. Shameful to talk about and often misunderstood, loneliness is everywhere, from the most major of metropolises to the smallest of towns. In Seek You, Kristen Radtke's wide-ranging exploration of our inner lives and public selves, Radtke digs into the ways in which we attempt to feel closer to one another, and the distance that remains. Through the lenses of gender and violence, technology and art, Radtke ushers us through a history of loneliness and longing, and shares what feels impossible to share. Ranging from the invention of the laugh-track to the rise of Instagram, the bootstrap-pulling cowboy to the brutal experiments of Harry Harlow, Radtke investigates why we engage with each other, and what we risk when we turn away. With her distinctive, emotionally-charged drawings and deeply empathetic prose, Kristen Radtke masterfully shines a light on some of our most vulnerable and sublime moments, and asks how we might keep the spaces between us from splitting entirely.

What makes people lonely? And how can Christian communities better minister to the lonely? In The Loneliness Epidemic, behavioral scientist and researcher Susan Mettes explores those questions and more. Guided by current research from Barna Group, Mettes illustrates the profound physical, emotional, and social toll of loneliness in the United States. Surprisingly, her research shows that it is not the oldest Americans but the youngest adults who are loneliest and that social media can actually play a positive role in alleviating loneliness. Mettes highlights the role that belonging, friendship, closeness, and expectations play in preventing it. She also offers meaningful ways the church can minister to lonely people, going far beyond simplistic solutions--like helping them meet new people--to addressing their inner lives and the God who understands them. With practical and highly applicable tips, this book is an invaluable tool for anyone--ministry leaders, parents, friends--trying to help someone who feels alone. Readers will emerge better able to deal with their own loneliness and to help alleviate the loneliness of others. Foreword by Barna Group president David Kinnaman.