It’s been a long, long couple of years. A global pandemic, an economic crisis, racial and political strife brought to the boiling point, the climate not far behind. As we nervously embark on yet another uncertain trip around the sun, we wonder: How’s everyone doing?

Ten of America’s finest writers tell us in This Is Life. Drawing on their wisdom and lived experience, they share bold, occasionally comic, occasionally biting insights on the past two years and offer possible ways forward, both for the country and for us as individuals. They articulate the anxiety of these inarguably lousy times yet also remind us that there remain plenty of reasons to be hopeful despite it all.

In this collection:

NPR’s Weekend Edition host Scott Simon on the hard-won lessons that will inform our lives going forward

National Book Award winner and MacArthur Fellow Jacqueline Woodson on savoring today to better cope with tomorrow’s perils

Climate activist Bill McKibben on a reimagined infrastructure that could finally save the planet

New York Times bestselling author and national security expert Garrett M. Graff on the precarious fate of American democracy

National Book Award finalist Carmen Maria Machado on the impulse to love harder in the face of calamity

Bethany McLean, bestselling author of The Smartest Guys in the Room, on where to go now that the free-market economy has failed us

Kiese Laymon, author of the bestselling memoir Heavy, on the poisonous influence of nonstop news

Former Republican strategist Stuart Stevens on the bridge-building power of sports

R. Eric Thomas, playwright and bestselling author of Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America, on the thrill and anxiety of reconnecting with people in person

Bonnie Tsui, author of the 2020 bestseller Why We Swim, on how to find joy in the smallest of life’s moments

Candid and empathetic, timely and timeless, This Is Life is a much-needed literary compass for navigating 2022 and beyond.