How Not To Be Wrong
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  • Published: 22 October 2020
  • ISBN: 9780753557723
  • Imprint: Virgin Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 240
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How Not To Be Wrong

The Art of Changing Your Mind

Formats & editions
Paperback
20 Jul 2021
EBook
22 Oct 2020
Audiobook
22 Oct 2020
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James O’Brien – bestselling author, radio and podcast sensation, twitter phenomenon – answers the question he is asked more than any other: ‘what have you changed you mind about?’ Why all of us must kick the tyres of our opinions, check our assumptions and make sure we really think what we think we do.

There's no point having a mind if you're not willing to change it

James O'Brien has built well over a million loyal listeners to his radio show by dissecting the opinions of callers live on air, every day. But winning the argument doesn't necessarily mean you're right.

In this deeply personal book, James turns the mirror on himself to reveal what he has changed his mind about and why, and explore how examining and changing our own views is our new civic duty in a world of outrage, disagreement and echo chambers. He writes candidly about the stiff upper lip attitudes and toxic masculinity that coloured his childhood, and the therapy and personal growth that have led him question his assumptions and explore new perspectives. Laying open his personal views on everything from racial prejudice to emotional vulnerability, from fat-shaming to tattoos, he then delves into the real reasons - often irrational or unconscious - he holds them.

Unflinchingly honest, revealing and funny, How Not to Be Wrong is a tonic for a world more divided than ever and a personal manifesto for a better way of thinking and living.

Because after all, if we can't change our own minds we'll never really be able to change anyone else's.
  • Published: 22 October 2020
  • ISBN: 9780753557723
  • Imprint: Virgin Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 240
Categories:
Share…

About the author

James O'Brien

James O'Brien is a writer and radio broadcaster. His journalism has appeared everywhere from the TLS to the Daily Mirror. He has presented BBC Two’s Newsnight and his own daytime talk show O’Brien on ITV. His daily current affairs phone-in show on LBC has 1.2 million weekly listeners. His last book, How to be Right, was a Sunday Times Bestseller.

portrait photo of James O'Brien

Also by James O'Brien

How They Broke Britain
How To Be Right
See all

Praise for How Not To Be Wrong

Disarmingly honest about where he has been wrong, this book is a refreshing reminder of our ability to change our minds

Susanna Reid

Blending profound self-reflection with genuine warmth... the perfect book for a loud world that seems more divided than ever

John Amaechi OBE

The conscience of liberal Britain

New Statesman

I know few broadcasters as consistently, forensically, brilliant as James O'Brien

Emily Maitlis

Such verbal ability seems like a superpower

The Times

Classic James O'Brien - smart, analytical, self-aware and important to public debate at a time the toffs in power are taking it into the sewer

Alastair Campbell

James is more right than ever -- particularly in our entrenched, binary thinking culture -- about the importance of being able to admit to being wrong

David Baddiel

An admirably personal guide to the lost art of changing your mind. James showed me how often a change of mind is really a change of heart

Marina Hyde

Simply brilliant ... Its calm but brutal honesty makes for compelling reading. This book is needed now more than ever

The Secret Barrister

Highly personal and confessional, yet also a passionate and brilliantly argued appeal against the dangerous tribalism of our times

David Olusoga

An exceptional broadcaster with a peerless ability to calmly point out the absurdity of certain viewpoints

Guardian

A model of lucidity, humour and humanity - we should be thankful that we have him

Times Literary Supplement

Far and away the best thing he has ever written -- indeed, a kind of deconstruction of everything he has written and said, or at least propounded. A series of reflections on various topical themes that doubles as a memoir, almost a mea culpa, about the psychological origin of his opinions, and of the force and certitude with which he used to wield them.

New Statesman Book of the Year