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  • Published: 5 January 2021
  • ISBN: 9781784709402
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 304
  • RRP: $24.99

You’re Not Listening

What You’re Missing and Why It Matters




When was the last time you listened to someone, or someone really listened to you?

This life-changing book will transform your conversations and your relationships forever

'BRILLIANT' Chris Evans, Virgin Radio Breakfast Show

When was the last time you listened to someone, or someone really listened to you?

This life-changing book will transform your conversations forever.

At work, we're taught to lead the conversation.

On social media, we shape our personal narratives.

At parties, we talk over one another. So do our politicians.

We're not listening.

And no one is listening to us.

Now more than ever, we need to listen to those around us. New York Times contributor Kate Murphy draws on countless conversations she has had with everyone from priests to CIA interrogators, focus group moderators to bartenders, her great-great aunt to her friend's toddler, to show how only by listening well can we truly connect with others.

Listening has the potential to transform our relationships and our working lives, improve our self-knowledge, and increase our creativity and happiness. While it may take some effort, it's a skill that can be learnt and perfected.

When all we crave is to understand and be understood, You're Not Listening shows us how.

* With a new afterword by the author *

'This book couldn't be more timely. Inspiringly profound...smart and playful' Observer
'I'll be adopting Murphy's advice' Sunday Times, Style

  • Published: 5 January 2021
  • ISBN: 9781784709402
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 304
  • RRP: $24.99

About the author

Kate Murphy

Kate Murphy has extensive experience in animation, voice over and voice direction, voicing feature films, television series and web series with over 50 million views. Since earning her Bachelor of Theatre Arts (Acting) from USQ, Kate has voiced characters for the iconic Sesame Street, and was lead voice actor portraying more than 20 characters in the globally popular web-series Shopkins, before voicing three Shopkins feature films, Chef Club (2016), World Vacation (2017) and Wild (2018).

Kate has also voiced characters for National Geographic’s You’re Called What (2018), feature film, The Wishmas Tree (2020), ABC’s The Strange Chores (late 2019) and web series Crafty Kingdom. She was also Voice Director for 52 episodes of Space Chickens in Space (Nine Network). Kate has a unique and varied skillset, from earning a scholarship to study improvisation and sketch comedy writing at world renowned The Second City in Chicago to training and performing with Butoh icons Dairakudakan in Hakuba, Japan.

Onstage, Kate has performed in numerous productions, including SMACK (2017), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2011), Oh the Humanity (2013) and Life Etc. (2012), as well as on tour with the Queensland Arts Council (2009).
She has also taught and directed many productions at the University of Southern Queensland, including The Winter’s Tale and Much Ado About Nothing as part of the Shakespeare in the Park Festival, along with The Cherry Orchard and Girls Like That.

Praise for You’re Not Listening

In this powerful and potentially life-changing book… the US journalist and author argues that in this age of technology and political division, actually just listening is more important than ever... Part expose, part rousing call to action, and part manual of practical advice... The book looks to be to listening what Susan Cain’s Quiet was to introversion.

Caroline Sanderson, Bookseller

An essential book for our times. How well we listen determines how we love, learn, and connect with one another, and in this moment when we need to hear and be heard more than ever, this thought-provoking and engaging book shows us how.

Lori Gottlieb, New York Times bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone

I was instantly hooked by Kate Murphy's simple but profound argument--that although listening is the foundation of communication, innovation, growth, and love, few of us really know how to do it properly, or where to even start. You're Not Listening is a captivating and enlightening book that provides readers with a road map on how to listen and why it is so important to how we connect, work, and live.

Kim Scott, New York Times bestselling author of Radical Candor

In an age when technology has made it easier than ever before to talk with each other, we've paradoxically become worse at listening. Fortunately, we have Kate Murphy to teach us how to reclaim this crucial skill. This book changed the way I think about communicating with the people who matter to me.

Cal Newport, New York Times bestselling author of Deep Work and Digital Minimalism

In an age of echo chambers and multiple narratives, there is a lot of noise going on but very little listening. In this insightful, cogently reasoned book, Murphy extols the myriad virtues of this underused skill... A thoughtful, eloquent volume that could transform not just your relationships but your own worldview as well.

Waterstones Best Non-fiction Books for 2020

Wide ranging, deeply researched, readable and persuasive. Ms Murphy, we hear you!

Rose Shepherd, Saga Magazine, *Books to Look Our For in 2020*

If you’re like most people, you don’t listen as often or as well as you’d like. There’s no one better qualified than a talented journalist to introduce you to the right mindset and skillset - and this book does it with science and humour.

Adam Grant, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Originals and Give and Take

Fiercely topical... You're Not Listening is an intriguing and constructive take on the problem... and a manual for better communication. Murphy’s book is intelligent and thought-provoking… Listening is when someone take a real interest in who you are…a moment of attunement and understanding that sticks in both heads. We could all do with some of that.

Melanie Reid, The Times

The premise of this book couldn't be more timely... inspiringly profound… Smart and playful... It feels like a reiteration of something essential... Murphy is here to remind us – entertainingly and compellingly – exactly why it matters so much, especially right now. Hear, hear.

Viv Groskop, Observer

Murphy has correctly identified a problem... This isn't a neo-Luddite manifesto, urging us to wean ourselves decisively off our phones, but it is a useful reminder that happiness often lies elsewhere.

Amelia Gentleman, Guardian

We are losing this most crucial, arguably, of our skills in the modern world... I'll be adopting Murphy's advice... and I will be employing "support" responses everywhere.

Charlotte Edwardes, Sunday Times Style Magazine

A thoroughly researched piece of long-form journalism… An interesting read.

Natalie Bowen, UK Press Syndication

Murphy offers a timely reminder of how we could enrich out lives and relationships if we redouble our efforts to listen to opposing views.

Lucy Popescu, Tablet

It’s time for a spot of re-education... A fascinating guide to something we assume we do automatically, yet for the most part do very badly... The art of listening is really the art of being human.

Stephen Moss, Guardian

Full of fascinating insights and advice on the art of listening... a deeply researched and thought-provoking read… [that] feels timely and necessary

Eastern Daily Press, *Book of the Week*

This lively book makes an impassioned plea for listening… an instructive and thought-provoking book that will help readers think about the way they frame questions and responses to forge intimacy.

Emma Jacobs, Financial Times

As any Samaritans volunteer will tell you, learning to listen properly can change lives — your own included. You’re Not Listening perfectly describes a problem a lot of us face in the smartphone age, and how to fix it.

Holly Brockwell, Evening Standard

Gripping from start to finish... brilliant…extraordinarily interesting…full of meat and gold.

Chris Evans, Virgin Radio Breakfast Show

A timely intervention

Niki Seth-Smith, New Humanist

Warn, earnest, gently beseeching... Carefully read, Murphy's book might help us all pay more great compliments to the ones we love

M. M. Owen, Times Literary Supplement

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