Galvanized by her work in our nation's jails, psychiatrist Christine Montross illuminates the human cost of mass incarceration and mental illnessDr. Christine Montross has spent her career treating the most severely ill psychiatric patients. Several years ago, she set out to investigate why so many of her patients got caught up in the legal system when discharged from her care-and what happened to them therein.Waiting for an Echo is a riveting, rarely seen glimpse into American incarceration. It is also a damning account of policies that have criminalized mental illness, shifting large numbers of people who belong in therapeutic settings into punitive ones.The stark world of American prisons is shocking for all who enter it. But Dr. Montross's expertise-the mind in crisis-allowed her to reckon with the human stories behind the bars. A father attempting to weigh the impossible calculus of a plea bargain. A bright young woman whose life is derailed by addiction. Boys in a juvenile detention facility who, desperate for human connection, invent a way to communicate with one another from cell to cell. Overextended doctors and correctional officers who strive to provide care and security in environments riddled with danger. In these encounters, Montross finds that while our system of correction routinely makes people with mental illness worse, just as routinely it renders mentally stable people psychiatrically unwell. The system is quite literally maddening.Our methods of incarceration take away not only freedom but also selfhood and soundness of mind. In a nation where 95 percent of all inmates are released from prison and return to our communities, this is a practice that punishes us all.

DEFUND PRISON WAITING FOR AN ECHO reimagines justice for a better future, as Montross detailed in a blockbuster essay for Time at pub. Her work speaks to this moment in a singular way. The book is a hard-fought argument for prison reform that should be read alongside SOLITARY, THE NEW JIM CROW, HELL IS A VERY SMALL PLACE, LOCKING UP OUR OWN, and AMERICAN PRISON.GREAT HARDCOVER RECEPTION Montross was featured in a brilliant "Fresh Air" interview at pub; WAITING FOR AN ECHO was a Times and Time book pick for the month; and it was rapturously reviewed at pub.BEAUTIFUL WRITING As in her previous books, BODY OF WORK and FALLING INTO THE FIRE, former poet Montross has an exquisite sensibility on the page. Montross' expertise in how the human mind functions-and malfunctions-is the golden thread through this work.URGENT ISSUES Christine was featured on "Fresh Air"; WAITING FOR AN ECHO was a Times and Time book pick for July 20; and it was widely reviewed at pub. The book is a hard-fought argument for prison reform that should be read alongside SOLITARY, THE NEW JIM CROW, HELL IS A VERY SMALL PLACE, LOCKING UP OUR OWN, and AMERICAN PRISON.NEW LENS ON PRISON REFORM FROM BELOVED HOUSE AUTHOR As a medical and mental health expert, Montross has examined complicated systems that may-or may not-be designed for human flourishing. Now she tackles perhaps the most challenging system of all: our system of incarcerations and punishment. Of punishment so brutal that it literally causes more mental illness.