The Next Chapter is Jana Kramer’s intimate and moving account about setting her life back on the right path after her sudden divorce. Chronicling the year that follows, Jana relives personal stories of early traumas and past relationships, and with raw honesty she shares topics dear to her heart and music, including hearing God, loving oneself, navigating setbacks, female friendships, grief, and motherhood.

There is a voice of longing inside each woman. We strive so mightily to be good: good partners, daughters, mothers, employees, and friends. We hope all this striving will make us feel alive. Instead, it leaves us feeling weary, stuck, overwhelmed, and underwhelmed. We look at our lives and wonder: Wasn’t it all supposed to be more beautiful than this? We quickly silence that question, telling ourselves to be grateful, hiding our discontent—even from ourselves.

A few years ago, Kris Carr’s world was falling apart. Her father was dying, she had to pivot her business because of the pandemic, and she was on the verge of reaching her twenty-year milestone of living with an incurable Stage IV cancer diagnosis. While sitting in a CVS parking lot, she broke down, finally allowing herself to feel the massive stress and sadness she had been suppressing in order to seem strong for those around her, and for herself.

On June 4th, 2019, country music singer Granger Smith was enjoying a final evening with his kids before heading to Nashville for the CMT Music Awards and his next tour. While helping his daughter London with her gymnastics, his youngest son fell into their pool. Granger did everything he could to get to him, but he was too late. River drowned, and Granger's world shattered.

What could possibly be “lucky” about addiction? Absolutely nothing, thought Laura McKowen when drinking brought her to her knees. As she puts it, she “kicked and screamed . . . wishing for something - anything - else” to be her issue. The people who got to drink normally, she thought, were so damn lucky. But in the midst of early sobriety, when no longer able to anesthetize her pain and anxiety, she realized that she was actually the lucky one. Lucky to feel her feelings, live honestly, really be with her daughter, change her legacy.

As women, we are exhausted. Our hearts are being wrung out to dry - squeezed and yanked in every direction. We take care of everyone but ourselves. We've gotten lost in bedtime routines and our Costco lists. We have lost our voices in the storm of everyday life. We need to be reminded to reach inward and heed the quiet voice whispering, Stay. This book is for anyone who longs for a connection with God and his people but can't seem to escape the haunting feelings of guilt, shame, loneliness, and fear.

“Can I kiss you?” It was two months before the world premiere of Juno, and Elliot Page was in his first ever queer bar. The hot summer air hung heavy around him as he looked at her. And then it happened. In front of everyone. A previously unfathomable experience. Here he was on the precipice of discovering himself as a queer person, as a trans person. Getting closer to his desires, his dreams, himself, without the repression he’d carried for so long. But for Elliot, two steps forward had always come with one step back.

On January 21, 2008, a routine medical procedure left Mallory paralyzed from her waist down. Less than two years later, Mallory had broken eight world records, and by the 2012 Paralympic Games, she held fifteen world records and thirty-four American records. Two years after that, a devastating fall severely damaged her left arm. But despite all of the hardships that Mallory faced, she was sure about one thing: she refused to give up.

Laila Tarraf was the chief people officer for Peet’s Coffee and Tea, the iconic Berkeley coffee roaster, but she had a secret: She was failing in the most important relationships in her life. Yes, she was a strong and effective business leader, the successful daughter of immigrants, and the mother of a toddler, but she was disconnected from her own feelings ­and had little patience for those of others. All that changed, however, when three of the people most important to her - her husband, father, and mother - died in quick succession.

We all have past experiences we wish we could redo or undo altogether. In Nothing Wasted, counselor and teacher Kasey Van Norman's vulnerability invites you to discover God's personal and purposeful design for your future - not in spite of your story, but through it.

While on her way to teach a yoga retreat in March 2014, Rachel Brathen collapses at an airport, brought to her knees by excruciating stomach pains. She is rushed to the hospital on the tiny island of Bonaire and hours later forced to undergo surgery. When she wakes up from anesthesia, her boyfriend is weeping at her bedside. While Rachel was struck down with seemingly mysterious pain, her best friend, Andrea, sustained fatal injuries as a result of a car accident. Rachel and Andrea had a magical friendship.

Oksana Masters was born in Ukraine—in the shadow of Chernobyl—seemingly with the odds stacked against her. She came into the world with one kidney, a partial stomach, six toes on each foot, webbed fingers, no right bicep, and no thumbs. Her left leg was six inches shorter than her right, and she was missing both tibias.

When Steph Catudal met her husband Rivs, she thought that the love, stability, and warmth she shared with her husband had finally dispelled her pent-up anger and grief over the loss of her father and her faith. But when Rivs became ill and was put into coma at the height of the pandemic, the painful memories of her childhood—watching her father die of cancer—came flooding back.

Since he was 12, Brandon Sulser has survived four brushes with death. One of those life-threatening injuries left him paralyzed from the chest down. Although his life story appears to be unfair, Brandon knows that life is only negative and hard if you allow it to be. And in his experience, we are all paralyzed in our own way, by bad choices, by circumstance, by illness, and more. His paralysis happens to be more obvious than most, but make no mistake; we are all paralyzed. But we don't have to stay that way.

In Living Fully, Mallory shares her personal story of overcoming the unhealthy and damaging patterns in her life and shows listeners how to trade this for something completely new and more rewarding. What she discovered was there had always been a different life available to her, one that she had not yet seen.

After the tragic loss of her son and a marriage that ended in divorce and near-bankruptcy, world-renowned health and transformation expert Danette May found her life in shambles. But when her support seemed to come from few and her options seemed the most far between, she began to hear a voice inside her telling her it was time. May never predicted that her journey would take her into a world bikini competition, to a sacred healer in Costa Rica, or through a process of heart-wrenching forgiveness. Yet it was her soul's calling that led her there.

Rhythms of Renewal is your guide to daily rescue and a way forward into the peace your soul longs for. As a society, we are in the throes of a collective panic attack. Anxiety and loneliness are on the rise, with 77% of our population experiencing physical symptoms of stress on a regular basis. We feel pressure chasing careers, security, and keeping up. We worry about health, politics, and many other complexities we can't control. Eventually, we find our minds spinning, trying to cope or manage a low hum of anxiety, unlike ever before.

When their only child was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis (CF) at the age of two, Maryanne O'Hara and her husband were told that Caitlin could live a long life or be dead in a matter of months. Thirty-one years later, Caitlin lost her battle with this devastating disease following an excruciating two-year wait on the transplant list and a last-minute race to locate a pair of healthy lungs. The sudden spiral of events left Maryanne in an existential crisis, searching to find an answer to the eternal question: Why we are here?

With his signature acerbic wit and hilarious voice, 20-something author, blogger, and entrepreneur Shane Burcaw is back with an essay collection about living a full life in a body that many people perceive as a tragedy. From anecdotes about first introductions where people patted him on the head instead of shaking his hand, to stories of passersby mistaking his able-bodied girlfriend for a nurse, Shane tackles awkward situations and assumptions with humor and grace.

What could possibly be “lucky” about addiction? Absolutely nothing, thought Laura McKowen when drinking brought her to her knees. As she puts it, she “kicked and screamed . . . wishing for something - anything - else” to be her issue. The people who got to drink normally, she thought, were so damn lucky. But in the midst of early sobriety, when no longer able to anesthetize her pain and anxiety, she realized that she was actually the lucky one. Lucky to feel her feelings, live honestly, really be with her daughter, change her legacy.