Hush (The Health Crisis of Noise and the Extraordinary Gifts of Quiet)

A groundbreaking revelation of the cost of noise pollution and an actionable plan for soundproofing your life and protecting your peace—from an award-winning public health journalist.

From traffic to construction to constant notifications and beyond, modern life is rife with noise triggers. In Hush, journalist Joanne Silberner exposes how this unmitigated noise creep has become a hidden toxin that affects us all, posing nothing less than a healthcare crisis.

Urgent and eye-opening, Hush tells the story of manmade sound in everyday life through investigative reporting and frontlines scientific research to reveal the startling ways noise infiltrates every corner of our lives, eroding our sense of psychological safety and wellbeing, raising our risk for diseases, harming wildlife, and disrupting the natural world.

Yet relief is within reach. Hush maps out an actionable path to protecting yourself from noise stressors, and preserving the peace and quiet upon which human health and happiness depends.

Silberner takes readers on a journey from the Amazon rainforest, where survival depends on listening, to the depths of the ocean, now dubbed “acoustic hell” by marine biologists, to an anechoic chamber where silence is measured in negative decibels. Along the way, she reveals the profound physical, mental, and emotional benefits of quiet, ranging from:

• improved brain function and neuroplasticity,
• reduced stress,
• enhanced creativity,
• increased capacity to be present,
• and more.

With practical strategies for reclaiming quiet in your own life—like measuring decibels with your smartphone—and a passionate argument for making silence as accessible as clean air and water, Hush is required reading for anyone who’s ever craved calm amid the clamor of modern life. The transformative power of quiet awaits.