Kin: The Future of Family

Summary

Discover a transformative reframing of intimate relationships with practical steps to build community and combat the loneliness epidemic in this bold and warmhearted blend of memoir and social science in the vein of When You Care and Big Friendship.

What would life look like if all your needs, and the needs of all the people you love, were met?

When we’re juggling a mountain of responsibilities on our own, it feels like there simply isn’t enough time to take care of ourselves, our families, and our to-do lists. And even when we’re partnered and surrounded by friends, we’re often too afraid to ask for help. But to survive today’s age of overwork and precarity, we need to turn to our relationships for the support we need to stay afloat, whether it’s financial, emotional, or otherwise. So why don’t we?

Now, in Kin, Sophie Lucido Johnson explores the social science of friendship and provides the tools to forge kinship: relationships built on mutual care and shared resources that extend beyond the typical nuclear family or casual friendship. Lucido Johnson lays out the steps you need to gain the full, mutual benefits of kin, including being radically honest about your needs and eliminating relationship hierarchies from your life. From asking for help on a grocery run, to choosing to have roommates later in life to combat loneliness, to living in modern day “mommunes” of single mothers sharing bills and responsibilities, Kin shows the vast range of kinship structures she and others are thriving in—and how to build your own community of support.

Through personal stories and insights from psychologists and sociologists, Kin reveals how to prosper in an increasingly overwhelming and lonely world, that everyone has access to community, and that kin has the power to drastically change our lives for the better.