Michael Joseph signs second 'life-changing' book from Dr Julie Smith

Penguin Michael Joseph has scooped Open When..., the second book from clinical psychologist Dr Julie Smith.

Publisher Ione Walder acquired UK and Commonwealth rights from Amanda Harris at YMU Literary. The book will be published on 2nd January 2025 simultaneously with HarperOne in the US. 

Open When... follows Smith’s British Book Award-shortlisted Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before?. It combines "messages of hope and compassion with simple, immediate, effective advice to alleviate over two dozen common situations, from overthinking to grieving". Smith wrote Open When... in response to feedback from readers who said they carried Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before? for moments of crisis. Open When... is designed for such moments.

Smith, also an "online educator" with a combined following of over seven million, commented: "This is the book I wish I’d been able to press into the hands of clients as they finished therapy. It’s the book I will slip into the suitcase of each of my children when they leave home for the first time, and it’s the book I will be sending across the world to family and friends who, like so many of us, face life’s difficult moments quietly and alone."

Walder added: "When a book is as phenomenally successful and universally helpful as Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before?, it can feel like a difficult act to follow, both for author and for publisher. But I truly believe that in Open When…, Julie has written something just as brilliant, just as vital and just as life-changing—a book which serves a different but complementary purpose to her first book, which readers can turn to whenever life gets tricky."