[QCrit] DE-NIHLISM: The Collapse of Belief in the Modern World , 50,000, Nonfiction/Psychology (First Attempt)
Hey all. Looking for any guidance you can provide. I've tried a few times to parlay my unique professional and lived experience into nonfiction works (memoir, self-help themed related to the lessons and transitions from poverty to my current job). This time focusing more so on an issue book. Not sure how this would be received or looked at so anything helps!
Dear agent,
I am seeking representation for DE-NIHLISM, a work of accessible philosophical psychology and cultural criticism exploring why modern society feels increasingly fragmented, tribal, reactive, and disconnected from authentic meaning despite unprecedented access to information and connection.
DE-NIHLISM argues that modern society is not suffering from a collapse of information, but from a collapse of authentic belief. Human beings are not primarily rational creatures guided by objective principles, but emotional and social beings who construct identity structures for survival beginning in childhood. Political, religious, ideological, and social identities increasingly become extensions of the self rather than consciously examined principles. As a result, people often defend beliefs emotionally while experiencing themselves as rational and morally consistent. Challenges to worldview feel threatening not simply because ideas are being questioned, but because the constructed self itself feels at risk of unraveling.
Drawing from psychology, existential philosophy, and contemporary culture, I examine how technology, social media, consumer culture, and modern tribal systems intensify this process by continuously reinforcing emotionally satisfying narratives while reducing the need for introspection, ambiguity, or existential struggle. People increasingly inhabit separate identity-reinforcing realities, mistaking outrage, certainty, and performance for conviction while becoming more fragmented and disconnected from authentic meaning.
Ultimately, DE-NIHLISM argues that without deeply examined belief and some form of shared orienting meaning, societies drift toward nihilism, resentment, distraction, and identity warfare while mistaking all of it for conviction. The book offers a path beyond nihilism not through rigid certainty or ideological purity, but through self-examination, tolerating uncertainty, loosening attachment to ego structures, and consciously constructing meaning rooted in authentic engagement with existence.
DE-NIHLISM will appeal to readers of The Righteous Mind, The Coddling of the American Mind, Stolen Focus, and The Denial of Death.
I am a mental health therapist and performance coach at an upper-tier practice in New York City, where I work with high-profile clients including executives, elite athletes, entertainers, politicians, and hedge fund managers. Raised in generational poverty by parents struggling with mental illness and substance abuse and beginning my career working exclusively with low income trauma populations, my perspective is informed both by clinical work and firsthand experience navigating identity, meaning, trauma, and social mobility. I also previously secured literary representation for fiction works.
Thank you for your time and consideration,
Me