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WINNER - Best Audiobook at the 2021 Business Book Awards

This is a laugh out loud, narrative-driven self-help book. Think Bridget Jones gets a critical makeover.

In Why Smart Women Make Bad Decisions, our protagonist Kat is learning that the philosophy of ‘Believe-in-yourself-and Magic-will-happen’ will not deliver her a better life. Her story, which recounts her hapless attempts to navigate scenarios disturbingly familiar to many readers, is presented with a companion account of the cognitive quirks that drive her faulty thinking and behaviour.  

This is neuroscience explained through the lens of a modern comedy; the buggy brain stripped bare in a laugh out loud take down of magical thinking and the goofy, delusional self-actualisation movement. 

Kat discovers that the simplistic advice to honour your intuition is not all it’s cracked up to be. Despite practising Gratitude and Acceptance, she is still failing to lose the 2.35 kilos that preoccupy her. Despite her Positive Thinking, her performance review leaves her limp with despair, and despite her assiduous application to making affirmations, her philandering Hipster Boyfriend leaves her (taking with him the remote control).

In the companion explanation to each chapter, author explains to readers what drives people to behave in blindly optimistic and self-destructive ways. If only they could apply the critical thinking that our narrator suggests, smart women would indeed stop making bad decisions.

It becomes clear to Kat, and in turn the reader, that positive thinking, meditation and magical thinking will not turn her life around. Instead, women should apply the narrator’s advice and change the inherent cognitive flaws that run, and often ruin, their lives.

PRAISE FOR WHY SMART WOMEN MAKE BAD DECISIONS

'This book is aimed unashamedly at women, and the non-skeptic, but everyone will recognise aspects of Kat in themselves. It would make a great Christmas present and is highly recommended.'
Skeptics Magazine

'I didn't realise how greatly the literary world was lacking a book like this until I held this novel in my hands.'
Ashleigh's Booked Out

'The thing about Annie McCubbin's writing is the detail. It's specific and concrete and it makes you laugh out loud when you read it because you instantly relate to it. It's great storytelling, and because the story in this book is so good, you remember the science that goes with it.'
Katrina Foster, Lecturer, Writing for Performance, NIDA

'Wow! What an achievement. I loved every part of it and wished it wouldn't end.'
Nikki Pender, NZ barrister and business director

'A book for our times - a serious yet entertaining look at how women can take control personally and professionally. It is also a book for men, who will surely recognise themselves or their friends somewhere in these pages and be motivated to act.'
Dagmar Schmidmaier AM, Director, CEW Leaders Program

'Engaging, humorous and thought-provoking, Why Smart Women Make Bad Decisions is a must read for every 25- to 45-year-old woman.'
Amelia Russell, retail buying manager

'Kat's fast-moving second-person inner-monologue made me laugh out loud! Annie McCubbin uses her humour and humanity to share some pertinent insights into how we can untangle our thinking and engage more meaningfully with ourselves and those around us.'
Odile LeClezio, actor and voice coach

'This is brilliant. The book that HAS to be read right now. My genuine hope is that this book is lapped up.'
Lyndall Russell, clinical psychotherapist and transformational leadership strategist

Books by Annie McCubbin

Podcasts by Annie McCubbin