Anger: Why Your Fuse Got So Short and What's Actually Behind It

by Kate Mercer

Do you find yourself snapping at your partner over a sink full of dishes? Does a minor traffic delay send you into a white-knuckled rage? If you are tired of being told to 'just breathe' or 'count to ten' when your brain has already hit the detonator, this book is for you. In ‘Anger’, journalist Kate Mercer skips the moralizing and goes straight to the biology of the 'Midnight Snap.' Drawing on neuroscience and polyvagal theory, Mercer reframes your rage not as a character flaw, but as a 'bodyguard emotion'—a high-energy shield protecting your most vulnerable parts.

You’ll discover why your prefrontal cortex goes offline during a hijack, how your nervous system's 'smoke alarm' gets over-calibrated, and why traditional 'venting' actually makes you angrier. This is an unsentimental, research-backed field guide to widening the gap between the trigger and the explosion. Learn how to stand down the bodyguard, recalibrate your internal threshold, and reclaim your calm from the inside out.

99 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 9, 2026