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If you\u2019re like us, there are a few trusted guides you\u2019ve looked to for help making sense of a world turned suddenly upside down.\xa0One of our guides has been James Howard Kunstler. \nThe author of essential books like The Long Emergency, The Geography of Nowhere, and the World Made By Hand novels, Kunstler has for years been eerily prescient in his ability to imagine and interpret the future.\xa0Strong Towns president Chuck Marohn described The Long Emergency as \u201cthe most coherent narrative explanation I\u2019ve read of the converging crises our society is living through, particularly when it comes to the triple threats of energy, economy and environment.\u201d It's one of 15 books on the Strong Towns Essential Reading List,\xa0and somehow feels even more relevant today than when it was first published in 2005.\nKunstler\u2019s new book \u2014 Living in the Long Emergency: Global Crisis, the Failure of the Futurists, and the Early Adapters Who Are Showing Us the Way Forward \u2014 is once again spookily timed. We received requests from listeners that we interview him about the new book and the COVID-19 crisis...the very thing we were eager to do. So we\u2019re especially happy to welcome Jim Kunstler back in this week\u2019s episode of the Strong Towns podcast.\nIn this fascinating and wide-ranging discussion, Chuck and Jim look\xa0at the impact of the crisis on the automotive and airline industries, our food systems, and more. They discuss the social upheaval being caused by COVID-19, including the understandable anger from people who see the federal government bailing out Wall Street while their own jobs disappear. They talk too about the problems not only with the argument that COVID-19 will launch a suburban renaissance \u2014 \u201cAll the signs are that suburbia is not only going to fail, but it\u2019s going to fail pretty quickly and pretty harshly\u201d \u2014 but also with some urbanists\u2019 reflexive defense of cities.\nBut this conversation is not just doom-and-gloom, Chuck and Jim also discuss how Living in the Long Emergency provides a ray of hope in dark days. Just in time, the book helps us understand what\u2019s going on....and also how to create a healthy, vibrant, and enjoyable future.\nAdditional Show Notes\nKunstler.com\nKunstler's Monday & Friday Blog\nKunstlerCast\nLiving in the Long Emergency\nSupport Jim Kunstler\u2019s work on Patreon\xa0\nStrong Towns Essential Reading List (free ebook)\nStrong Towns Academy\nPrevious podcast interviews with Jim Kunstler\n\u201cIt\u2019s All Going to Have to Get Smaller\u201d (September 2019)\nThe Harrows of Spring (January 2017)