Hardcover Edition

The Outrage Cure

How Overcoming Anger and Betrayal Can Transform the Way We Live, Connect and Heal

  • Language:
    Publisher:
  • English
    HarperCollins Canada
About The Outrage Cure:

From an award-winning physician, health innovator, and former head of the Canadian Medical Association comes a groundbreaking exploration of how anger and a sense of betrayal deepen into outrage when we lose hope that change is possible—and a guide to finding our way back, individually and together.

If you’ve found your way to this book, you may be troubled by the rising tension in the world around you. Perhaps you’ve been carrying a frustration that defies explanation, or you’ve watched someone close to you slowly slip into anger. Conversations that were once easy are now strained or distant. You may feel as if you’re walking on eggshells—or notice that others are on edge when they’re around you. You might not have the words for what you’re experiencing, but you know that something essential has been lost. Like trust. Even hope. If any of this feels familiar, you’re not alone. And you’re not wrong for feeling it.

The Outrage Cure draws on Dr. Alika Lafontaine’s decades of personal and professional experiences to reveal how outrage distorts the way we see one another, the systems we work in, and the stories we tell ourselves about who we are. The Outrage Cure doesn’t ask you to stop caring or to quiet your anger. Instead, it poses important, necessary questions: What happens when anger no longer moves us forward? What do we do when outrage, once a response to harm, becomes the harm itself? In answering these questions, it invites you to examine what we’re carrying, how it’s shaping us, and what it might take to put it down. The world may deserve your outrage. But you deserve more than what it leaves you with.

Critical Praise:

“Dr. Lafontaine has spent his career caring for others in a Canadian health-care system that is on fire. In his new book, he tackles the root causes of so much of our discontent—outrage: what it looks like, what it feels like and how to overcome it. He explains what it is biologically and how Canadians need to put aside outrage to build the just society we all seek. This is an honest explanation of what anger is and how we need to work through it for the health of ourselves, homes and nations.”

Tanya Talaga, author of The Knowing


“In a world boiling over with rampant anger, escalating outrage, political division and indifference for others, The Outrage Cure is a balm for the soul. With wisdom-filled stories, ranging from the deeply personal to societal in breadth, Alika Lafontaine reminds us that when we’re consumed by rage, we forsake key elements of building a better life: clarity, courage, connection and love.”

André Picard, health columnist for The Globe and Mail and author of Neglected No More


"Most of us have experienced the challenge of anger in our lives. Seen how it disrupts, how it affects relationships. We try to deal with it and move on, but the scars often linger. What we rarely do is try to understand why—why do anger and outrage happen in the first place, where do they come from, and how do we best confront them? My friend, Dr. Alika Lafontaine, is no different than the rest of us, and in The Outrage Cure he's brutally honest about how anger has affected his life and what he's doing about it."

Peter Mansbridge


“If you’ve had a falling out with a family member or friend, or you know someone who has, The Outrage Cure is the one book you must read. With incredible courage and integrity, Dr. Alika Lafontaine explores the anger that ruptured the bond he had with his closest friend and shows us how we might reclaim lost bonds by reclaiming our better selves.”

Dr. Brian Goldman, CBC Radio host and author of The Casino Shift

About the Author(s):

ALIKA LAFONTAINE, MD is an award-winning physician, innovator, public speaker, and one of Canada’s leading advocates for social change. He is an Associate Clinical Professor in the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at the University of Alberta and a rural anesthesiologist. Named Maclean’s top Health Care Innovator of 2023, Dr. Lafontaine was the first Indigenous doctor and the youngest physician to lead the Canadian Medical Association (CMA) in its 156-year history.

With a mixed Indigenous ancestry of Metis, Oji-Cree and Pacific Islander, Dr. Lafontaine is a Canada’s Top 40 under 40 recipient, former host of the podcast, The Healthcare Divide, and Chairs the board of the Downie Wenjack Fund, a national charity focused on reconciliation.