Why Does Gladwell Open His Audiobook With Troubles?

Malcolm Gladwell opens the audiobook with Drew Holcomb singing Troubles because a mass shooting is one of the rare moments when the reality of gun violence in the country hits home to the majority of people. Gladwell says in the book that mass shootings are a tiny part of the problem, and he still wanted the song for that reason.

Drew Holcomb is a singer in Nashville and a friend of Gladwell, and Holcomb is adopted. Holcomb had read the book. Gladwell likes music in audiobooks and asked Holcomb for any music that would work. Holcomb sent a song written one morning after driving kids to school and hearing about a mass shooting at a school. Gladwell calls Troubles haunting and beautiful, and the audiobook begins with Holcomb singing it. Listening made Gladwell cry. Holcomb had just dropped the kids off at school, then heard that 25 kids were shot in Uvalde, and Gladwell calls the news something so profane.

Gladwell says the emotional response is in some ways distinct from the rational response. He calls the response a bug and argues it really threatens a person's understanding of where they live. A place where adults go in and shoot the children is hard to reconcile with the society a person is participating in, or with the fact that people are capable of it.