This Is Where You Belong
The Art and Science of Loving the Place You Live

In the spirit of Gretchen Rubins The Happiness Project and Eric Weiners The Geography of Bliss, a journalist embarks on a project to discover what it takes to love where you live. The average restless American will move 11.7 times in a lifetime. For Melody Warnick, it was her sixth move, from Austin, Texas, to Blacksburg, Virginia, that threatened to unhinge her. In the lonely aftermath of unpacking, she wondered: Arent we supposed to put down roots at some point? How does the place we live become the place we want to stay? This time she had an epiphany. Rather than hold her breath and hope this new town would be her familys perfect fit, she would figure out how to fall in love with itno matter what. How we come to feel at home in our towns and cities is what Warnick sets out to discover in This Is Where You Belong. She dives into the body of research around place attachmentthe deep sense of connection that binds some of us to our cities and increases our physical and emotional well-beingthen travels to towns across America to see it in action. Inspired by a growing movement of placemaking, she examines what its practitioners are doing to create likable locales. She also speaks with frequent movers and loyal stayers around the country to learn what draws highly mobile Americans to a new city, and what makes us stay. The best ideas she imports to her adopted hometown of Blacksburg for a series of Love Where You Live experiments designed to make her feel more locally connected: dining with her neighbors, shopping Small Business Saturday, marching in the town Christmas parade. Can these efforts make a halfhearted resident happier? Will Blacksburg be the place she finally stays? What Warnick learns will inspire you to embrace your own communityand perhaps discover that the place where you live right now is home.