Young People and the Curse of Ordinariness

1. Introduction. 2. A Story about difference. 3. Otherness. 4. Trying to be interesting. 5. Ordinariness and extraordinariness. 6. Special. 7. A brittle belief. 8. Ordinary death and ordinary sex. 9. The road not taken. 10. What if and what is. 11. A promised land. 12. Disillusioning. 13. Back to the garden. 14. Ordinary parents, ordinary professionals. 15. Afterword

This is an excellent book. Its 14 chapters -some quite short- are thoughtful and stimulating, theoretically sound but grounded in real life, lucid and readable. For those of us who want to understand a little better what makes our children and young people tick -not to mention ourselves- it has much to offer. I hope it will be widely read.