SPIRITUAL focus on books November 29, 2004 Issue

Straight talk about teenagers

By Kim Shippey

Having survived the raising of five teenagers in my own home, I welcome the publication this month of Mimi Doe's Nurturing Your Teenager's Soul (Perigree Trade Paperback Original). I really could have used it 20 years ago.

Doe, author of three previous books and hundreds of parenting columns, and a mother of two teenagers, is all about straight talk. She tells it how she sees it and leaves parents and guardians to draw their own conclusions and make their own adaptations.

She acknowledges that overwhelming pressures assail young people today—among them, peer influences, the hazards of substance abuse and sexual activity, the risks and freedoms of driving and dating, and the pressure to succeed in school and get into a good college. And parents try to help by advising, warning, solving homework problems, turning over their car keys, waiting up into the wee hours, and touring multiple college campuses to find the right one.

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