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This book was given to me by my wife to read as our girls transition into the teenage years. First let me start out with the positives. It is refreshing to read an author who actually engages in scholarly reading on a topic. And, likewise, it's nice to read an author who clearly has spent time with teenagers. And this experience and scholarship shows in a number of key areas: the prominence and prevalence of internet/media in the lives of our girls shapes them in ways previous generations never had to deal with. She does an excellent job of walking through the consequences of underestimating the reach and pull of the internet in the lives of our girls. Then she gives some very practical strategies for dealing with this. So also, when it comes to the use or rather, the abuse of drugs, she shows the candor of one (who like me) has seen people's lives destroyed by substance abuse. She mentions two key facts that the 'legalize marijuana' groups don't like to mention: First, the THC in marijuana products is more than 5 times more potent than in the Baby-boomer years of old. Second, she repeated the fact that anyone who has dealt with substance abuse in teens knows well: the age at which the teen abuses substances, in intellect and maturity, that's the age at which the teen stays. I give the preceding as a sampling of examples of why it is good to read this book—both to see the issues our girls face and to be given strategies to address them.

On the negative side, the final chapters about sexuality are sadly lacking in scope and wisdom. After laying the thorough foundation in the beginning chapters that a teenage girl's brain isn't fully developed until her early twenties, she then, when it comes to sexuality gives the advice that we should just ask what the girl wants (p. 206). It's hard to get more inconsistent than that. Further on she mentions that there are some young women who study first and then experiment. But there are others who experiment (sexually) and then study the results after. And she concludes that both are viable approaches (p. 216). As one who counsels women as part of my every day work, I can say that the approach of experimenting first and studying later on yields tragic results that young women then have to shoulder and deal with the rest of their lives. What she outlines here is not good advice. There is more I could add here. But it will be enough to say, that in the area of human sexuality, Damour's advice is not as much substance as it is well-wishing.