0-19: Book Review

Understanding Your Baby/ One Year-Old/Two-Year-Old/Three
Year-Old Series

Editor Jonathan Bradley

Published by Jessica Kingsley

£8.95 each, ISBNs: 1843102420, 1843102412,
1843102889, 1843102439

Star Rating: 4/5

Don’t be put off by the lack of pictures and the close typed
text in these four slim volumes; once you have tuned into the
format they are a rich resource of balanced, sensitive and
non-judgemental advice to help parents and professionals looking
after children, writes Annie O’Brian.

The central subject is the mental and emotional development of
children and their parents. And the style is intelligent and
friendly – although a degree of brain power is required to get
through some of the sentences and concepts.

That said, each book is divided into very easily digestible
sections, with excellent (and often very funny) case studies
scattered liberally throughout and a really detailed contents page
for those “where did I see that bit about…” moments.

Understanding Your Baby is further divided into weeks and
months.

The books form a cohesive and continuous guide to almost
everything I have ever wondered about bringing up my children. I
learnt a lot. And a friend, mother of her first two-year-old, could
not wait to get her hands on these when I described them.

They are now going into our bathroom “reference library” for
family and visitors to peruse and digest.

Annie O’Brian works for family support charity Home
Start and is a mother of three boys aged between one and
seven.