This is probably the most important book on stuttering in print today. It is also one of the driest volumes in speech-language pathology I have ever read. Will tell you more about stuttering than you may want to know. Significantly, the material on treatment covers only 50 pages out of 600, so this is not the book you want to spend your money on if you are a speech therapist looking for treatment material. This is more of an overview of every scrap of research done on the subject since day one. Touches on every study ever done on the subject. Difficult reading because of its very dry, academic nature. Reads like one long journal article. ZZzzzzzz

Dr. Bloodstein's work will endure long after the current "how to make stuttering disappear" books via sleight of hand or "secret techniques" have been "swept away by the reality of their utter failure". Not an easy read, but an essential one for any clinician, scientist, or person who stutters. A complete reading will make one well-informed as to the nature of stuttering and decades of research findings- plus Bloodstein's cogent synthesis and interpretations. The critique on therapy in the back of the book is compelling, but all too often ignored.