I purchased this book hoping it would help allay some of my guilt over my son's disorder. Although it didn't help me very much, it's probably worth reading if you are struggling with these issues.

If you are a parent and are questioning whether or not you should medicate your child, you should read this book. No parent wants to put their child on medicine. This book has helped me realize that medicine is needed for certain disorders and therapy alone does not work all of the time. This book is very informative and will help you understand that yes, medicine does help along with therapy. I enjoyed reading and realize that I am not alone and there is help.

This book was so helpful to my husband and me when our son was diagnosed with ADHD. This really helped us to stop second-guessing ourselves and offers helpful advice on the issues of finding a good doctor and whether or not to medicate. Though learning that ADHD is a brain disorder was painful, it was comforting to learn that there was nothing we could have done to prevent it!

Sure the images are quite beautiful and the information is compelling in this book. It would look really great on your coffee table, the color reproductions are excellent. However, selling the art of children with mental illness and trauma and other serious problems does bring up some questions about ethics. And why were not the therapists who gathered the work for these "editors" not given more credit for their contributions (they were only listed in the back, as if they were a sidebar when indeed their efforts made this book happen). It seems that only the authors came out ahead in this endeavor, both through publicity and royalties.
I am wondering if these authors will next be capitalizing on the art of children who witnessed the WTC terrorist attacks. Seems like a logical follow-up to this book, although I hope they have the morals to handle the material in a less sensational, self-serving way.

The images in this book are very moving and the stories are poignant. But the reader is left to wonder-- is it really in the children's best interest to have their stories and images laid out in a coffee table book? Children do not understand informed consent and the use of their images, which are treated for the most part sensitively, so one is left considering the question, how or were their rights addressed in using their artwork in this way? I think this book is worth the purchase, I am, however, wondering what the authors' agenda was in getting it published.

Having scored with his well-presented previous book "It's Nobody's Fault",Dr. Koplewicz, his collegues and a few famous friends are back with a moving and powerful book of art and expression that deserves to be displayed on any coffee table. With thoughtful insight on the topic of mental health coming from notables such as NBC's Katie Couric and Whoopi Goldberg, to the average teenager who has expressed his or her pain and thoughts through art, the book presents their story in a tastefull collection. The meaning behind this book paints a picture that should should not go unnoticed-the treatment of mental health among our youth. Pick up this book for just one moment, and you are sure to be moved.

Koplewics has long been a leading advocate of psychiatric drugs for kids. In a June 17, 1999 story for Salon.com he said, "I actually think we're not medicating kids enough." This book is his attempt to get more kids on mind-altering drugs.

It is simply astonishing how Koplewics ignores the mountains of evidence in his own book that childhood problems have non-biological causes (relationships, life events, cultural factors) and real physical causes (e.g., hormones) and instead pushes pills - without offering a shred of evidence that these kids have bad brains. Of course, in this regard he displays a common trait of psychiatrists - the dismissal of the obvious in favor of the hypothetical and untestable.

Just so no kid misses his or her pharmocological treat, there are the multitude of different types of depression followed by the all encompassing caveat: "none of this is etched in stone." In other words, don't be discouraged if your kid doesn't meet all the criteria. We've got a diagnosis for everyone. (One is reminded of the statement in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV)(xxii): "In DSM-IV, there is not assumption that each category of mental disorder is a completely discrete entity with absolute boundaries dividing it from other mental disorders or from no mental disorder." Imagine a real doctor saying diabetes is not a distinct entity with boundaries dividing it from cancer, an infection or complete health.)

There are the unquestioned and unexamined platitudes: "adolesence is demoralizing almost by definition." Understandable feelings are redefined as "symptoms" of illness. A fear of the future (we're all so confident of the future, aren't we?) becomes "Generalized Anxiety Disorder." Fears of the family well-being (imagine a kid being concerned about that!) become "Separation Anxiety Disorder."

Koplewics writes, "It's the duration of the symptoms that tell if a teenager has crossed the line into depression." Says who? Psychiatrist Nancy Andreasen, editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Psychiatry, has written (Science, vol. 275,14 March 97), "thresholds based upon duration ... are boundaries of convenience ... not boundaries with any inherent biological meaning."

Koplewics attitude towards children is often patronizing. One girl's description of a horrible childhood is described by Koplewics as "the product of the drama of adolescence."

Questionable "facts" and outright untruth abound in the book. According to Koplewics, the newer antidepressants (SSRIs) "have fewer side-effects" and "have always been found to be more effective than placebos." Not so. In his 1999 textbook, The Fundamentals of Clinical Neuropsychiatry, Dr. Michael Alan Taylor writes, "It is a mistake to think that one class of drug is 'safer' or has 'fewer' side effects .... Taylor specifically cites claims about the SSRIs

A July, 2002 analysis by George Washington University's Thomas Moore of 47 studies used by the FDA in approving six antidepressants found that in over half the studies, the drugs were no better than placebo. The overall slight benefit antidepressants had over placebo were found to be "not meaningful for people in clinical settings."

Koplewics ignores the side-effects of drugs and the withdrawal effects. Failed treatment is excused because, of course, one never recovers from psychiatric "illness." Typical is this statement: "That Jesse [treated with drugs as an adolescent] has depression as an adult is not a surprise."

Ho-hum. Failed treatment is all part of a days work.

This book is a real page turner! I could not put it down. As a teenager I suffered from severe bouts of depression and I wish a book like this was available for my parents to read. Now as a parent of an adolescent who suffers from depression I can empathize with the teenagers, their parents and the stories in this book. More than Moody is not filled with a lot of psycho babble, but rather with easy to read and comprehend stories and situations we can all relate to and the various treatments available. Thank you Dr. Koplewicz for giving my family the thing we've been searching for - Thank you for giving us hope.

As a mother who has two children that have suffered from teenage depression, this book is a true breath of fresh air. Koplewicz sheds light to the distiction between regular behavior and clinical depression in an entertaining and informative way that I have not experienced after personally researching the topic for five years.

Thank you Dr. Koplewicz.