*will be published on August 29th

I have to say I'm very impressed with the sudden surge of mental health resources being geared toward teens. I love that teens are being provided the tools to take charge of their lives and empower themselves.

There was great material in this book. It broke down the science of things without being overwhelming. It also provided stories/interviews with real teens and young adults who explained how they used the tips in this book to manage their anxiety.

The tips were simple when you looked at them, but they made so much sense. The biggest one that resonated with me was the one about your comfort zone. Sometimes being in your "comfort zone" can be lonely--that really stuck with me because it made me realize that was kind of how I was feeling at the time. I'm an introvert who tends to stick to what I know. I'm reluctant to try new things and often get really anxious about changes so I avoid them altogether. Yet, around the time that I was reading this book I was feeling restless in a way I couldn't explain until I read that chapter. I realized I had an urge to do things differently. I was tired of my usual routine. Honestly, that chapter is what pushed me recently to try and overcome my driving anxiety and it's the first time I feel like I'm actually succeeding at it.

Other chapters also went into detail about how to deal with conflict in your friend group and how it's good to distance yourself a little from social media. Both of these were really great sections and I loved them! Personally, it took me a long time to understand why I didn't like social media as a teen, but this book explained it perfectly. It went over the damaging way people compare themselves to others and how mentally draining it can be. I think it's so important that teens know that in today's world where social media is so integral to our lives. Plus, it takes time away from really connecting with the friends and family who are your support system.

All in all, this was a solid book perfect for any teen looking to grow and be more confident with themselves!

The Teen Girl’s Anxiety Survival Guide by Lucie Hemmen is another great mental health resource from New Harbinger. This guide provides useful information for therapists to incorporate into their practices when working with teenagers or for teenagers benefit from if they are struggling with anxiety. #TheTeenGirlsAnxietySurvivalGuide #NetGalley

Many teens and adults understand what it is to deal with anxiety, and this book was a great guide that gave simple and clear steps to help conquer the anxiety. I didn't learn how to control my anxiety until I was well into my 20's, and many of the steps I now take were included in this guide. This is a book I wish I would have had when I was younger, because it is a great aid to anyone who is just learning how to deal with their anxiety.

Ugh. I wanted to love this book.
Hell, there are definitely some things that make it worth reading.

But, no, Anxiety is not a gift!
Yes, normal levels of anxiety is good. We feel anxious when we sense danger.
But, anxiety disorders, social anxiety, panic attacks, etc, are NOT A GIFT!

Attitudes like that will not help those who truly need help.
I have two kids who have severe anxiety. I would love to call it a gift and force it away. But it doesn't work like that.

This was very helpful in working with my adolescent clients. As a social worker it’s great to have resources available to help clients with anxiety.

I would give The Teen Girl's Anxiety Survival Guide a 4 star review because. this book gives the readers some helpful tips for Anxiety that makes life so much easier.

I read this with my teenage daughter and we both loved it. I liked that it’s a guide to help teen girls sort through their anxiety and find ways to get through it. As someone who has suffered from anxiety for ,most of my life I found that there were tips that I could also incorporate to help me as well. My daughter said she liked it because it was easy to understand and not confusing at all. She also loved the examples from real girls and said their stories made her not feel so alone. There are quite a few ideas that she’s eager to try out. We both feel like this is a great book for teen girls or anyone who suffers from anxiety.

This workbook provides good recommendations with solid descriptions of how to put them into practice. I love the chapter on self-care as I think this is something that is so often over looked in society as a whole. Elements of CBT are described well and in simple enough language that teens will easily understand the concepts and be able to put them into practice on their own. This is a good workbook for counselors to add to their libraries.

I am so far beyond DONE with people saying anxiety is a gift or a helpful survival mechanism or a good thing because yes, NORMAL LEVELS of anxiety is all fine and good, but the type of anxiety that's talked about in this book, the type of girls who are going to reach for a book for help with their anxiety- this kind of anxiety is not a 'gift.' It's painful and it causes so much stress and can very literally destroy your life. Especially for young girls who don't understand what they're going through or don't know how to handle or manage their anxiety.

Trying to make something that young girls are suffering from seem less bad by calling it a gift is not, in any way, helpful. Not to the teens, not to their families, and not to their educators and friends. It minimizes the very real damage that anxiety causes and contributes even more to those suffering feeling like they're not being heard. And I'm speaking from first-hand knowledge on this one.

I wanted to read this book because I wish I had access to books on anxiety and learning to understand myself when I was a teen, but these types of materials weren't accessible to me at that time. I was hoping that I would find good, solid advice in this book. And some things were helpful. I particularly appreciated laying the book out into different steps and options, so that the author can reach a wider audience. Even if one thing doesn't apply to you, then maybe something else will. Other things can help.

However, the author's explanation of anxiety just felt tone deaf to me, and this isn't an issue I've found to be exclusive to this author, but to therapists and psychiatrists as a whole. I have never once met a mental health professional who didn't try to tell me that my anxiety was a good thing because it was a survival mechanism for the stone ages.

I get that. I really do, and in some ways this explanation can be interesting from an outsider perspective, but it's not what someone wants to hear when they're asking for help managing their anxiety. No amount of sunshine or glitter is going to make anxiety stop wrecking my life. Eventually I did learn ways of managing my anxiety. It took a lot of trial and error on my own, but eventually I found some things that work for me. I really truly wish I'd had access to more resources that would have helped me sort that out much sooner.

What I think a lot of mental health professionals don't understand is that many of us have tried other solutions before coming to get professional help. We've talked to friends and family and we've exhausted a lot of other options before resorting to spending money to talk to someone. By the time we reach them, we're so used to being gaslit and having our problems minimized that it's really easy to cause someone, especially someone with anxiety, to completely shut down and/or discontinue services if we feel like we're being spoken down to or like our problems aren't that big of a deal. And that's what this book did to me. Minimized the effects of anxiety.

Another thing that really grated on my nerves with this book was the slang. The author seemed like she was trying to be cool or something and use slang, but she undershot by about a decade and ended up using a lot of outdated terms and language, which gave the book a juvenile, condescending tone. Again, not really helpful for people with anxiety.

This felt like a book written more for pre-teens who are struggling with managing normal stress levels than a book for teens who are actually struggling with managing clinical anxiety. I cannot recommend this book, and would even go so far as to say, depending on the person, this book could actually cause more harm than help.

Thank you NetGalley and New Harbinger Publications for the advance e*book edition of The Teen Girl's Anxiety Survival Guide by Lucie Hemmen. The advanced copy is in exchange for an honest review

This is a real thought out book written in language that can be easily understood by young girls who suffer from anxiety. The author gave a realistic explanation of anxiety and did not overwhelm with techniques to help. She gave 10 skills which is a realistic number.

My only downside to the book is the title, I would have preferred the book be titles for "Teens" and not girls. The wording in the title could make people who a could benefit from its contents, instead hesitate to pick it up. In a society with so much pressure and stress on our youth and all forms of mental health concerns on the rise, the limited title makes me give the book 3 stars. The same exact book with TEENS rather than GIRLS would be a 5 stars rating

I have been reading a few books on anxiety, but few are as practical for a teen audience as this book. Let me talk about what works.

First, offering teen girls 10 practical strategies. often times, as a parent navigating these books, the lessons or "help" is not readily apparent. What I am seeking in working with my teen girl is practical advice that does not require me to be a therapist myself. This book is user-friendly, and easy to navigate. My daughter and I had fruitful discussions about the book, and for that I am so grateful.

I suppose there is one thing that (though it is no fault of the author) grate on my nerves. It exhausts me that self-care is used too often. Making that term a major tenet of a book to help a teen girl cope with anxiety is problematic. Again, let me reiterate that this is a personal statement. Self care means so many things, and can show up in a lot of ways. Sometimes self care is sleeping when you are exhausted by life and stress. Sometimes self care is leaving toxic relationships.

That being said, thank you for an early copy of this book. I truly appreciate the practical, helpful advice.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing an e-copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Title: The Teen Girl’s Anxiety Survival Guide: Ten Ways to Conquer Anxiety and Feel Your Best
Author: Lucie Hemmen
Publication Date: February 1, 2021

Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

Review: The Teen Girl’s Anxiety Survival Guide is a simple book that breaks down basic anxiety struggles. One thing I loved was the input from teens who struggle with anxiety in real life.

I’m going to be breaking this down into multiple things I disliked about it, read on if you’d please.

This book made anxiety seem like a little spider that could be squashed if you put enough glitter on it. The author described having anxiety as a gift, multiple times. Anxiety is not a gift, if you don’t struggle with anxiety, then I see how you can see the mental illness that way, but as someone with severe anxiety it felt like I was being gaslighted. The tips were simple things like “going outside” and “taking a bubble bath.” Anxiety isn’t solved by that, unless it’s surface level anxiety.

This book also made anxiety just seem like regular phobias. One interviewee said her anxiety stemmed from planes and another was her friends not liking her. I’m not ignoring that these are real anxieties but many people suffer from anxieties that are more complicated and invisible from basic descriptions. I don’t know what my anxiety stems from, but I suffer from it almost every day without fault, I don’t just ‘recover‘ by doing square breathing.

Another thing I didn’t like was how the author tried to act like she was down with the times. Using things like “tbh” or “when your crush doesn’t Snap (Snapchat) you back.”

The final thing I have to say is I strongly disliked how gendered it was. It made it seem like only teen girls have anxiety and theirs is the only one that is valid. As a teen girl, this is not true and only stems to the patriarchy we’re all trying to smash. Boys get anxiety, non-binary folks get anxiety, trans people get anxiety. Everyone who suffers with anxiety has anxiety.

Overall, I would not recommend this book. Unless it’s for a 10-12 year old girl (because of how gendered it is) who doesn’t have anxiety but gets stressed out often.

As someone in their early 20s who deals with a lot of stress, I was curious to see if this book was able to provide some insights.

Overall, I thought this book had a lot of the understandings that teenagers usually are very self-aware of these issues that feed into their anxiety. The interviews with teenagers were a nice touch. I liked the small "Nerd Alert" and "Noodle This" sections, especially when they recommended TED talks or other interesting resources that could be explored if the reader wanted to.

However, what bothered me was how the word-choice of the book sometimes felt a bit too much like the authors were trying to be relatable to teenagers but overshot into a bit of a condescending tone. I cringed while reading the sentence "Can you just see the fat boo‑boo in that kind of thinking?", and I'm the kind of person who wouldn't hesitate to use the type of casual slang that most of the book has. This happened a few times in the first half of the book, which is enough to be memorable, so one star off for that. Otherwise, a pretty good book.

A thank you to New Harbinger Publications and NetGalley for this ARC!

I REALLY enjoyed this book. I have used this book to assist a few of the teen girls I currently work with and I can see some changes in the thought pattern! THANK YOU!

3 Stars

Thank You to Netgalley for providing a free E-ARC in exchange for an honest review. I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

When I saw this book on Netgalley, it most certainly caught my eye. Being someone who is frequently stressed, I thought this book would be perfect to read, hoping I could learn some tips and facts about anxiety.

And after finishing it, I'd say I have mixed feelings about this book.

To start, I thought the writing was clear, most likely since the author is a practicing psychologist. It flowed perfectly, and although the chapters were quite long, once you sat down and got into it, it was a quick read. However, I wasn’t a fan of the word choice. There was just a lot of figurative language and jokes. For being a book about anxiety, it was just too cheerful.

Anxiety is a storm cloud over your head, but in parts of this book, it acted like anxiety was a rainbow almost. Don’t get me wrong, it talked about how anxiety sucks and it is daunting at some parts, but, overall it just seemed to unintentionally come off as pleasant. Now, of course, you don’t want to make depressed teenagers read dismal books. You most certainly need courage and jokes in a book about such a heavy topic. But, in order (personally) for me to relate and understand the tips, I needed to relate to the problem first. Anxiety sucks, it truly does. It’s heavy and depressing. And in this book, I felt like the information described and some of the words changed to make it lighter, made it harder to relate to.

My experience hasn’t been rainbows and unicorns, so when I read a book that talked about anxiety using so many similies and so much optimism, I just couldn’t understand it as well. It just made me feel a bit uncomfortable, thinking that my situation should be sucky, but still easy to manage and smiley. Overall, this was the biggest complaint. But, just because I find it easier to read a slightly heavier book on anxiety, doesn’t mean this book will be uncomfortable for you. You might find reading a cozier and lighter book better because I think it truly depends on your situation and taste!

Now, aside from the structure and word-choice, I thought some of the tips were great! Going into this I thought the tips would be more physical. For example, do blank when you are feeling stressed, or eat blank, etc. However, the tips were most certainly unique and they focused a lot more on your mental area. I can’t say that I can name all ten tips because they were very layered and had a lot of lessons inside of lessons. This wasn’t a bad thing though.

What was special about these tips was that they went really into depth, and I felt like the author was speaking to and helping me, specifically. Everything was really deep and felt like tips and conversations I would have if I had a therapist.

You can tell the author put a lot of time into writing them. Each “tip” wasn’t just a little piece of advice, but it had background info, experiences, and all the emotions and work you have to put into them. Now can I say that every tip will work for me? No! And not everyone is supposed to. I can’t put much emphasis on the fact that what works for me, will not always work for others, and vice-versa!

I’d also like to say in advance, that these tips aren’t easy-peasy. You have to put effort into testing them out and using each one, but that’s a good thing. I truly feel that if you focused on a few tips and worked on them for a while, your anxiety levels will decrease a lot! You have to focus on your body and your mind, your emotions, and have the ambition to want to change how you feel! And even if none of these tips work for you, I feel like this book did a really good job on how to keep your mind healthy, and if you can’t take away a tip from this, I do think your view on your mindset will change for the better, even if just a bit!

Last, but not least, my favorite thing about this book was all the interviews and entries from real teenagers! It was fascinating to read about real teen’s experiences with anxiety, along with what helps them and what causes their anxiety.

And I think that’s all I have to say about this book! Although the writing wasn’t ideal for me, I do think other readers will connect with and admire it. It depends on your situation. One thing I’m sure of though is that the tips are excellent, and I highly recommend this book to those who would like to change their mindset and learn more about how to do that!

Conversation, practical, and right to the point. I’ve been recommending titles in this series since the pandemic began, and this latest teen mental health guide is hitting all the right notes. The short length and quotes from teens make a this book approachable for young adults who are struggling.

This a great supportive text for teenage girls who want to learn more about managing anxiety, either independently or in tandem with therapy. The Teen Girl's Anxiety Survival Guide is written in a conversational style which will likely most appeal to younger teens, but older teens and young adults would likely also benefit from this guide.

This guide does a great job of providing accessible and developmentally appropriate psychoeducation about anxiety including the role of the brain and the body, and blends techniques from lots of different modalities. Where this book really shines is through normalizing and validating with voices of teen girls, and in its discussion of academic and social anxiety.

As a therapist who works with adolescents, I could think of at least a half dozen girls that I'll be discussing this book with once it's published. I can't wait to add a finished copy of this to my bookshelf.

One note: this is very much a guide rather than a workbook, and likely won't appeal to teens who don't like to read or prefer a more hands-on approach to learning.

This has good resources and tips for teenagers dealing with stress and its very easily readable. That said, I wouldn't suggest it to anyone dealing with an anxiety disorder, as it contains damaging information (ie anxiety disorders are not mental illnesses.) Additionally, the writing feels very young (middle school audience.

I think this guide had some really helpful tips and I liked that it included quotes from real girls who have experienced anxiety and were willing to share their stories.
As someone with anxiety, I was really interested in reading this and hopefully finding some healthy coping mechanisms. This guide was able to provide a new perspective to view anxiety with and change my mindset on how I approach situations that typically make me anxious.
I found this to be very helpful and I think what I have learned will come in handy for the future.

Despite being in my late 20's this book was such an insightful read for me.

It is very well written and a lot of it definitely hit home with me.

I would recommend to anyone who suffers from anxiety as this is a relevant read for all ages