People who work with, live with, love, or hate teenagers will appreciate this current and compassionate framing of this transformative stage of life. The writing is clear and accessible.

Unfortunately this one was a bit disappointing. I found it very dry and hard to stay interested and it didn't provide any "breakthrough" information. Still some good reminders, or maybe good info for those who don't know much about tweens and teens.

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for allowing me to preview this book in the AudioBook format.

The first thing that I pay attention to when I begin an audiobook is the narrator's voice and whether or not it is pleasant and goes along with the text being read. I enjoyed both the author's voice and Cassandra Campbell's voice. I think they both emphasized the key points well and read at a good pace.

With respect to the content of the audiobook, Ellen Galinsky has proved to be an expert in the field of adolescence. She had a good mix of adolescent voice and feedback, scientific research, and regular narration throughout the book. It keeps the reader engaged with the text which explains the adolescent brain, how adolescents want to be viewed by adults, and how best to react to adolescent behavior, among other helpful topics. I was surprised by some of the research that went against traditional thinking regarding adolescents. For example, I was always told that teenagers want to move away from their parents and establish their individuality. According to Galinsky, it's not that they want to be independent, it's that they want a different relationship, which can be fomented using strategies given in this text.

I was happy with the positive view Galinsky has of adolescents and their brains. Whenever I read about adolescents, many of the articles and/or texts are negative saying things such as adolescents take unnecessary risks and it's a reckless time in our lives. Galinsky lets us know that it doesn't have to be this way.

I found this book to be supremely helpful not just as a mom, but as a teacher of pre-teens as well. I would recommend this book to educators and parents as well as sections for adolescents themselves so that they can understand why they behave as they do.

In The Breakthrough Years, researcher Ellen Galinsky shares results from her long term study of adolescence by the same title. My interest in this book stems from my experience as a parent to two adolescence boys.

It’s been a long time since I’ve read anything at all about childhood development. When my kids were young, I read a lot of parenting and early childhood education books- but after a while, it can be discouraging when your expectations (shaped by this deep reading from so many opinions about how best to raise and teach your children) don’t match reality.

In that way, this book is refreshing. I found it low on opinions and agenda and very high on numbers and facts. All the statistics shared could be overwhelming for the casual reader, but for anyone not adverse to so much data, and for anyone that has a professional interest in what is happening in the adolescent brain, The Breakthrough Years provides plenty of insight.

I especially appreciated the way that Galinsky sets out right from the start to upend long held negative assumptions about the teen brain and the way relationships between teens and adults have been typically perceived in American culture. I learned so many ways to reframe my encounters with my children from the lens of what adolescents actually reported that they need from the adults in their lives.

This feels like the kind of book that I’m going to need to reread, highlight, annotate and take notes from, and refer to time and again in the years to come. I particularly recommend it for educators, counselors, and anyone else who works with tweens, teens, and young adults. Parents will benefit from this information, as well, since most of us have been led to believe this season is necessarily divisive and scary. When we learn to respect and honor what our teens actually need from us, it may not have to be that way after all.

I listened to an advance audio copy of this book provided by Netgalley and Macmillan Audio.