While it's a helpful book that explains what happens inside of us, it might be a little too wordy for children that are too young, which could be a factor in keeping their attention.

This is a book that appears to be about how while the parts of us that can make us act or react in ways that may not be positive (the Exile, the Firefighter), those parts also can be useful at times.
I really like the premise of this and think that it has some positive messages at its core. However, I think the language and ideas might be too tricky for younger children while the illustrations and tone may be too young for older children, which narrows its potential audience somewhat. I also feel that some of it is very Americanized, which is fine if the book isn't aimed at the UK market. Otherwise, some of the phrases like 'lickety split' aren't used much over here.
Lastly, the colour of the print will need to be considered carefully as in some places it's very difficult to read. I appreciate that this is not a finished copy though and likely to be different in print.
Overally, I liked the concept and I might get a copy for our school library, but it just didn't quite work for me.

Well written and illustrated book that explains that people are composed of different people, having different roles and jobs in life. This approach helps to explain why and how we are sometimes helpful to ourselves, sometimes critical, sometimes healing, and sometimes harming. Psychologically comforting and easy to understand. Useful, wonderful, I enjoyed it.

No Bad Parts! Is a child's version of a book by Richard Swartz called No Bad Parts. Which explain Internal Family Systems in a very clear and child friendly way. As an adult learning about Internal Family Systems this book helped me to understand some of the nuances of the theory through analogies and simple explanations. It would be a perfect book for a parent, therapist, teacher or librarian to read to children to explain how their brain works and protects them in different situations. It also helps them understand why they react in different ways when faced with challenging situations. The book explains the different roles The Manager, The Exile and The Firefighter and the kinds of reactions that might be the result of these parts taking over. I think this would be a perfect addition to a personal library, therapist library and school/public libraries.

Thank you NetGalley, Richard Schwartz, Bethany Hegedus and Sounds True Publishing for the opportunity to preview this title and the opinions shared are my own.

No Bad Parts! is expected to be released Sept. 9, 2025.

An informative and compassionate translation of Schwartz's Internal Family Systems model for children. Our brains can be scary and confusing, especially when we're first learning how to truly articulate how we think and feel. This does a great job of laying out the basics, allowing kids to learn that we're made up of many working parts and that none of those parts are, in fact, bad.

The illustrations are fun but a bit busy set against the text; however I am only reviewing the unpublished ARC, so final font formatting may change that.

Thank you to NetGalley and the author for providing me with a free eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I received a digital ARC of this book via Netgalley in exchange for a review.

I have such mixed feelings about this book! Initially, I was excited to see a picture book which represents the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model of therapy. I am by no means an expert, but an understanding of the basics of this approach to psychology has helped me in my own life, and I think there are concepts within it, particularly how to recognize being emotionally "identified with a part," that would be generally very beneficial if more people were aware of them.

But ugh, right off the bat, why do so many children's books have such laborious, stilted rhyming? Meter is important, ya'll. So often in a rhyming picture book there's kind of a flow and then they just jam in like five extra syllables in the last line to get a rhyming phrase to work, and I'm like ???

On the positive side, the art in this is a total slam dunk. Rich, layered, evocative of the intense emotions associated with each member of the family system, and how they manifest--the art, plus the general existence of a book about this subject oriented towards younger readers, does make it somewhat worthwhile.

Still, I think if you were an adult previously unfamiliar with IFS, you would come away from this with a rudimentary understanding of the intention, but I think some parts are not explained enough, and some phrases that I understood because I have context might be confusing for those without it.

Kind of a bummer, this is such a good concept, I just wish it was a little more elegantly conveyed.