MAY 2021 - AudioFile
NPR reporter Michaeleen Doucleff narrates this audiobook—part memoir and part guide on contemporary parenting. She is honest, clear, and thoughtful as she presents a wide range of research on parenting theories from many cultures. For those seeking new ways to connect with or better understand their children, this will be a welcome listen. Doucleff creates the feeling she is in your kitchen, swapping stories and wisdom of the ages. This title is easy on the ears, and the chapters go by swiftly. For an author turned narrator, she is very confident as she presents ideas from diverse sources. From the Inuit to city dwellers, Doucleff informs as she entertains, regaling us with advice of how to keep the peace. M.R. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine
Publishers Weekly
02/15/2021
Doucleff, a correspondent for NPR’s Science Desk, debuts with a lively account of traveling with her three-year-old daughter Rosy “to the corners of the world” to research parenting techniques. Through interviews and anecdotes, Doucleff pieces together a universal parenting approach that “has been tested for millennia... across six continents” and is composed of four elements: togetherness, encouragement, autonomy, and minimal interference. In the Yucatan, Doucleff observes a familiar morning routine—getting children ready for school—unfold with no chaos, and in watching the children help one another, learns how to “transmit the value of helpfulness to a child.” During a visit to Kugaaruk, a small village in the Canadian arctic, Doucleff watches the effect of anger-free parenting in raising children who act thoughtfully. And during a brief stay outside the plains of the Serengeti, she witnesses the Hadzabe peoples’ “gift economy,” and how parents teach their children self-sufficiency, kindness, and respect by allowing them to set their own agendas. Doucleff includes specific and manageable instructions for parents (“Start with a daily time-out from entertaining and instructing your child,” for example), and end-of-chapter summaries include extra resources. Parents will find Doucleff’s curiosity contagious and guidance encouraging. Agent: Alex Glass, Glass Literary Management. (Mar.)
From the Publisher
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY BESTSELLER
USA TODAY BESTSELLER
“Hunt, Gather, Parent is full of smart ideas that I immediately wanted to force on my own kids. (I wish I’d read it at the start of the pandemic, when I made their chore charts.) Doucleff is a dogged reporter who’s good at observing families and breaking down what they’re doing.”
—Pamela Druckerman, The New York Times Book Review
“Deeply researched . . . [Doucleff] takes care to portray her subjects not as curiosities ‘frozen in time,’ but instead as modern-day families who have held on to invaluable child-rearing techniques that likely date back tens of thousands of years.”
—The Atlantic
“Parents: You don’t have to go to kid birthday parties anymore! Or awkwardly straddle playground equipment! Or create chore charts! In her funny, honest, and practical book, Michaeleen Doucleff collects ancient wisdom that can restore sanity to parenting.”
—Amanda Ripley, New York Times bestselling author of The Smartest Kids in the World and High Conflict
“THIS IS THE PARENTING BOOK I’VE BEEN WAITING FOR!!! Frustrated by the challenges of being a new parent, investigative journalist Michaeleen Doucleff straps her kid on her back and travels thousands of miles to learn why and how indigenous cultures seem to raise kids to be far more skilled, confident, and content than the kids back at home. Armed with respect and curiosity, Doucleff realizes that incessant communication with her child while attempting to control every small thing leads her child to feel anxiety and act out. And that giving a child autonomy while building a loving connection yields highly skilled kids who cooperate, regulate their emotions, and pitch in without waiting to be asked. Smart, humbling, and revealing, Hunt, Gather, Parent should force a re-set of modern American parenting and return a healthier and happier childhood to both parents and children.”
—Julie Lythcott-Haims, New York Times bestselling author of How to Raise an Adult and Real American
“Michaeleen Doucleff’s Hunt, Gather, Parent breathes a gust of fresh air onto the parenting bookshelf. She gives us a whole new way of looking at raising kids, and it is so beautifully intuitive even as it runs counter to everything we have been taught as Western parents. I loved all the families she introduces us to, the landscapes she brings to life, and her honesty about her relationships with her own daughter. It really does take a village to raise a child, and it is pure joy to follow Michaeleen and Rosy from village to village seeing how it can be done. I can’t wait to talk to other parents about this book.”
—Angela C. Santomero, creator, head writer, and executive producer of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood and Blue’s Clues, and author of Radical Kindness and Preschool Clues
“Most of our greatest parenting challenges, such as how to instill helpfulness, kindness, and confidence in little ones, aren’t problems at all in other cultures. Michaeleen Doucleff travels far and wide to observe firsthand how parents in non-Western societies have successfully nurtured these traits in children for centuries, and she shares their effective strategies in this very readable book. Hunt, Gather, Parent is the new required reading for moms and dads seeking wise and creative solutions to our most vexing parenting dilemmas.”
—David F. Lancey, PhD, author of The Anthropology of Childhood and Raising Children: Surprising Insights from Other Cultures
“A lively account of traveling with her three-year-old daughter Rosy ‘to the corners of the world’ to research parenting techniques . . . Doucleff includes specific and manageable instructions for parents, and end-of-chapter summaries include extra resources. Parents will find Doucleff’s curiosity contagious and guidance encouraging.”
—Publishers Weekly
“This book is filled with accessible, practical information and anecdotes that can help parents address challenges they may face.”
—Jamie Herndon, Book Riot
MAY 2021 - AudioFile
NPR reporter Michaeleen Doucleff narrates this audiobook—part memoir and part guide on contemporary parenting. She is honest, clear, and thoughtful as she presents a wide range of research on parenting theories from many cultures. For those seeking new ways to connect with or better understand their children, this will be a welcome listen. Doucleff creates the feeling she is in your kitchen, swapping stories and wisdom of the ages. This title is easy on the ears, and the chapters go by swiftly. For an author turned narrator, she is very confident as she presents ideas from diverse sources. From the Inuit to city dwellers, Doucleff informs as she entertains, regaling us with advice of how to keep the peace. M.R. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2021-03-31
Time-tested parenting methods from three Indigenous cultures help a mother tame her wild toddler.
Doucleff knew there had to be a better way to parent her child, one that didn’t result in Rosy’s hitting, screaming, and throwing temper tantrums, where every day wasn’t a battle from morning to night. Using the investigative skills she has honed as a correspondent for NPR’s Science Desk, she traveled to the Yucatán to live with a Mayan family, the Arctic to spend time with an Inuit family, and Tanzania and the Hadzabe tribe to understand how other cultures raised helpful, independent, disciplined children without unnecessary drama and frustration. Doucleff shares the tips and tricks she learned along the way and includes with each chapter a distilled list of insights that can be quickly referenced when the need arises. For example, she explains how to deescalate a situation by remaining calm and instilling awe and how having a child help with chores at a young age may create more work at first but gives the child the chance to learn and assume responsibilities that help the family. Also, when a child understands the consequences of her actions, she is less likely to misbehave than if she only hears the words no or don’t. Of course, the author recommends outdoor time, emphasizes the power of stories to teach lessons, and shows why it’s important to let children speak for themselves. Doucleff, who has a doctorate in chemistry, interweaves scientific research and her own trials with Rosy into the information she learned from the Mayans, Inuits, and Hadzabe. The result is an intriguing study that should be useful to parents from any culture, especially those who are at their wits’ end with their rambunctious, untamed children.
Eye-opening looks at how ancient techniques can benefit modern parents.