...this book really helped me not only feel more prepared to handle my two kids, but also helped me understand some of the dynamics in my husband's family.

It builds on the active listening skills I am trying to master from their "how to talk.." book, plus other books like Parent effectiveness Training that promote a more sensative, less punishing approach to parenting.

The format is great, the comics really summarize the points of each chapter well and I want to photocopy them to have them handy.

This is a very useful book in dealing with sibling rivalry on a day by day basis.

This book is extraordinary. The writing pulls you in because of the humble nature of the author. After reading it, there is no doubt they know what they are talking about and it's not because of their credentials per say. It's spells out everything so clearly that there is no denying the issues. The big thing to know about this book is there are REAL specific tips and rules for communicating and dealing with situations. It is very well organized. And, there is more information than "How to talk to your kids..." I wondered if I should read both - sure enough, you do need both. I'm grateful for this book.

I bought this book a couple of months after we brought home our newly adopted son from Russia and the rivalry and fighting looked to become a huge problem... a never-ending battle between our only-slightly-older son and his new brother.

Over time both adjusted and now we have just run-of-the-mill rivalry and occasional jealousy, something that is manageable. But those first weeks and months were awful.

This book is nicely written and reasonably well organized. It's a quick read and provides a lot of useful ideas for how to defuse and ultimately avoid situations. Much of it is common sense or "frame shifting" (putting you into the child's situation through their eyes). I found some of the strategies useful and others not applicable, which is what you'd expect.

The downside of this book is that it is a bit on the frothy side, a bit simplistic and stagey. Some of the examples and true-life type stories go from one extreme to a too-good-to-be-true resolution "a week later". Some of the divisions in the book struck me as artificial.

Nonetheless this book is the standard for many parent dealing with this kind of problem for good reason. It is a useful reference, gets you to think about managing the situations better and gives you some tools to work with. Well recommended.

This book is truly amazing. I have never written an online review of anything in my life, but I simply had to stop and sit down and write my thoughts on this extraordinary book.
As an only child who now is the mom to two boys I was dumbfounded by their ever changing relationship. I worked on trying to get the older one to be "nicer" to the younger one, but it seemed the more I tried, the more it backfired, and I was really at my wits end. It was so difficult to watch. And then I read this wonderful book. It gave me so many tools to work with and it really helped me to understand their relationship. Instead of watching from a distance and being powerless it made me realize that I was the key to helping them understand each other. The results were immediate and I am happy to say at this point my boys, who are only 19 months apart, are best friends. They rarely fight and when they do I know just what to say to get them to stop and listen. Usually with this gentle help they can work things out on their own.
I can't say enough good things about this book. Anyone who has more than one child should read it...anyone who has siblings of their own should read it as well as it gives much insight into adult sibling relationships too.
This book has changed our lives!!!