No Family Is Perfect: A Guide to Embracing the Messy Reality

(Hardback)

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'A wonderfully optimistic and original book ... No doubt it will be extremely reassuring for readers and everyone will find some nuggets that are helpful to them' - Professor Susan Golombok
'Helpful to anyone interested in learning more about their own families. I highly recommend it' - Dr Joshua Coleman

Family researcher Lucy Blake pulls apart our expectations about family and shows us how to embrace the messy, beautiful reality.

What makes a good parent

Can sibling relationships survive to adulthood

Should love within a family really be unconditional

Wherever, whenever and however you learnt about family, it's likely that you have unshakeable answers to these questions. In this revelatory new book, family researcher Lucy Blake shows that, whatever your assumptions are, they are almost certainly wrong and probably doing damage to your closest relationships.

Blake looks at how the expectations we have affect and even hinder our interactions with parents, siblings, relatives and our children. Drawing on her experience of interviewing hundreds of family members - of all backgrounds - she explores these unrealistic ideas, exposes the truth of what a family really is and explains how we can better understand and appreciate the one we have.

No Family Is Perfect is a fascinating examination of the messy and beautiful reality of family life, and a look at how we can change our beliefs about family for the better and maybe even enjoy Christmas.

Reviews

'A wonderfully optimistic and original book ... No doubt it will be extremely reassuring for readers and everyone will find some nuggets that are helpful to them' -- Professor Susan Golombok
'Helpful to anyone interested in learning more about their own families. I highly recommend it' -- Dr Joshua Coleman
'Provides a fresh context for exploring issues that engage us throughout our lives ... No Family is Perfect will change how we think and write about families' -- Terri Apter, author of Difficult Mothers and The Sister Knot

Author Bio

Lucy Blake did her post-doctoral work at the Centre for Family Research at the University of Cambridge and is now a professor at Edge Hill University in Lancashire. She was the author of the 'Hidden Voices' report on family estrangement for the charity Stand Alone, which reached an audience of millions, and her work has been reported on in theDaily Mail, theNew York Times, theTelegraph,BBC News,Psychologies Magazine andPsychology Today. This is her first book.