Psychology

Steve Biddulph writes: '10 Things Girls Need Most is a revolution. For 40 years I've worked with parents in groups - and it is so much fun and so moving that I would love to do that with every parent in the world. But I can't! So 10 Things Girls Need Most aims to be the next best thing. This is a special kind of book. You can read it straight through and get great ideas for raising your daughter. But it also offers something extra that can give you so much more. On many pages you will find opportunities to interact. These are very simple - just a list to tick, or a couple of questions to respond to. These interactive tasks immediately get you thinking about your own life, your family and, of course, your daughter. 10 Things Girls Need Most is a dual gift. It provides the very best information that we have about girls growing up today - and, alongside, are interactive tasks and self-exploration practices will help you to put that into practice. '

How does the content differ from Steve Biddulph's Raising Girls?

SB: 'This is a whole new book on girls, and it has grown out of years of online discussions which have gone deeper and further than much of the coverage in Steve Biddulph's Raising Girls. It is a reflection of the issues that parents want to explore in more depth. Many of these are new.'

Why is this called an interactive companion to Steve Biddulph's Raising Girls?

SB: 'We found that parents were keen to share their experiences and concerns online. So this new book includes opportunities for parents to consider topics with more depth, courtesy of the reader-response style. The interactivity is a totally new concept. Focus groups have found it quite profound - as there are opportunities for the reader to respond to questions in the text. In this way it is a companion to Steve Biddulph's Raising Girls, exploring many of the same areas but with the added dimension of parent involvement and response to the questions.

Steve Biddulph says: '

The aim of this book is twofold. Firstly, to help you understand how daughters grow and thrive, and to be confident in raising your own. To lay down the foundations of good mental health early in your daughter's life, and to keep her strong all the way through. And secondly, to enlist you in the new wave of feminism, fighting against a world that is so toxic to our kids.'

'We have the potential to change the world our daughters face. Girls are being exploited. We need to challenge the companies worldwide that profit from making girls insecure and compliant through manipulative marketing.

'This book helps parents understand how we can win back girlhood - happy, wild and free. It's the core of individuality and self-belief - and is the new feminism that we want for our daughters.

'It tackles the most important mental health risk in the world today - the harm that is being inflicted on girls and young women. The exploitation of it starts with babyhood and rockets through primary school and into the teens.'

Imprint: FINCH PUBLISHING
RRP: $29.99

Jordan Peterson's work as a clinical psychologist has reshaped the modern understanding of personality, and now he has become one of the world's most popular public thinkers, with his lectures on topics ranging from the Bible to romantic relationships drawing tens of millions of viewers. In an era of polarizing politics, echo chambers and trigger warnings, his startling message about the value of personal responsibility and the dangers of ideology has resonated around the world.In this book, he combines ancient wisdom with decades of experience to provide twelve profound and challenging principles for how to live a meaningful life, from setting your house in order before criticising others to comparing yourself to who you were yesterday, not someone else today.

Imprint: Penguin Books
RRP: $19.99

A brand new edition of the bestselling guide to the greatest books in psychology, from Jung to Kahneman, from THE MAN WHO MISTOOK HIS WIFE FOR A HAT to QUIET.

This brand new edition of the bestselling 50 PSYCHOLOGY CLASSICS includes new classics like THINKING FAST AND SLOW; QUIET and THE MARSHMALLOW TEST.

In a journey spanning 50 books, hundreds of ideas and over a century, 50 PSYCHOLOGY CLASSICS looks at some of the most intriguing questions relating to what motivates us, what makes us feel and act in certain ways, how our brains work, and how we create a sense of self. 50 PSYCHOLOGY CLASSICS explores writings from some iconic figures such as Freud, Adler, Jung, Skinner, James, Piaget and Pavlov, but also highlights the work of contemporary thinkers such as Gardner, Gilbert, Goleman and Seligman. 50 PSYCHOLOGY CLASSICS will further your understanding of human nature and yourself.

Imprint: NICHOLAS BREALEY
RRP: $19.99

Have you ever watched your child give up too quickly and easily, moaning 'I can't'. Perhaps your child resists going to school because they don't like their teacher or their friend rejected them. Maybe they failed in a sporting contest or an exam.

One of the most frequent questions Kidspot parenting expert Dr Justin Coulson is asked is 'How can I help my child become resilient?' Friendship problems, bullying, physical changes and parenting styles are just some of the issues that can affect our children's ability to bounce back from difficulty and adapt to challenging situations. Helping our children develop resilience can have lifelong positive effects.

9 Ways to a Resilient Child will help parents enable their children to cope with the challenges that life throws at us all. Discover why winners aren't always grinners, the problems with common advice like 'Toughen up, princess', the negative impact of helicopter parenting, and how praise can harm instead of help. Understand both the protective and the risk factors affecting resilience for better or for worse. And uncover the psychological secrets that will build your child's ability to bounce back, stronger and more resilient than ever: from the ability to think flexibly, make safe and healthy choices, and exercise self-control, to the powerful impact of family, relationships, school and community.

Dr Coulson aims to bolster resilience - not just in our children, but also in ourselves. Because resilient parents are more likely to have resilient kids.

Imprint: ABC PUBLICATIONS
RRP: $29.99

A renowned Buddhist teacher's magnum opus, based on his fresh reading of the tradition's earliest texts.


Some twenty-five centuries after the Buddha started teaching, his message continues to inspire people across the globe, including those living in predominantly secular societies. What does it mean to adapt religious practices to secular contexts? Stephen Batchelor, an internationally known author and teacher, is committed to a secularized version of the Buddha's teachings. The time has come, he feels, to articulate a coherent ethical, contemplative, and philosophical vision of Buddhism for our age. After Buddhism, the culmination of four decades of study and practice in the Tibetan, Zen, and Theravada traditions, is his attempt to set the record straight about who the Buddha was and what he was trying to teach. Combining critical readings of the earliest canonical texts with narrative accounts of five members of the Buddha's inner circle, Batchelor depicts the Buddha as a pragmatic ethicist rather than a dogmatic metaphysician. He envisions Buddhism as a constantly evolving culture of awakening whose long survival is due to its capacity to reinvent itself and interact creatively with each society it encounters.


This original and provocative book presents a new framework for understanding the remarkable spread of Buddhism in today's globalized world. It also reminds us of what was so startling about the Buddha's vision of human flourishing.

Imprint: YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS
RRP: $34.99

Ageless Soul reveals a fresh, optimistic and rewarding path towards ageing. Renowned psychotherapist and bestselling author Thomas Moore shows us that as we grow older we become more distinctive and complex.

Drawing on stories from his practice as a psychotherapist and teacher, Moore argues for a new vision of ageing and shows readers how to embrace the richness of the experience and how to feel fulfilled as they grow older.

Thomas Moore is the New York Times bestselling author of Care of the Soul,as well as many other books on enriching your life. At turns he has been a monk, a musician, a university professor, and a psychotherapist. Today he lectures widely on creating a more soulful world and on spirituality.

Imprint: Simon & Schuster
RRP: $32.99

The acclaimed first volume in bell hooks' "Love Song to the Nation"

“The word ‘love' is most often defined as a noun, yet . . . we would all love better if we used it as a verb,” writes bell hooks as she comes out fighting and on fire in All About Love. Here, at her most provocative and intensely personal, bell hooks (renowned scholar, cultural critic, and feminist) skewers our view of love as romance. In its place she offers a proactive new ethic for a people and a society bereft with lovelessness.As bell hooks uses her incisive mind and razor-sharp pen to explore the question “What is love” her answers strike at both the mind and heart. In thirteen concise chapters, hooks examines her own search for emotional connection and society's failure to provide a model for learning to love. Razing the cultural paradigm that the ideal love is infused with sex and desire, she provides a new path to love that is sacred, redemptive, and healing for individuals and for a nation.

The Utne Reader declared bell hooks one of the “100 Visionaries Who Can Change Your Life.” All About Love is a powerful affirmation of just how profoundly she can.

Imprint: MORROW
RRP: $24.99

As with The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Oliver Sacks uses case studies to illustrate the myriad ways in which neurological conditions can affect our sense of self, our experience of the world, and how we relate to those around us. Writing with his trademark blend of scientific rigour and human compassion, he describes patients such as the colour-blind painter or the surgeon with compulsive tics that disappear in the operating theatre; patients for whom disorientation and alienation – but also adaptation – are inescapable facts of life.

Imprint: Picador
RRP: $24.99

Wherever he goes, Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard is asked to explain what meditation is, how it is done and what it can achieve. In this authoritative and inspiring book, he sets out to answer these questions.

Matthieu Ricard shows that practising meditation can change our understanding of ourselves and the world around us. He talks us through its theory, spirituality and practical aspects of deep contemplation and illustrates each stage of his teaching with examples.

Through his experience as a monk, his close reading of sacred texts and his deep knowledge of the Buddhist masters, Matthieu Ricard reveals the significant benefits that meditation - based on selfless love and compassion - can bring to each of us.

Imprint: ATLANTIC BOOKS
RRP: $19.99

Since its first publication, The Artist's Way has inspired the genius of Elizabeth Gilbert, Tim Ferriss and millions of readers to embark on a creative journey and find a deeper connection to process and purpose. Julia Cameron guides readers in uncovering problems and pressure points that may be restricting their creative flow and offers techniques to open up opportunities for self-growth and self-discovery.

The program begins with Cameron's most vital tools for creative recovery: The Morning Pages and The Artist Date. From there, she shares hundreds of exercises, activities, and prompts to help readers thoroughly explore each chapter.

A revolutionary programme for personal renewal, The Artist's Way will help get you back on track, rediscover your passions, and take the steps you need to change your life.

Imprint: SOUVENIR PRESS
RRP: $34.99