Dr. Perry is not just a psychiatrist who spends his time listening to and diagnosing clients. He is a maverick, willing to break the rules whenever needed and play detective rather than assert his expertise. By taking this approach to his young clients and studying not just their symptoms, but the treatment they were given from birth, he follows the brain as it develops. What he learns is of value to everyone. We were all children once.As he talks us through each of the cases covered in this book, we get a strong sense of his love for and understanding of the traumatized children. He approaches them slowly and with the utmost respect for their personhood. Like Alice Miller, he is acutely aware of the ways in which we seek to control or diminish small lives and the horrific consequences that sometimes result. But his quest is not just to address the psychological, it is to probe the way the brain itself forms and what can be done when its components lag or turn off.You will find every kind of child in this book, those who murder, those lacking normal social responses and those unable to thrive physically. In each case Dr. Perry reaches back into their past to uncover how the brain was encouraged to or discouraged from developing in corresponding ways. What is different about Perry's work is how he uses with this information. You won't find the perfect drug to control a child mentioned here. You will find some excellent stories about how touch therapy can renew and enhance neural pathways or how dance and movement can help a child regain natural psychological and physical cycles. In every case he fully explains what he did and why and gives full credit to those who taught him along the way. I am not talking about other doctors here, but people such as a foster mother and the children themselves.Even if you have no children and never plan to work with them, this book is worth reading. If you are an adult who has always felt out of sync with the world, you may find an explanation here.I found quite a few ah-ha moments and a great deal of personal food for thought. If you are an adherent of mind/body medicine, much of what he says will appeal to you as well.