Daughters in Danger, by Elayne Bennett, is
purportedly about how we can protect our daughters from the threats of our
culture.
There
can be no doubt that the girls of today face serious obstacles to their health
and well-being. When I picked this book
up, I was hoping for a book that would address ways to help our daughters
through these issues. However, the
author tries to tackle too many issues.
As a result, the book is disjointed and full of such generalized advice
that it doesn't really add much about raising children that is not already
widely known.
The
first third of the book is full of cautionary tales and partisan rhetoric,
despite the author's later claim that she does not see this as a political
issue. There were a few red flags for me
- beginning with the statement that "California... educators have all but banished
the Boy Scouts from public facilities."
As a California educator and a Boy Scout mother, I disagree with this, and
it didn't set a good tone for the book.
The author also makes a broad generalization about young adults based on
a limited survey of high schoolers in her foundation. As an M.Ed. myself, this left me questioning
the rest of her research.
The
latter half of the book has some good advice, but it doesn't flow well because
the author tries to cover too many topics.
The good advice is interspersed
far too often with more cautionary tales both from real life and from
literature and movies. The advice is
also over-simplified, giving few details that a parent who is truly struggling
would find useful.
I
appreciate the author's attempt, but there are better books that cover the
topic of how to raise Christian children in today's world. Her writing style is good, and I'd love to
see her write a book that doesn't try to cover quite so much ground.
Disclaimer: I was provided a copy of this book from the
publisher in exchange for an honest review.
Two
out of Five Stars
