This thoughtful compilation focuses on a critical current topic in secondary education: mental health. As overwhelming numbers of adolescents struggle with mental health challenges, this book addresses how adolescent literature can help generate awareness of, reduce the stigma associated with, and normalize experiences with mental health issues. Aimed at middle- and high-school English language arts (ELA) teachers, this volume provides background information and insight into various mental health needs while maintaining a clear focus on using the suggested books to introduce, teach, and reinforce specific concepts within the ELA curriculum. Highly recommended. Advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and professionals.

Choice Reviews

Fostering Mental Health Literacy through Adolescent Literature is a perfectly timed answer to a critical issue in schools: the prominence of mental health challenges rising in the lives of our teens. Eisenbach’s vast knowledge of Young Adult Literature and Frydman’s mental health expertise helped to curate and edit a book that includes chapters from leading educators and counselors in the field, setting mental health literacy education in the authentic context of Young Adult Literature. As a former secondary language arts teacher and mental health counselor (and now parent to a teen), I recognize it as the book we’ve needed and wished for. The research-based solutions in Fostering Mental Health Literacy through Adolescent Literature help integrate the many facets of English Language Arts and literacy standards, with attention to mental health awareness.

Susan Densmore-James, PhD, Associate Professor; Director of the Emerald Coast National Writing Project; The Book Dealer

In Fostering Mental Health Literacy through Adolescent Literature the editors have curated a helpful, practical guide for classroom teachers to navigate the sometimes tricky but incredibly important work of introducing and integrating mental health literacy into the classroom. They provide the reader with what we so often need to do this work - helpful and straightforward ways to approach these topics in the classroom with students in middle and high school. This text presents a continued step toward bridging the knowledge set of both teachers and mental health professionals to guide students through challenging and necessary conversations.

Sophia Hoffman, PhD, director of clinical training, School-Clinical Child Psy.D. Program, Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology, Yeshiva University

Some books are timely, and some books arrive at the perfect time. Eisenbach and Frydman’s Fostering Mental Health Literacy through Adolescent Literature is both. As teachers and students emerge from more than a year of COVID forced social isolation, they have gathered a powerful collection of essays by a remarkable group of contributors that address a range of Mental Health Issues using landmark YA texts from The Boy in the Black Suit to Hey, Kiddo. In these trying times teachers and students need hope and this edited collection provides this hope through pedagogical strategies for teachers who want to guide an entire class, establish book clubs, or to guide independent reading.

Steven T. Bickmore, Associate Professor of English Education, University of Nevada Las Vegas; curator, Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday Blog

This powerful collection of resources for the middle and high school English Language Arts teacher provides a richly researched scaffold for mental health awareness, using carefully selected adolescent books. This text will give the teacher the confidence to explore these important themes without becoming a school counselor themselves. Each chapter meticulously guides the reader into the particular mental health issue, demonstrating ways the teacher can engage the interest of students on the impact of trauma, abuse, poverty, and toxic stress on diverse individuals and indeed society at large. This book will excite teachers and provide them the tools they require to enhance their efforts in addressing the socioemotional needs of their adolescent students. Congratulations to the editors for fashioning a truly remarkable collaboration between mental health and education!

David Read Johnson, Johnson PhD, Co-Director, Post Traumatic Stress Center, New Haven, CT; Associate Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry, Yale University School of Medicine; CEO, Miss Kendra Programs