Stien, a supervising therapist and mental health consultant for Head Start and early childhood education programs, and health care writer Kendall describe a new psychobiological model of child development that posits a complex interaction between environmental and biological factors. They explain wh

In the tradition of The Professor and the Madman, a "brisk and vivid"( Los Angeles Times) account of an obsessive scholar.
Polymath, eccentric, and synonym aficionado, Peter Mark Roget had a host of female admirers, was one of the first to test the effects of laughing gas, invented the slide rule, and narrowly escaped jail in Napoleon's France. But Roget is best known for making lists.
After the tragic turmoil of his early life (both his mother and sister were institutionalized), Roget longed for order in his chaotic world. At the age of eight, he began his...

Noah Webster's name is now synonymous with the dictionary he created, but his story is not nearly so ubiquitous. Now acclaimed author of The Man Who Made Lists, Joshua Kendall sheds new light on Webster's life, and his far-reaching influence in establishing the American nation.

Webster hobnobbed with various Founding Fathers and was a young confidant of George Washington and Ben Franklin. He started New York's first daily newspaper, predating Alexander Hamilton's New York Post. His "blue-backed speller" for schoolchildren sold millions of copies and influenced early copyright...

When most of us think of Charles Lindbergh, we picture a mild-mannered, 25-year-old aviator stepping out of The Spirit of St. Louis after completing his solo flight across the Atlantic. What we don't see is the boy who made detailed inventories of his toy soldiers. Sure, Lindbergh invented the pre-flight checklist, but his obsession with order also led him to demand that his wife and German mistresses account for all household expenditures in detailed ledgers. Like many of the icons that Joshua Kendall puts on the couch in his new book, Lindbergh is a uniquely American type-the obsessive. And...