BOOKS ON CHILDREN, DEATH AND GRIEF
 FOR PARENTS AND OTHERS

 Reviewed by Benjamin Garber, MD,
Barbara Hozinsky, M.Ed., Doris Libman, MSW.,
 Johanna Sonnenfeld, LCSW,
and Venus Whiting

Barr-Harris Children's Grief Center
122 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1300
Chicago, Illinois

(312) 922-7474
www.barrharris.org

Edelman, Hope, Motherless Daughters, 1994, and Letters from Motherless Daughters, 1996. Both published by Delta.

Motherless Daughters is an excellent compilation of interviews with young women whose mothers died when they were young girls. The stories are poignant and the psychological comments that accompany the vignettes are accurate and insightful. The companion book, Letters from Motherless Daughters, written two years later, does not have the same impact although it is still interesting. The books are highly recommended, not only because of the subject, but also because of the clear and lucid writing style.

Grollman, Earl A., Talking about Death.  Boston: Beacon Press, 1990. 

This is a most practical guide for parents and other adults who are faced with explaining death to a child while at the same time often struggling with their own feelings about death. It addresses many questions children may ask and provides suggestions for responding, keeping in mind the developmental age of the child and the unique circumstances of the individual loss. It provides read-along passages for children whose parents who may need some help finding the words to express their responses. This book would be most helpful if read by parents first, before using the read-along passages, as the author is sensitive to the grief process of the adults as they help their children cope with their own thoughts and feelings about death. 

Earl A. Grollman has written many excellent books about death.

Requarth, Margo. After a Parent’s Suicide: Helping Children Heal. Sebastpol, CA: Healing Hearts Press, 2006.

The book deals addresses a difficult subject that most feel helpless in addressing. It is written to help the surviving parent or caretaker deal with the children’s particular grief when their parent commits suicide. It would also help teachers or mental health professionals to become aware of the additional complications for survivors of suicide. The author is a survivor of a parental suicide and addresses the issue in a compassionate and practical manner. The reader will learn what to tell the child, how the child will understand the news depending on his or her age, and what to expect later as the child grows up with this event impacting his/her life. Ms. Requarth also shares anecdotes of children at each stage, which make the book resonate with the reader. The book is practical, hands-on, and gives the reader hope that children may be helped to survive a parent’s suicide.  

Schaefer, Dan and Christine Lyons, How Do We Tell the Children?  New Market Press, 1993. 

This is a clearly written book by a funeral director that provides helpful suggestions to parents and caregivers on how to inform children of death in many different situations. It respects the child’s need to know what has happened in a way that is appropriate for his or her age. It discusses listening to children's thoughts and feelings and addressing common misperceptions. There is an excellent quick reference crisis section at the end of the book that clearly outlines various kinds of deaths, suggestions as to how to explain them to children in different age groups, and how to prepare them for what comes next. Various feelings are described with an attempt to understand each child’s unique coping needs surrounding the death experience. This is an excellent book to guide parents whose own grief may be interfering with their thinking about how to help their children. 

Seibert, Diana et al. Helping Children Live with Death and Loss.  Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2003. 

This book is designed for parents, caregivers, teachers, and other adults who will be responding to children who have experienced a loss. Several topics are discussed: how to answer children's questions about death, how children respond developmentally to loss, choosing literature about death for children, and understanding and responding to specific death and loss situations. he book is written sensitively and empathically so as to help the adult deal with the child's feelings about loss.

Simon, Leslie, and Jan Johnson Drantell. A Music I No Longer Heard: The Early Death of a Parent.  NY: Simon and Schuster. 

This book consists of interviews with 70 people who lost a parent before the age of 19 because of illness, accident, suicide, or murder. The book is notable for the way the material is organized and presented as well as for the comments and conclusions interspersed throughout. The interviews appear in small segments to illustrate the themes of each chapter.  Each person interviewed digs deep into his or her own past to describe how, as a result of the loss, life was changed in their family and community relationships and how their orientation towards the future was changed.

The authors are sensitive to childhood idealization of the deceased but honor its uses in coping. They note the role of current, real relationships in the mourning process and show how mourning may be delayed. They acknowledge that childhood parent loss may involve what may already have been lost "before the final loss" and show how ever-present the loss becomes. They underscore the need to construct memories from the time before the event in order to retrieve a past which the bereaved child can use for future adaptations. They are also aware that each child responds uniquely at each stage of development and that children need to be informed in a way appropriate to that age. Finally, both authors share the circumstances and feelings  of their own parent loss in childhood and its effects on their lives.

This book is not a how-to for survivors but a very readable resource for anyone who has experienced loss of a parent in childhood or knows someone who has.

Copyright © Benjamin Garber, Barbara Hozinsky, Doris Libman, and Johanna Sonnenfeld. Permission is granted to reproduce this page for nonprofit educational use, if they are cited.