This is a volume of 14 chapters by 12 authors and the editor. The compression of the material into 396 pages, excluding the index, necessitated the use of uncomfortably small type. Since many of the chapters cover the same ground, fewer authors could have produced a more readable book of the same number of pages.

An introduction by Christine A. Courtois welcomes the book as an attempt to explore the conflict between those who believe child sexual abuse is rampant, underdiagnosed, and undertreated and those who describe a false memory syndrome produced by bias and suggestion by therapists, sensationalism in the media, lay