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In the six years since the authors' Child Psychiatry and the Law , much has occurred in the child forensic field. The value of their present text, however, is less in its currency—although many of its references date from the last year or two—and more in its broad overview of the topic. Indeed, my only quibble is that the book's title implies much less than it delivers: a seasoned summary of forensic child psychiatry as it currently exists in all its complexities. This is an era in which malpractice suits are finally confronting child psychiatrists, diagnostic techniques are increasingly complex, new psychopharmacologic interventions entail new complications, and increasing surveillance and demands are coupled with increasing insistence on short hospital stays. Schetky and Benedek have assembled an all-star cast, the members of which write well and whose case reports enliven their content. An interesting preliminary explication of the ethical issues underlying the

"One more accident and that ought to do it," Brian, aged 9 years, remarks in one of many arresting case examples in an impressive book. A monograph that discusses virtually every aspect of self-destruction in children,The Suicidal Childis balanced in its emphasis: psychoanalytic, cognitive, and psychopharmacological aspects of the problem and its treatment each receive equal time. Devoted to suicide in childhood, the work avoids the common error of labeling all patients younger than 19 years as "children," so this is not a book about the more common problem of adolescent suicide. Nevertheless, its lucid explication of the problem in childhood is of value to anyone interested in suicide prevention at any age. As Brian's comment suggests, children can contemplate self-destruction even at an early age. Whether or not we believe younger patients understand death's permanence, we can surely agree with Pfeffer's assertion that a child's death sought