ROBERTS, Janine, TALES & TRANSFORMATIONS: Stories in Families and Family Therapy. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1994, 230pp., $27.00 US, $35.00 Canadian, hardcover. Reviewed by: CHESTER A. WINTON This book explores the role of storytelling in a therapeutic process of affecting change, both intrapsychic change for an individual and interpersonal changes affecting relationship dynamics between people. The author begins by exploring different kinds of stories. There are oral stories that are told. Stories that are told about the past tend to be selective in the memories that are evoked. The selectivity process is grist for the therapeutic mill. Many people and families have stories that are unspoken, that they prefer not to tell. The secretive stories often function to inhibit change, because what is not disclosed, not discussed, is often about a problem. So long as the problem is avoided or repressed, it is maintained. The exploration of stories can thus be a valuable tool in confronting areas that are left out for any of multiple reasons. Stories have a past, present and a future and time is one dimension that can be used in therapeutically working with stories. Spoken stories have the benefits of spontaneity and immediacy. They can be used either in individual psychotherapy or in dealing with interpersonal interactions, where one person tells a story or part of a story and a family member or partner tells a story of what they heard, creating a dialogue around the story. Then there are written stories. This can involve writing one's own story or a family's story. It can involve reading a written story to another, again creating a dialogue around the story. The stories may be illustrated, by photographs that are stories within a story, or by pictures drawn by children, as may be useful when a child writes a story of a parental divorce. Written stories can include thank you notes or letters of appreciation which the author refers to as mini-stories. Stories can be enacted, which allows people to tell the story and be in the story simultaneously. Enactments may involve role-playing, sculpting, or using puppets. The author uses one chapter to link cultural themes and values to stories before discussing how she uses stories to train therapists. She discusses different styles of stories including intertwined stories that are used in an interpersonal context, distinct/separated stories, minimal/interrupted, silenced/secret, rigid and evolving stories. I think that all stories can become evolving stories. Throughout this book, there, there are innumerable illustrations of stories as told by the author's clients and students. …