The Idle Parent: Why Laid-Back Parents Raise Happier and Healthier Kids Paperback – May 13, 2010

I didn't love the writing, but the concepts are laudable - the author is basically saying "let's all back off our kids and have some more fun with this parenting thing" and if you agree with that but have family that struggles with that concept, this book might be an effective way to lend credibility to your approach. If you're already 100% on board and supported with that approach, this book doesn't offer much in the way of new ideas. That said, I'm such a fan of the entire concept of giving our kids space, and I'm happy that this book exists for people who DO need a persuasive, somewhat redundant text - so I'm happy to give it 5 stars. I don't know if I'd recommend it to other parents who are already fully embracing this* lifestyle.*letting kids be bored, giving plenty of unstructured playtime, ensuring that parents needs are met, considering the whole family when committing to activities, lots of other pretty basic stuff.

This book is a comfort to parents who are just doing what they can -- and for parents who might sometimes feel guilty for not playing with their children every moment of every day. This book asserts that children NEED to develop self-sufficiency, and being a little more hands-off might just be a good thing for your child. HE may be a little too Rousseauian for my taste, but makes great -- and FUNNY -- points!

After reading the The Freedom Manifesto: How to Free Yourself from Anxiety, Fear, Mortgages, Money, Guilt, Debt, Government, Boredom, Supermarkets, Bills, Melancholy, Pain, Depression, Work, and Waste I visited Tom's website to find out he wrote a book on parenting. For years I've been very much against the reading of parenting books which seem to cause more harm than good... but, being a fan of Tom, I decided to give this book a try. I'm glad I did! Yes the book needs to be read with a grain of salt but the advice is brilliant and it's so well written. In fact, the only problem I have with the book is that my wife has been doing most of these things (unplugging the tv, avoiding supermarkets, etc) for years while I have been fighting her the entire way.I must say I've never been so glad to have been proven wrong (by my wife and Tom)! This book works!-John Konrad author of Fire on the Horizon: The Untold Story of the Gulf Oil Disaster

Tom Hodgkinson's "The Idle Parent" is a frustrating mix of refreshingly anarchic parenting advice (relax, leave your kids alone, enjoy the journey) and weirdly didactic philosophical manifesto (quit your job, don't buy anything plastic, reject most societal norms) -- with plenty of tongue-in-cheek satire sprinkled liberally throughout. Hodgkinson is profoundly pro-environment and anti-capitalist, and believes in living a life as carbon-free and detached from The Man as possible -- yet the extent to which he foists his radical beliefs upon readers quickly becomes an irritant. Despite claiming that all Idle Parents should find their own way and create their own rules when it comes to parenting (yahoo!), his rhetorical style doesn't follow his own mandate -- instead, chapter after chapter outlines the way he's creating his own Idle Family (by getting rid of the dishwasher, eliminating "Family Days Out", growing a garden with his kids, etc.) and strongly intimates that unless you do the same, you're not following The Rules of Idle Parenting.Indeed, by drawing almost exclusively upon his own experiences (which affords him plenty of opportunities for humorous self-denigration), he alienates readers who don't live on a farm in England with easy access to animals and wilderness; ultimately, he fails to provide readers with a balanced sense of their options. Living in an urban environment, for instance, I'm incredibly grateful for the opportunity to take my kids outdoors to a nearby park -- yet Hodgkinson roundly labels all man-made parks the devil's work (!). Perhaps most egregiously, his categorical cries against both daycare and full-time work outside the house don't acknowledge those of us who find both those societal conventions to be an excellent start at Idle Parenting, given that they allow us to achieve two of his purported goals: a) widening the circle of adults to help care for our kids (daycare), and b) maximizing our own adult enjoyment of life (through meaningful work).Finally, Hodgkinson barely addresses the world of parenting with kids under three (his three kids are ages 3-8). He touches briefly upon sleeping arrangements (he's an advocate of co-sleeping, which does NOT make life easier and simpler for all parents!), and gratuitously notes that he thinks swaddling is a restrictive practice which should be banned. (Clearly none of his kids had colic... Swaddling can be a true godsend for the Idle Parent of a Fussy Baby.)With all that said, Hodgkinson's basic credo -- relax and stop feeling guilty about everything you're NOT doing for your kids -- is such an essential antidote to the toxicity of modern helicopter parenting that I'm willing to recommend this book to many of my friends -- with the caveat that much of what he writes (the book could/should have been about half the length) needs to be taken lightly, or ignored altogether.

My love for Tom Hodgkinson's book "The Freedom Manifesto" borders on the obsessive, so I have been looking forward to the US release of "The Idle Parent" for a long time. It did not disappoint. This is the only parenting book I have ever read (and I believe I have read them all) that makes me feel as if I have actually been doing it (sort of) right all these years. I say "sort of right," and I think Tom Hodgkinson would approve of that - because unlike the other 1456 parenting books I've read, this author is happy to point to specific examples where he has totally messed up in the parenting department. How refreshing! This is the anti-helicopter-parenting bible, as far as I am concerned. Enjoy your own life, and let your kids enjoy theirs. Brilliant!

This is my first parenting book (only 6mo pregnant right now), but it follows with what my husband and I pretty much believe (reduce plastic, don't run a restaurant at mealtime, lots of outside play time, etc.), and now I don't think that I need another book. I do agree with other reviewers that there's not enough in there about infants though, so I may need to re-read this in 2 years or so.