One of family therapy's wittiest and most sensible writers uses the family crisis as a launching point for discussing the entire range of events that can disrupt marriage and family life. A family crisis is heralded by symptomatic behavior, such as school phobia, adolescent rebellion, or depression, that trips up the family in its developmental path. Pittman show how the therapist can make the most of these crisis, creatively using whatever is at hand to pull the family through the chaos.