Families on the Fast Track; Overachieving Offspring Get Their Cues From Success-Oriented Parents
Andree Aelion Brooks's "Children of Fast-Track Parents" is really two books mingled together. The first book could be entitled "The Pain and Dangers of Growing Up Rich," and it is an excellent analysis of the pressures that more than 5 million children face growing up in families with incomes of $75,000 or more per year.</br></br>Brooks is a mother of grown children and a journalist who specializes in family issues. She has written pieces for McCalls, Woman's Day and The New York Times.</br></br>In February 1987, Brooks attended a workshop called "Where Do We Go From the Garden of Eden?" held in her home town of Westport, Conn. Psychologists, school administrators and clergy discussed the problems of rearing children in an affluent community.</br></br>Brooks wrote about the workshop in The New York Times Magazine, and the response was so enormous that she decided to write this book. As part of her research she interviewed children, parents, teachers, psychiatrists, psychologists and guidance counselors.</br></br>One of the book's major contributions is simply to bring the problems of wealthy children out into the open. In a world full of poverty, fortunate children are often embarrassed to admit that they have any problems at all, but in conversations with Brooks they revealed over and over again that pain accompanies privilege.