Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

"Who am I?" "How do I fit in the world around me?" This revealing and innovative book demonstrates that each of us discovers what is true and meaningful, in our lives and in ourselves, through the creation of personal myths. Challenging the traditional view that our personalities are formed by fixed, unchanging characteristics, or by predictable stages through which every individual travels, The Stories We Live By persuasively argues that we are the stories we tell. Informed by extensive scientific research--yet highly readable, engaging, and accessible--the book explores how understanding and revising our personal stories can open up new possibilities for our lives.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

Ranging widely within the canon of Western psychology, McAdams claims to offer a new perspective on personal mythmaking. He discriminates between the collective myths that people inherit and the private myths that individuals create to formulate their identities. Using the terminology of literary narrative study and behavioral psychology, McAdams attempts to combine the two into a new theory of identity. There is a great deal of discussion of themes like grief and intimacy; references to Freud, Erik Erikson, and others; and reviews of the passage from childhood to adolescence to adulthood. While the book is easy reading, its theme has been dealt with before in numerous psychology textbooks. However, it could serve as an introduction to psychology and mythmaking. For large psychology collections.-- Nancy E. Zuwiyya, Binghamton City Sch. Dist., N.Y. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Publishers Weekly Review

No self-help treatise about exorcising fatalistic visions of one's life, this frequently wooden but intermittently arresting book proposes that ``each of us comes to know who he or she is by creating a heroic story of the self.'' McAdams, a Chicago psychologist, argues against archetypal myths, although he makes tantalizing if fleeting references to fairy tales and other properties of mass culture. A little heavy on developmental theory, the work hypothesizes how people begin to ``gather material'' for their ``self-defining stories'' in infancy and early childhood. In several case studies McAdams demonstrates the role of myth, while one of the stronger sections explains how to write a narrative to uncover personal myths, offering a list of questions for that purpose. Elsewhere, McAdams discusses ``imagoes''--defined as idealized concepts of self, the characters in personal narratives--and explores how such historical events as the Kennedy assassination are assimilated into one's own saga. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Booklist Review

Psychologist McAdams theorizes that people form their identities through a mythical narrative, which is a result of the cumulation of early-life events put into a historical perspective and given a setting during the adolescent years and an ideology in early adulthood. The author takes the reader step-by-step through each stage of human development to thoroughly explain his idea. He backs up his carefully footnoted argument by incorporating other human development theories (Piaget's, for instance) and even some existential ideas (anguish, for example); he also uses interesting case stories collected during his 11 years of research. McAdams discusses how a person can explore his or her own myth. Two appendixes highlight his key ideas--nuclear episodes (turning-point events) and agency and communion (motivational dispositions). Other psychologists' concepts not explained in the text are treated in the footnotes. Even if one doesn't agree with his theory, this is still an interesting book on general human development. (Reviewed Feb 15, 1993)0688108660Caroline Paulison

Kirkus Book Review

From psychologist McAdams, a strong and engrossing argument for the relationship between storytelling and personal development. The stories people tell about their lives re-create special moments, recognize turning points, or reveal ongoing identity issues. Finding a particular ``grammar'' in these narratives, McAdams contends that they act as ``a natural package for organizing...information'' and illuminate ``the values of an individual life,'' reaching the level of myth. People define themselves in the tone and content of their narratives as well as in the telling, and the themes that emerge most often--especially love and power--appear in a wide variety of contexts. Ultimately, these stories create ``a human narrative of the self'' and, usually toward midlife, give each life a sense of unity and purpose. Pointing out developmental correlates in his scheme--the emergence of narrative tone in the earliest years or of intention-themes in adolescence--McAdams places a powerful emphasis on ``agentic'' and ``communal characters''--awkward terms for those who act, think, and feel vigorously, or for those who are oriented toward love and intimacy. McAdams also alludes to classical mythology for occasional amplification and refers to standard works (Erikson) and famous individuals (Karen Horney, Margaret Mead) to support his ideas and to highlight his theoretical departures. Likening his role as listener to the protagonist in the film sex, lies, and videotape, McAdams has been researching this cluster of ideas for many years and urges others to follow his outline for ``interpersonal dialogue'' and to pursue a similar exploration. Stimulating--but dense and demanding.

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Dan P. McAdams, PhD, is Professor of Human Development and Social Policy and Professor of Psychology at Northwestern University, where he is also Director of the Foley Center for the Study of Lives. He has published 12 books and over 100 articles and chapters in the areas of personality and developmental psychology.