Your Baby Is Speaking to You – Book Review

A baby book is not something that readers will typically associate with art books. However, the photography included in Your Baby Is Speaking to You is heart-warming and makes the book a great one to leaf through, even for those of us who do not have children and for those of us who are not usually captivated by other people’s off-spring.

Photography and Parenting Advice

Nugent’s advice for new parents is accompanied by photographs that demonstrate the different communication techniques that babies innately demonstrate when interacting with their parents. The photographs are up close and personal, capturing heart-felt moments and sweet glimpses into the simple gestures that are exchanged between baby and parent. Moreover, if you are reading the book for the advice on how your baby is communicating, Kevin Nugent is more than a solid enough authority to do so. Dr. Nugent is a well-known authority on parent-infant communication.

Dr. Nugent worked with acclaimed photographer Abelardo Morell to truly capture what he discusses in each chapter. Morell’s body of work shows a clear understanding of intimate moments and how to get them just right. The photographs that are included in Your Baby Is Speaking to You are innocent and heart-felt.

Infant-Parent Communication

Nugent illustrates a wide-array of various communications that occur between infant and parent. He included everything from early smiling to startling, listening to your voice and recognizing your face to feeding and sleeping. He also highlights:

• Yawning
• Various cries and their meanings
• The different sleep states and the body language that accompanies them

Overall, Your Baby Is Speaking to You is hybrid in that it gives new parents an accessible way to read and understand more about their infant while including heart-warming photography that can be enjoyed by those of us who are not trying to understand how our non-existent infants are not communicating with us.

Dr. Kevin Nugent studied infants through hands-on experiences through intimate access to the infants and their families. Compiled with his education and experience in the field, Nugent’s book presents an informative and well-researched look into infant-parent communication. Readers have commented that Nugent’s book is one of the more informative and easier to understand books about infant-parent communication, further explaining that it was a quick read that gave them a lot more insight into their children, their lives and their roles as parents.

Your Baby Is Speaking to You by Dr. Kevin Nugent with photography by Abelardo Morell was published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt on January 13, 2011 with ISBN 0547242956.