This book is small but packs a powerful punch. Andy Crouch writes from personal experience and conviction, in what has worked (or not worked) in his family as far as managing technology and its effects. It has numerous Barna research results expressed in varying graphics, including bar and circle graphs and sobering statistics.
Crouch breaks the book down into 10 commitments, such as We develop wisdom and courage together as a family, and We wake up before our devices do, and they “go to bed” before we do, each getting a chapter. I really appreciated that he didn’t give hard and fast rules, the kind books like this can claim, “If you just put these rules into practice, you won’t have any troubles.” Instead, he offered principles that he and his wife really work hard to live by, candidly shows how they have succeeded and failed, and in all has written a book that encourages flourishing and celebrating all of life in a family rather than just focusing on cold hard facts about technology and its effects on the family.
I enthusiastically recommend this book to all. It obviously has the most impact on parent/children families, but I believe it is relevant even to the single person, or a couple without children. We all need to be reminded how important relationships with skin on are, and that we are to be the masters of our technology rather than allowing ourselves to be mastered.
I was given a complimentary copy of this book by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts are mine; I was not obligated to give a positive review.
The Quiet Life 