Treating Bipolar Disorder: A Clinician's Guide to Interpersonal and Social Rhythm Therapy. By E. Frank. (Pp. 212; $35.00; ISBN 1593852045.) Guilford Press: New York. 2005.

As the editors of Literacy: An International Handbook point out in the acknowledgments, compiling a handbook on any subject, let alone an international one, is a major challenge. Numerous handbooks and international volumes on literacy in an interdisciplinary perspective have already been produced and more will undoubtedly follow. Daniel A. Wagner, Richard L. Venezky, and Brian V. Street have produced a major contribution to this abundant, controversial, and ever-evolving literature. Literacy debates and issues inevitably arouse passion and concern worldwide and have done so for thousands of years. Each of us involved in some way in understanding and promoting reading and writing, especially as democratically and universally as possible, will find this volume provocative and instructive. Wagner identifies the challenge taken up in the Handbook as being ‘‘to provide, between two covers, a compendium on what is known, and not so well known, in this broad and diverse field’’ (p. 1). Such a challenge is no small undertaking, particularly when the primary United Nations agency that is mandated to promote universal literacy for all age-groups is a sponsor of that endeavor. Those of us with experience in this area cannot help but recognize the enormity of the accomplishment contained between the book’s covers. This volume is more a compendium of different views on literacy than a handbook per se. Perhaps the notion of handbook suggests something practical and transferable (albeit with some adaptation) and, above all, a coherence of approach and target. This volume provides a broader, more uneven, and definitely provocative set of entries that enriches debate but certainly provides no uniformity of objective or perspective. In fact, its title is misleading if intended to describe the wealth of material within the covers. The volume is divided into nine parts with several chapters in each section: ‘‘Historical and Philosophical Roots,’’ ‘‘Psychological Approaches,’’ ‘‘Sociological and Anthropological Approaches,’’ ‘‘Language and Literacy,’’ ‘‘Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment,’’ ‘‘Numeracy,’’ ‘‘Policy Perspectives,’’ ‘‘Contemporary Regional Perspectives,’’ and ‘‘Literacy and the New Technologies.’’ As far as themes are concerned, the breadth of coverage is impressive. The various subchapters are frequently informative, often contradictory, and challenging. For example, while Adama Ouane’s chapter on postliteracy materials uses the controversial term ‘‘relapse into illiteracy’’ to describe the main reason for producing these materials, Wagner and others reject this medical terminology, suggesting that the school or nonformal education setting has served learners poorly, fostering only partial and unsustainable basic skills. A great deal has been written on this debate alone. A number of the other chapters take up this theme in a more positive interdisciplinary way, looking at the meaning of literacy or literacies in specific contexts, for specific purposes, and in different cultural and historical settings.