This book is designed to serve as both a self-help book and a companion to cognitive therapy for anxiety disorders, written by leaders in cognitive therapy. The book is directed at individuals suffering from panic, social anxiety and generalized anxiety (or worry). Overall, the book is nicely structured. It guides readers to understanding their anxiety and develop strategies to overcoming their problems, using excellent case examples, trouble shooting tips, worksheets and homework exercises throughout.

The book begins by introducing the reader to the function of anxiety and how it can go wrong for some people and develop into a persistent problem, achieving this in a manner that is both normalizing and hope inspiring for the reader. The chapter introduces three characters, each with one of the three previously noted anxiety disorders, used to illustrate key points and meanings throughout the book, to great effect. This chapter also gives a clear, accessible description of cognitive therapy (CT) for anxiety disorders, how it works, and what to expect from therapy sessions and a therapist. This is particularly helpful for readers using this book in conjunction to therapy. The chapter draws readers’ attention to what will help them get the most out of the book (and therapy), namely motivation and positive expectations in making improvement in their anxiety, and concludes by focusing the reader on their goals and expectations for overcoming their fear and anxiety, using a worksheet to assist and guide them through this.

The next two chapters focus on understanding anxiety and the anxious mind. Chapter 2 illustrates how anxiety presents itself through physical, cognitive, behavioural and emotional symptoms, and encourages the reader to break down their own anxiety into these components. Interactive worksheets with useful prompting questions for each symptom, and illustrative case examples are provided to help readers to do this. The chapter moves on to identifying the core fear driving the reader's anxiety. Useful trouble shooting tips are provided with helpful prompting questions. Chapter 3 moves onto looking at automatic thoughts and thinking profiles that can maintain anxiety. The reader is helped to identify their own thinking styles, avoidance and safety seeking behaviours, using worksheets and illustrative examples throughout.

Now that the reader has developed their anxiety profile, the next four chapters focus on overcoming their anxiety problems. However, before getting started on therapy, the reader identifies their own beliefs about their anxiety problem and carrying out self-help assignments, which serves as an excellent tool to highlighting any potential barriers in getting the most out of the book and the exercises it provides. The remainder of this section uses a variety of resources such as worksheets, questionnaires, homework assignments, mental self-help exercises, anecdotes and case examples to help the reader to challenge and overcome their anxiety problems.

The first eight chapters of this book are presented in such a way that they can be generalized to helping readers with panic, social anxiety or generalized anxiety disorder. However, the authors also provide an additional three chapters targeting each of these disorders, for readers requiring more specific help. These chapters begin by helping the reader identify whether the chapter is relevant for them, and then guides them through the theory behind the disorder, developing their disorder specific profile, followed by strategies and self-help exercises and worksheets to help them to start overcoming their problem.

Overall this book provides in-depth explanations of anxiety and the theory behind CT. It guides the reader through overcoming their difficulties using case examples, trouble-shooting tips, and a wealth of interactive resources throughout. The book nicely balances normalizing people's experiences and inspiring hope and motivation, with gentle reminders that overcoming anxiety can take time and requires practice in implementing the strategies taught throughout the book. The book finishes by providing additional worksheets and advice and information on where to get further help, should it be needed. To conclude, this book is an excellent, accessible self-help manual for individuals suffering from anxiety. It would also be a valuable tool for therapists and an accompaniment to patients already having cognitive therapy.