Recent years have seen self-help publications being increasingly used by patients and recommended by therapists. Nowadays, many clinicians recommend particular self-help books to patients or provide patients with a list of recommended books. Mind over Mood by Padesky and Greenberger and Feeling Good: the new mood therapy by Burns have for years been two of the most popular self-help texts traditionally recommended to patients with depression. Now this book, aiming to do the same, provides an attractive modern and accessible alternative for UK patients and is indeed already widely used and recommended by many clinicians in the UK.

It is written by one of the leading figures in the CBT self-help field in the UK and the author of the popular Living Life to the Full CBT self-help website. This fully updated second edition explains depression and how to overcome it from within a CBT framework. The book uses a clear theoretical approach from start to finish that it describes as the five-areas approach, which makes the traditional CBT model more easily understandable to patients. As well as offering patients an easy way of understanding their problems, it is also helpful in providing professionals a way to simply explain the CBT model to patients. The book teaches the reader important CBT techniques step-by-step such as activity scheduling, graded task assignment, and challenging negative automatic thoughts, explaining these skills in layman's language.

The book has many good points, the most important of which is probably the well-written, jargon-free style that makes it clear and easy to read compared to other similar books on the market. Technical language is either completely avoided or skillfully translated into terms understandable to a lay audience. It is very accessible and the reading age is helpfully aimed at between 11 to 14 year olds, which is important given that the average reading age in the population is surprisingly low, and suffering from depression is likely to further impair this ability. There are many diagrams and tables that help to illustrate key points, and there are also more than a few well drawn cartoons to give this visually attractive publication a user friendly feel. Another advantage of this book is that it is licensed for unlimited photocopying for clinical use and teaching. Furthermore (and slightly unusually for a self-help book), there is some research support for the effectiveness of using Overcoming Depression. The author has done a randomized controlled study that supported using the workbooks from Overcoming Depression in primary care with the support of a guided self-help support worker.

Overcoming Depression consists of 10 short and practical self-help workbooks, with spaces for the reader to fill in details from their own experience. In the first part of the book the reader is asked to answer a series of questions to help identify which workbooks they should use. The book then includes sections and workbooks on important topics, which are entitled “Understanding why I feel as I do”, “Practical problem-solving”, “Being assertive”, “Building relationships”, “Noticing and changing extreme and unhelpful thinking”, “Overcoming reduced activity and avoidance”, “Using exercise to boost how you feel”, “Helpful and unhelpful things we can do”, “Alcohol, drugs and you”, “Overcoming sleep problems”, “Understanding and using antidepressant medication”, “Planning for the future”, as well as a section on how to use and support self-help.

One minor shortcoming of the book is that it is difficult to find particular topics as the book consists of a series of individual workbooks (the order of which is not particularly intuitive) that are all page-numbered separately, and unhelpfully there is no index. This can be slightly irritating, especially when trying to go back to something you have read earlier.

Overall, I would definitely recommend this book to depressed patients and to health professionals for use with their patients with mild to moderate depression. As well as being useful to experienced CBT therapists, it would also be useful to professionals who are not experts in CBT who work with depressed patients, be they psychologists, primary care counsellors, general practitioners, psychiatrists, psychiatric nurses or those offering either individual or group self-help. It can be used to supplement therapy, for patients on waiting lists, as well as a guided self-help intervention or “bibliotherapy”. The whole book could be recommended to patients to work through or particular workbooks from the book could be photocopied for patients. In summary, I do not think you would go far wrong if you considered this a first port of call when looking for a CBT self-help book on depression.