Books: Stepfamilies and remarriage
The one shelf where the research and the bestseller list point in noticeably different directions. Every entry says who it is not for, which is the useful part and the part nobody else prints.
The buy links go to Bookshop.org, which supports independent bookshops. If you buy through one of them we earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It does not affect which books are here or what we say about them — several of the books on this page we actively tell you not to buy, and the ones we rate worst are still listed with a link. Beside every buy link there is a library link, because a lot of people reading this site cannot spend forty dollars on a book this month and should not have to. How the rest of the site is funded.
Stepfamilies and remarriage: 7 books
Ordered by how well evidenced they are rather than by how good they are, because those are different questions and the second one depends on who you are.
Lawrence Ganong · Springer · first published 2016 · 359 pages
Lawrence Ganong (with Marilyn Coleman, his frequent co-author and not separately listed here) is a family studies researcher who has spent decades publishing the empirical demographic and relationship research on stepfamilies.
A scholarly review of the research literature on stepfamilies — prevalence, stepparent-stepchild relationship quality, remarriage stability, and what large studies actually show, with extensive citations. It is written for researchers, graduate students, and clinicians who want the evidence base, not for a stepparent looking for comfort or tactics on a Tuesday night.
Read it if Someone who wants to know what the actual research literature says about stepfamily outcomes — a clinician, student, or unusually research-minded reader.
Do not read it if Most readers going through a remarriage or blended-family transition right now — this is an academic text, not a self-help book, and most people in the middle of building a stepfamily will find it dry and will get more direct help from Papernow or the practical books further down this shelf.
Well evidenced A genuine synthesis of the empirical research literature — the strongest evidence base on this shelf — but that rigor comes with an academic register most readers won’t want.
No rating we could verify — we leave this blank rather than repeat a number we have not seen at its source.
Patricia L. Papernow · Gestalt Press · first published 2015 · 448 pages
Patricia Papernow, EdD — the same clinician-researcher as(Surviving and Thriving in Stepfamily Relationships); this is her earlier, foundational book, originally published in 1993 and reissued.
The original statement of the stepfamily-cycle model — the stages a stepfamily typically moves through, from early fantasy and confusion to eventual integration — worked out from her own clinical research and case studies. It’s more theoretical and developmental in focus than the later, more directly practical book at(Surviving and Thriving in Stepfamily Relationships).
Read it if A reader who wants to understand the underlying developmental model of how stepfamilies form and change over years, not just a list of what to do this month.
Do not read it if A reader who wants immediate, concrete tactics for a specific problem right now — that reader is better served by(Surviving and Thriving in Stepfamily Relationships)or the more popular stepmother-focused books further down this shelf.
Practitioner experience, not research A clinically derived developmental model built from case-study research rather than large quantitative samples — foundational and still widely cited, but read it as clinical theory, not epidemiology.
No rating we could verify — we leave this blank rather than repeat a number we have not seen at its source.
Patricia L. Papernow · Routledge · first published 2013
Patricia Papernow, EdD, is a clinical psychologist and one of the field’s most cited stepfamily researchers and trainers; she developed the widely used ‘stepfamily cycle’ model of stepfamily development.
A clinician’s synthesis of what actually helps stepfamilies function, aimed primarily at therapists and other professionals working with stepfamilies, though a determined lay reader can follow it. It covers the stepfamily cycle, the specific bind of the stepparent role, and what distinguishes stepfamily dynamics from first-family dynamics.
Read it if A therapist, coach, or clergy member working with stepfamilies, or a stepfamily member willing to read a professionally pitched book rather than a breezy one.
Do not read it if A reader who wants a quick, casual read — this is written at a practitioner level, denser and more clinical in register than the popular stepmother books on this shelf (Stepmonster and The Happy Stepmother).
Practitioner experience, not research Papernow’s model is built on decades of clinical work and case observation with stepfamilies rather than large-sample quantitative studies; it is the most respected clinical synthesis in the field but should not be read as equivalent to the demographic research base of Ganong and Coleman’s work (Stepfamily Relationships).
No rating we could verify — we leave this blank rather than repeat a number we have not seen at its source.
Rachelle Katz · Harlequin · first published 2010
Rachelle Katz is a marriage and family therapist and a stepmother herself.
A practical, personal-experience-driven guide to stepmother wellbeing, mixing the author’s own clinical caseload with her own stepfamily experience. It sits in the same popular, stepmother-affirming register as Stepmonster (Stepmonster) rather than the research register of Papernow or Ganong and Coleman.
Read it if A stepmother who wants warm, practitioner-informed encouragement and permission to prioritize her own wellbeing.
Do not read it if A reader who wants the advice traced back to a research base — like Stepmonster, this is closer to informed opinion and clinical anecdote than to the evidence-backed end of this shelf.
Practitioner experience, not research Drawn from the author’s clinical caseload and personal experience rather than published research; place it next to Stepmonster (51) in tone and rigor, and next to Papernow (48/49) or Ganong & Coleman (50) for the actual research base.
No rating we could verify — we leave this blank rather than repeat a number we have not seen at its source.
Ron L. Deal · Bethany House Publishers · first published 2002 · 293 pages
Ron L. Deal is a marriage and family therapist who specializes in stepfamilies and works within Christian ministry organizations (FamilyLife); Bethany House, the publisher, is a Christian press.
A practical, step-by-step guide to blended-family dynamics — expectations, discipline, the couple relationship — written explicitly from a Christian faith perspective, with scripture and faith-based framing woven through the advice.
Read it if A Christian reader who wants stepfamily guidance that shares their faith framework and isn’t shy about it.
Do not read it if A reader who isn’t Christian or doesn’t want religious framing in the advice — this book doesn’t hide its perspective, and it shapes the counsel throughout, not just in a chapter you can skip.
Practitioner experience, not research Deal’s clinical experience with blended families, filtered through an explicit faith lens rather than presented as secular research.
No rating we could verify — we leave this blank rather than repeat a number we have not seen at its source.
Pearl Ketover Prilik · Forman Pub. · first published 1988 · 254 pages
Pearl Ketover Prilik is a psychologist.
An early book-length treatment of the emotional experience of stepmothering, published in 1988 — well before Papernow’s or Ganong and Coleman’s major bodies of work existed. It predates the modern research base on stepfamilies almost entirely.
Read it if Someone researching the history of how stepmothering has been written about, more than someone looking for current guidance.
Do not read it if A stepmother looking for advice reflecting current research or current family law and custody norms — this book is nearly four decades old, and both the field’s understanding of stepfamily dynamics and the legal and social landscape around blended families have moved substantially since.
Check the edition Published in 1988, before the stepfamily field’s major research (Papernow, Ganong and Coleman) existed — treat it as a historical artifact, not current guidance.
No rating we could verify — we leave this blank rather than repeat a number we have not seen at its source.
Wednesday Martin · Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company · first published 2009 · 331 pages
Wednesday Martin holds a PhD in comparative literature and has written on social and cultural anthropology; she is not a family therapist or stepfamily researcher, and draws heavily on evolutionary psychology and her own interviews with stepmothers.
A validation-focused book arguing that stepmothers get an unfairly bad cultural rap, built around interviews with stepmothers and an evolutionary-psychology framing (stepchildren aren’t ‘yours,’ biologically, so resentment is natural and shouldn’t be a source of shame). It names feelings many stepmothers don’t feel permitted to admit to.
Read it if A stepmother who feels isolated and guilty for having complicated, sometimes resentful feelings about her stepchildren and needs to hear that’s common before she can move forward.
Do not read it if A reader who wants research-grounded guidance on what to actually do differently — the evolutionary-psychology explanations are more interesting story than settled science, and the book is stronger at naming the problem than solving it.
Popular, weakly evidenced Built on the author’s own interviews and evolutionary-psychology framing rather than controlled research; the underlying evolutionary claims about stepparent investment are contested within the field, not the consensus view the book’s confident tone suggests. Compare to Papernow (48/49) and Ganong & Coleman (50), the field’s actual research anchors.
Open Library 5.0 from 1 ratings. Checked 2026-09-02.
Every title, author, publisher, year, page count and ISBN here was checked against a bibliographic database rather than typed from memory, and the candidates that could not be confirmed were dropped rather than guessed at. Ratings are shown only where we could see them at source, which is why several books have none — a blank is honest and an invented four-point-three is not. The judgments about what a book is worth are ours, they are opinions, and you are entitled to disagree with them. Tell us when we are wrong.
Compiled 31 August 2026. Bibliographic data from Open Library. Prices, editions and availability change constantly; the links go to the current listing.