Normal, or Better Than Normal - at a High Cost

The vast majority of children who feel they are too tall or too short - or whose parents feel that way - have no medical problem. To be sure, some kids above or below "normal" height endure schoolmates who bully, mock, or exclude them; parents who pressure or infantilize them; and employers who underpay or overlook them. Their suffering can be considerable, but their condition is entirely psychological and social.

Normal at Any Cost: Tall Girls, Short Boys and the Medical Industry's Quest to Manipulate Height is a gripping account of efforts over the past 50 years to "fix" children's height with hormones and other drugs. Authors Susan Cohen and Christine Cosgrove give us solid reporting, rich detail and human stories about this ongoing experiment.

Some of the medical interventions into height have gone bad. From the 1950s to the 1980s - before Title IX invited girls to play basketball and volleyball, before fashions and fashion models changed, before Michelle Obama became First Lady - thousands of girls "at risk" of winding up tall were dosed with huge amounts of...