The Author: Wendy Austin is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Nursing at University of Alberta. She has a degree in nursing in addition to an M.Ed. in educational psychology (counseling), a Ph.D. in educational psychology, and a post-doctorate in health ethics. She has been a consultant for mental health with the International Council of Nurses and has published in journals on issues in psychiatric and mental health nursing. Her children, Mark and Kara, were adolescents when First Love was researched.

«This book is engaging, respectful, and well-written. It provides the reader with perceptive, dignified, and thoughtful insights into the mystery of adolescent love. I recommend it to everyone who believes in the vitality of youth, the power of the romantic pulse, and the union of two in young love.» (John J. Mitchell, Professor of Education, Okanagan University College, British Columbia; Author of ‘The Mental and Emotional Life of Teenagers’)«‘First Love’ is a book of greatest magnitude about a subject that is of greatest magnitude to all humans. This scholarly portal into the abiding concern of the significance of adoration, affection, and devotion in young people's lives opens up the question of the meaning of love relations for people of all ages... Love, that four-letter word, represents a subject that is still being shunned by serious scholars in the social and human sciences. But in this rich, deep, and eloquent exploration into the manifold theories and narrative perspectives on adolescent love, Wendy Austin demonstrates the timeliness and relevance for the study of love in people young and old. Her research is both learned and passionate. She spell-binds her readers with insights, reminiscences, and portrayals that cannot help but prompt us to reflect on the formative experiences in our own lives.» (Max van Manen, Author of ‘Researching Lived Experience: Human Science for an Action Sensitive Pedagogy’)