A companion is traditionally a secondary piece of work that accompanies the main texts of a discipline. Qualitative research now has such a foundation of work that we can begin to see the production of secondary literature. This book contains a selection of important writings from the broad literature relating to social science research as it is applied in qualitative research. The selection of included chapters was made from a possible battery of one thousand titles! There are three main sections to the book. Section one is concerned with looking at how we weave concepts together and develop theories that, in turn, influence research design. Section two addresses itself directly to methodological issues focusing, among other matters, on establishing credibility, avoiding bias and generalizing from small-scale studies. Section three takes six empirical studies from varying qualitative approaches and presents them as examples of how to do a qualitative study well. This is a valuable resource book providing some pertinent examples of research thinking and practice. The quality of writing is high. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0204367