'Narrative research' has become a catchword in the social sciences today, promising new fields of inquiry and creative solutions to persistent problems. This book will bring together ideas about narrative from a variety of contexts across the social sciences and synthesize understandings of the field. Rather than focusing on theory, the book will examine how narrative research is conducted and applied. It will operate as an introductory guide, simple enough for the beginner, but also as a window onto the more complex questions and difficulties that all researchers in this area face. It will guide readers through current debates not just about how to obtain and analyse narrative data, but about the nature of narrative, place of the researcher, the limits of researcher interpretations, and the significance of narrative work in applied and in broader political contexts.