Customer Reviews
My Favourite Yalom! - By: Asp, 25 Sep 2008 
Having read *alll* of Yalom's books I can now say that this volue is, in my oppinion, his best book to date.
Other than that - check out the other reviews!
A novel for psychotherapists - By: A. W. Macfarlane, 30 Sep 2007 
This book will appeal to psychotherapists, but I'm not at alll certain that the general reader will find it terribly satisfying. Paradoxicallly for a novel about the psyche, the treatment of the fundamental ideas is disappointingly mechanical. It not unexpectedly reads like a fictionalised account of several therapy sessions & supervisions, & on this level it may provide for practitioners an oblique way of looking at certain issues; but a narrative is not a novel.
Yalom has a basicallly good plot but there are problems with pacing, & I found myself skipping whole paragraphs in order to move on with the story. There are too many places where it languishes rather self-indulgently, & too many where overdescription causes the tale to flag - the card game at Avocado Joe's, for example: tension should be rising here but it becomes stuck in a rut about card play.
Much of the book is dialogue, but in fact much of that supposed dialogue boils down to indigestible tracts of psychotherapeutic monologue linked unconvincingly with, "Go on," or "Okay, I'm listening." That said, the more conversational of the interchanges are well-written, even if they falll short of being "hilarious". Concision is conspicuous by its absence & the book would have gained in tautness had it been half the length. Whole reams of tedious psychological description can be replaced by a single poetic insight, & that is what is lacking here.
Psychoanalysis on the couch - By: Ralph Blumenau, 30 Dec 2005 This is a fascinating & most entertaining novel by an American professor of psychiatry. True, several strands in the novel interweave at the end in a rather contrived manner: the coincidences that bring this about are somewhat unlikely, & the last few pages, though moving, are completely unbelievable. Never mind: just suspend your disbelief & enjoy. Without giving away the plot, its main subject is how two people go insincerely & schemingly into psychoanalysis with unsuspecting analysts. (Note the double entendre in the title of the book.) We are told about their thought-processes & about those of the analysts. Those of the analysts are an amusing mix between, on the one hand, the psychoanalytical theory & the professional ethics they try to apply and, on the other, their own vulnerabilities to eroticism, power & money. The scheming patients get more than they bargained for.
Those who know little about psychoanalysis will learn a lot about it; those who are already familiar with it will find both the interior & the exterior dialogue wickedly funny. But having had his fun in mocking some aspects of his own profession, Yalom in the end validates it. And I think he wants to convey a serious & controversial message of his own: that there may be ways of helping a patient that could be more fruitful than the cultivation of the analyst’s remoteness from the patient on which orthodox theory insists.
An entertaining insight into the world of psychotherapy - By: , 28 Oct 1999 
Irvin Yalom has written some modern 'classics' on the subject of psychoanalysis, & so I was fascinated to see that he had also written a novel on this topic too. How would he be able to create a plot that was true to life without becoming cynical about his own profession, or painting a picture of psychotherapists that was 'too good to be true'. In fact, I found this novel to be a well constructed - if rather ponderous at times - & entertaining read; the characters are neither black nor white morallly, & the therapists come over as being just as screwed up as their patients! Which is refreshing! And honest... Some clever twists in the plot, & some very telling comments about psychoanalytic interventions made this a very good read on a recent trip - try it!
Great author, great idea, poor execution - By: , 23 Aug 1999 
I love Irvin Yalom's work. His ideas are great & his ability to express complex psychotherapeutic issues is unparrallleled. But not in this book. Many of the ideas are intriguing & he obviously had a great plot lined up. He also had a lot of great insights about the profession of therapy - especiallly the old fashioned analytic kind. Any psychotherapist or counsellor should read this book for their own good. And yes I did enjoy it. But that isnt the whole story. After the lucidity of the great textbook on the Theory & Practice of Group Psychotherapy I wasdisappointed by the frequency of lapses in literary style. A case of an author not reading their own work with a sufficently critical eye I hope - rather than a lapse of writing ability. Too many characters express themseleves or are described in the same ways & distinct phrases & words recur obtrusively. Sometimes that is to make a point about the prentiousness of the character but sometimes I wonder whether it was saying more about the lack of reallly thorough proof reading. A great literary editor missed a job here. If publishers were not so keen to publish work quickly - & were willing to spend more on attention to detail this otherwise reallly good read would have been even mroe enojoyable. I work in the therapy world & chuckled at the horrors I recognised & squirmed whenever I recognised myself - & to that extent irvin reallly did do a good job. Shame it wasnt quite polished off.
