Synopses & Reviews
Lauren Slater, a brilliant writer who is a young therapist, takes us on a mesmerizing personal and professional journey in this remarkable memoir about her work with mental and emotional illness. The territory of the mind and of madness can seem a foreign, even frightening place-until you read
Welcome to My Country.
Writing in a powerful and original voice, Lauren Slater closes the distance between "us" and "them," transporting us into the country of Lenny, Moxi, Oscar, and Marie. She lets us watch as she interacts with and strives to understand patients suffering from mental and emotional distress-the schizophrenic, the depressed, the suicidal. As the young psychologist responds to, reflects on, and re-creates her interactions with the inner realities of the dispossessed, she moves us to a deeper understanding of the complexities of the human mind and spirit. And then, in a stunning final chapter, the psychologist confronts herself, when she is asked to treat a young woman, bulimic and suicidal, who is on the same ward where Slater herself was once such a patient.
Like An Unquiet Mind, Listening to Prozac and Girl, Interrupted, Welcome to My Country is a beautifully written, captivating, and revealing book, an unusual personal and professional memoir that brings us closer to understanding ourselves, one another, and the human condition.
Synopsis
Lauren Slater, a brilliant writer and a young therapist, chronicles her remarkable personal and professional journeys in this extraordinary memoir of her work with mentally and emotionally ill patients. Closing the distance between "us" and "them", Slater transports the reader into a country where patients are suffering from schizophrenia and depression. As the young psychologist responds to, reflects on, and re-creates her interactions with the dispossessed, she offers a deeper understanding of the complexities of the human mind and spirit. And then, in a stunning final chapter, the psychologist confronts herself, when she is asked to treat a young woman, bulimic and suicidal, who is on the same ward where Slater herself was once such a patient.
Like An Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison, Listening to Prozac by Peter Kramer, and Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen, Welcome to My Country is a beautifully written, captivating, and revealing book, an unusual personal and professional memoir that brings readers closer to understanding themselves, one another, and the human condition.