On the Couch: Great American Stories About Therapy

By Erica Kates

Book Overview

The therapist's office remains one of the few private places in our world. On the Couch, a scintillating collection of contemporary American short stories, provides nineteen separate windows onto this intensely private experience, from the heroine in Lorrie Moore's If Only Bert Were Here, who cannot recover from the death of her beloved cat (and who lists Haagen-Dazs as a distinct stage of mourning), to the couple in John Updike's The Fairy Godfathers, whose passion requires the presence of their respective therapists, to the protagonist of Stephen McCauley's The Whole Truth, who can, hilariously, barely keep straight the twisted lies she tells her therapist about her romantic entanglements.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0871136627
• ISBN13: 9780871136626
• Release Date: January 1997
• Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Pr
• Length: 387 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 1.3" x 6.0"

Customer Reviews

A great collection!

Cutting-edge stories by our top writers....Will definitely appeal to anyone interested in psychotherapy and therapists....

If you have gotten here via inetrest in therapy...

then you should definitely buy this book.I enjoyed 90 percent of the stories. Of those that I liked there were a couple I will definitely read again! These stories are good not only because of the subject matter but mostly due to the clever writing abilities.... especially John Updike and Daniel Menaker.

The Bible of the Cult of Pyscho-therapy

You'll be reading it up until the Doctor calls you into the office. Especially good for insomniacs who are up late on their own couch

A wonderful collection!

I was mesmerized! A must read for anyone who has experience in or would like to know more about psychotherapy.