Book review: Group: Six People in Search of a Life

Paul Solotaroff
Penguin Press, £18.99
ISBN 0 71 399398 7
Rating: 3/4

February in New York: Manhattan is under snow, while the salt trucks try hopelessly to melt the ice. In an office somewhere on University Place, tucked away between the bohemia of Greenwich Village and the brash consumerism of Union Square, a man in a suit opens the door to six strangers, one by one. They take their seats in a ring, terrified to make eye contact. Their leader is crisply tailored, professional, and authoritative in manner. The most important rule, he tells them, is fearless honesty.

On the surface the strangers seem to be successful professionals-an editor, a Wall Street multimillionaire, a rock musician, a clinic director, an accountant, a Broadway producer-but all of their lives, says the man in the suit, are just "false stories." They have one year to cast off the self delusion, to reinvent themselves, to write their true stories. And the clock is ticking away.

Although this sounds like the opening of a fictional thriller, Group is a factual account of six patients undergoing psychotherapy. Solotaroff, who writes for Vogue, GQ, and Rolling Stone, sat in on the sessions as an observer, turning the patients' addictions, compulsions, and self destruction into an engrossing narrative. And as in all good dramas, you'll want to know how each of their stories will turn out.

Take Lina for instance, a 45 year old woman who directs a community health centre in the notoriously run down Bronx district. Her abusive husband won't give her a divorce and is trying to make her and their teenage sons homeless. The boys are spiralling out of control. Lina herself is wracked with low self esteem. Will group therapy give her the strength to go into battle in the divorce courts? Or enough self esteem to risk another relationship?

Or Dylan, a 48 year old musician. To overcome his depressed moods, he self medicates with near lethal doses of alcohol. But it is a condition of the treatment that he turns up sober to the sessions. In his sobriety, and under the group's gaze, he must face up to his compulsive behaviour.

Slowly and skilfully, Charles Lathon, the therapist, helps the group to discover what lies behind these "suffering conversations." Lathon's therapeutic technique is strictly Freudian, linking patients' current emotions to their faulty upbringing. Perhaps, more importantly, the group as a social unit tackles its collective distress, providing a safe space to talk and fresh perspectives on deeply rooted problems.

If psychobabble irritates you, you'll hate this book. It is full of advice to "name your pain and suffering," and to "declare and feel your wound." But you would have to be very hard hearted to remain unmoved by its unfolding stories. Stay with that pain, and you'll discover some fascinating insights. And for those who like their dramas to have a twist in the tale, the final chapter comes with a stunning denouement.

Gavin Yamey, BMJ


studentBMJ 2000;08:303-346 September ISSN 0966-6494