Dear colleagues,

Thirteen new books from a combined 21 authors are announced in this edition of The IARPP Bookshelf.

Jo Frasca (Australia) and Jo Silbert (Australia) demonstrate the myriad ways that the presence of an animal in the treatment arena can help bring about relational, interpersonal and intrapsychic change. In Animals as the Third in Relational Psychotherapy: Exploring Theory, Frame and Practice, the co-editors and several IARPP members contribute chapters exploring how the impact of a non-human being in the therapeutic space is experienced by the psychotherapist, the patient and often the third – animal as attachment figure, transferential object, subjective other, and bridge from the unconscious to the conscious, from the dissociated to the experienced.

The late Michele Minolli’s (Italy) work has been edited by Maria Pia Roggero (Italy) and posthumously published as New Frontiers of Relational Thinking in Psychoanalysis: A Meta-Theory of Being and Becoming. Minolli promotes a creative process he calls “consistency,” a way of thinking about the vicissitudes of experience within oneself and with others. Alert to the sociocultural context in which psychoanalysis is currently operating, the author brings scientific and philosophical lenses to the essential assumptions, theoretical strands and key concepts underpinning contemporary psychoanalysis.

The ever-prolific Michael Eigen (USA), whom Robert Grossmark has called “the ultimate psychoanalytic alchemist,” offers us two new volumes. Eigen in Seoul, Volume Three: Pain and Beauty, Terror and Wonder draws upon the third seminar Eigen gave in Korea over three days in 2011. In Healing, Rebirth and the Work of Michael Eigen: Collected Essays on a Pioneer in Psychoanalysis, co-editors Ken Fuchsman (USA) and Keri S. Cohen (USA) provide an overview of Eigen’s work, with contributions by a number of IARPP members including Eigen. Donna Orange writes, “Eigen gives us a poetic space where psychoanalysis, radical ethics and the holy live together,” pointedly adding that his work is “a perfect companion in our world of plague.”

Daniel Shaw’s (USA) new title, Traumatic Narcissism and Recovery: Leaving the Prison of Shame and Fear, revisits themes from his influential first book, Traumatic Narcissism: Relational Systems of Subjugation (2014). Shaw again explores the trauma suffered by those in relationships with narcissists, covering topics such as surviving a cult, dysfunctional families, political dysfunction, and imbalances of power in places of work and education. His text not only offers further reflections on the character and behavior of the traumatizing narcissist; it also examines the challenges clinicians often face in finding effective ways of helping those who have suffered narcissistic abuse.

From Roz Carroll (UK) and Jane Ryan (UK) comes What is Normal?: Psychotherapists Explore the Question. This interrogation of normality includes reflections from several additional IARPP members including Doris Brothers, Andrew Samuels and Stephen Seligman. It is argued that our very uniqueness, oddness and differences as individuals are what make us fully human. For the authors, the freedom to be oneself – whatever form that takes – is a strong and potentially radical stance at a time of rapid social change.

As to the burdens of being the “normal” one, Johanna Dobrich (USA) brings us Working with Survivor Siblings in Psychoanalysis: Ability and Disability in Clinical Process. What happens, she asks, to a person’s sense of self when they grow up alongside a severely disabled sibling? Through an amalgam of academic writing and memoir, Dobrich explores a previously neglected area in our field, addressing undertheorized concepts on siblings, disabilities and psychic survivorship, in the process broadening our conceptualization of the enduring effects of lateral relations on human development.

Judith Brisman (USA) has co-authored the fourth edition of Surviving an Eating Disorder: Strategies for Family and Friends, a title that has been an important resource for over 30 years. With an emphasis on exploring why change can be so hard for everyone involved, this new edition explains the latest treatments and offers concrete advice and support for the “silent sufferers,” those affected by a loved one’s eating disorder.

Another older title finding fresh life is Lawrence Josephs’ (USA) The Dynamics of Infidelity: Applying Relationship Science to Psychotherapy Practice, a 2017 book which argues for a new understanding of the psychological foundations of “cheating.” Its new Italian translation is entitled Infedelta: Scienza Delle Relazioni e Psicoterapia.

Four Argentinian co-authors, Victoria Font Saravia, Martin Forli, Paula M. Mayorga and Yanina Piccolo, review central tenets of Relational theory in their new book, Psicoanálisis Relacional. Una nueva mirada, una nueva práctica (Relational Psychoanalysis: A New Look, A New Practice). Tracing how traditional analytic concepts have been revised, they examine interrelations among interpretation, enactment and self-disclosure in contemporary notions of therapeutic action. The book concludes by describing the attitudinal shifts required of “The Relational Therapist,” grounded in ethics and mutual commitment.

Part memoir, part teaching tool, Judith Ruskay Rabinor’s (USA) The Girl in the Red Boots: Making Peace with My Mother traces a therapist’s quest to make sense of a recently uncovered childhood trauma. Weaving together tales from her psychotherapy practice with her investigation of her own past, Rabinor confronts her ambivalence toward her mother and comes to develop understanding, compassion and healing, demonstrating that “it’s never too late” to let go of hurts.

Amy Schwartz Cooney (USA) and Rachel Sopher (USA) have co-edited a volume focusing on the ways that psychoanalysis can be a uniquely creative encounter in which the dyadic process ignites new experiences and brings withdrawn aspects of the self to life. Vitalization in Psychoanalysis: Perspectives on Being and Becoming collects a wide range of contemporary voices from all the main psychoanalytic schools of thought, including Margaret Black, Christopher Bonovitz, Jody Messler Davies, Lisa Director, Dianne Elise, Daniel Hill, Joseph Newirth, Boaz Shalgi, Steven Stern and the co-editors. Generativity and progressive action, rather than repetition of entrenched patterns of relating, take center stage in this novel perspective on the psychotherapeutic project.

And from our Immediate Past President Steven Kuchuck (USA) comes what may be Relational psychoanalysis’ first primer, The Relational Revolution in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. A comprehensive overview of our analytic orientation in one concise volume, the book surveys clinical theory and technique and explores implications of conducting treatment during the twinned circumstances of the global pandemic and the equally widespread societal awakening to the consequences of systemic racism. Kuchuck investigates the therapist’s subjectivity and other hallmarks of a Relational approach, such as enactments, co-construction, self-disclosure, multiplicity and relational perspectives on race, gender and sexuality, in a book intended for new and seasoned clinicians as well as the interested non-professional reader.

I received only one entry in the category of article and presentation announcements for this Bookshelf – my own. Teetering between self-promotion and self-consciousness, I’ll go ahead and inform you that my new paper, “The Sleepy Analyst Struggles to Awaken: Dissociation, Enactment, Regression, and Altered States with Trauma Patients,” examines countertransferential sleepiness. Wrestling with contradictory techniques, paralysis and shame, I limn an encounter with psychic deadness in which, it seems, no one gets out alive – a far cry from Schwartz Cooney and Sopher’s vitalization.

So come keep me company. Share news of your latest books, papers and presentations; keep your colleagues abreast of your contributions and activities. Send word.

The submission deadline for the October edition of The IARPP Bookshelf is Sunday, September 26, 2021. Kindly include the following materials with your submission:

• Title of your recent or upcoming publication or presentation
• An abstract or brief description of its content
• Link to a publisher (if applicable) so that members might access or purchase a copy
• Book cover photo or artwork (if applicable)
• Digital photograph of yourself (jpeg format)
• Professional contact information as you would like it to appear publicly for our readers (email and, if you wish, mailing address)
• Book authors: please provide a brief bio of 75-90 words.
• Presenters: please spell out organizations’ acronyms.

Wishing you health, wishing you peace,

Matt Aibel
Northport and New York, NY
Email Matt Aibel