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PATIENT OR PRETENDER

Name: PATIENT OR PRETENDER
Author: Marc D. Feldman
ISBN: 0-471-58080-5

INSIDE THE STRANGE WORLD OF FACTITIOUS DISORDERS

by Marc D. Feldman & Charles V. Ford with Toni Reinhold ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 1993

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An unsettling account of the pathological behavior of people who carry ``playing sick'' to bizarre extremes. Psychiatrists Feldman and Ford, writing with Reinhold (coauthor, Untamed, 1991), use their own experiences as well as case studies from the medical literature to construct a patchwork portrait of the condition known as ``factitious disorder''—a mental disorder in which physical or psychological symptoms are feigned for emotional satisfaction. Factitious disorder may become the focus of a person's life and can take an extreme, chronic form known as Munchausen syndrome. Especially troubling are cases of Munchausen by proxy, in which parents inflict harm on children to create the appearance of illness in them. The authors reveal how skilled patient-pretenders can become at fooling doctors, nurses, and other caretakers with schemes to produce symptoms and create erroneous test results by putting blood or other substances into their urine, injecting themselves with insulin, or wounding, infecting, starving, or bleeding themselves. Numerous first-person narratives include accounts by either Feldman and Ford, as well as by those suffering from factitious disorder—and their victims. The authors seem both fascinated and exasperated by the syndrome and are clearly dismayed by the harm it causes not just to its sufferers but to those around them. But while Feldman and Ford's stated aim is to increase awareness of factitious disorder in order to make diagnosis and treatment more likely, they seem more concerned with exposing and weeding out than with helping, and their account comes close to being a freak show in which the grotesqueries on display are of central interest. An interesting subject regrettably presented with more sensationalism than science.

Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1993

ISBN: 0-471-58080-5

Page Count: 240

Publisher: Wiley

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1993

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.