Human Traces

doi:10.1136/bmj.331.7523.1029

BMJ 2005;331:1029 (29 October), doi:10.1136/bmj.331.7523.1029

reviews

Book

Human Traces

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

One of the pleasures of reading Sebastian Faulks' new novelis that he has convincingly imagined the reality of madnessand, in doing so, has done justice to the subjective experienceof many patients. Faulks has admirably attempted a huge rangeof themes: the evolution of Western psychiatry from the middleof the 19th to the beginning of the 20th century, the evolutionaryorigins of psychosis, the nature of subjective experience, toname but a few. However, Human Traces, like madness itself,also runs into internal inconsistencies, some of which are leftunresolved.

Sebastian Faulks

Hutchinson,£17.99, pp 624 ISBN 0 09 179455 2

Rating: $*$ $*$ $*$

The novel begins by introducing one of its two main characters,Jacques Rebière, a 19th century French teenager, whosemother died soon after he was born and whose cherished olderbrother has developed schizophrenia. Jacques' ensuing search,for both a containing female relationship and . . . [Full text of this article]

Iain McClure, consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist

Vale of Leven Hospital, Alexandria, iain.mcclure@nhs.net