Nils Retterstol, Cambridge University Press, (pound)35, pp 261; ISBN 0-521-42099-7

Suicide tests us to the limits of our beliefs concerning why we are here and what we are about. The many unknowns surrounding it mean that whatever aspect of it we consider we are confronted with polarised views. The clinical approach, which assumes that most suicidal people are mentally ill, with the implication that prevention is feasible in at least some of them, is challenged by those who invoke individual personal autonomy (the right to decide for the self) and challenge what they see as the inappropriateness of …