May 17, 2021
This heartfelt and nuanced memoir by Adshead, a forensic psychiatrist and psychotherapist, charts her decades-long career in Britain’s National Health Service treating violent offenders. With the assistance of dramatist Horne, Adshead recounts 11 cases, each a composite to protect patient privacy. She treated her first serial killer, Tony, at England’s high-security Broadmoor Hospital for criminals. Having confessed to three murders, he remembered a fourth victim during talk therapy treatment. Success often meant treating suicidal convicts so they could be returned to prison to serve out their sentences or helping ex-cons return to the outside world. Some cases are tragic, some sad, and some unredeemable, such as that of Ian, who sexually abused his two sons and later committed suicide, and of Lydia, who wound up back in a mental hospital after being released from prison and attacking her therapist’s staff members in his office, but the author manages to humanize her subjects and make a case for devoting more resources to the treatment of all mentally ill in prisons. In addition, Adshead explains the British health-care system and offers a brief history of psychotherapy of inmates. For those interested in the inner workings of the criminal mind, this is must reading. Agent: Anna Stein, ICM Partners.
June 1, 2021
A physician recounts stories from her years at Broadmoor, Britain's premier psychiatric institution. Over a working life of more than 30 years, Adshead has served patients at Broadmoor, a place with "a history of housing some of the UK's most notorious violent criminals." As in the U.S., mental health facilities in Britain have been starved of funds in recent years, and those violent criminals are shut away instead in ordinary prisons, where they become predators and prey. Writing with Horne, Adshead notes that 70% of prisoners in the U.K. "are estimated to have at least two mental health issues, ranging from depression to substance misuse and addiction or psychosis." While most people with mental health issues are not criminals, those who are often pose difficulties in securing treatment and taking medications. Before delivering a series of sometimes-discomfiting case studies of serial murder, child abuse, infanticide, and other horrific acts, Adshead observes that nations that have experienced military occupation, such as Norway and Holland, have been the most progressive in treatment of the mentally ill, perhaps because they consider mentally ill criminals to be ill first and criminals second. The protagonists of her case studies would seem to fit this description, though dark passages abound--e.g., an inmate who seemed to be on the path to recovery but committed suicide: "Ian had been unable to come to terms with himself, and in his mind, death became his best or only option." Adshead's interest is not lurid, though there are lurid episodes, and her overarching goal is to secure more funding for better treatment. "I wish for my psychiatric great-grandchildren to look back on this period as if revisiting medieval times...[which] did little to help people fix or rediscover their minds, inside and outside of institutions." A welcome contribution to the literature of crime and rehabilitation.
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June 18, 2021
Forensic psychiatrist and psychotherapist Adshead has spent her career in the UK treating people charged with violent offenses; here, she and Horne (Zola and the Victorians) share 11 stories from Adshead's time at Broadmoor Hospital, in Berkshire. To preserve patient anonymity, each story is a composite of several individuals, from "Kezia," a woman who killed her care worker while under the delusion that he was possessed by a demon, to "Ian," a man who sexually assaulted his sons and eventually died by suicide. Each case is described with care and understanding, allowing the reader to get a sense of the human behind the crime. VERDICT A compassionate yet unflinching look into the psychology of people who perpetrate violent crimes, and the care afforded them in the UK, this book would be of interest to true crime fans and especially valuable to those studying psychology, medicine, or law.--Ahliah Bratzler, Indianapolis
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