cover image God's Shrink: 10 Sessions and Life's Greatest Lessons from an Unexpected Patient

God's Shrink: 10 Sessions and Life's Greatest Lessons from an Unexpected Patient

Michael Adamse, PH.D.. Health Communications, $16.95 (172pp) ISBN 978-0-7573-0617-4

By turns engrossing and didactic, this short novel by Adamse (Anniversary) follows psychiatrist Richard Johnson through 10 sessions with a patient named Gabriel, who claims to be God. At the outset of the relationship, Johnson assumes that his new patient is psychotic-though also possibly psychic. For his part, Gabe says he has come to ""vent."" He's ""emotionally exhausted,"" wants people to be good and kind, and insists that without humanity's cooperation, he can't foster love in the world. He thinks religion sometimes helps people, but dismisses the idea that there's only one path to God. Sometimes Gabe's monologues devolve into bumper-sticker treacle: ""scarcity of oil isn't going to be the problem, the shortage of genuine compassion is."" Still, sections of this novel are moving, as when Gabe recites a long litany about the world's suffering. Adamse can be sophisticated-when Johnson admits that he wishes he and Gabe could cease acting like doctor and patient, and casually converse instead, it's clear Adamse is also making a statement about God's wish that people would stop beseeching him and just hang out. Still, the therapy-session format, which guarantees that the novel mostly consists of dialogue, gets old.