Falling into the Fire: A Psychiatrist's Encounters with the Mind in Crisis

Psychiatrist Christine Montross brings us inside the doctor's mind, sharing gripping patient encounters that reveal the grave human costs of mental illness, as well as the challenges of diagnosis and treatment. In this intimate portrait of care within the locked inpatient ward of a psychiatric hospital, we meet patients in profound crisis: a young woman who habitually commits self-injury by ingesting knives, lightbulbs, and other objects; a young man who declares that love emanates from everything around him; a mother haunted by visions of harming her child. A doctor of uncommon curiosity and compassion, Montross's rigorous response to these singular cases sheds new light on the mysteries of the mind and affirms the humanity of the practice.