One of Those Things That I Only Read Because I Had To

This is a misleading little textbook in terms of how long it actually takes to get through it. I thought, “oh it’s so small compared to my other books, this will be easy!” But no. The writing is compact and while there is a lot of dialogue in the presented case studies to make things interesting, overall it is quite dry and I found it hard to focus on what I was reading. That is not to say that it wasn’t informative! But as compared to the other two textbooks I’ve read so far this year, it’s been the most difficult to get through.

In this book, Gerald Corey presents the hypothetical counseling case of “Ruth”, and provides information that might be acquired during an intake interview. Corey then invites counselors from a variety of different theoretical perspectives to describe what their style of counseling might involve when working with someone like Ruth. There is also an inclusion at the end of each chapter with discussion on what Corey’s process would be with Ruth within each specified theoretical framework. These theories involve perspective ranging from psychodynamic to humanistic, from family therapy to multicultural perspectives, from gestalt to cognitive behavioral, and more.

The range of practices and theories presented is a good, diverse spread, and each makes sense in their own way of working with the same patient. But of course, there are some that I myself am more drawn to than others, as is always the case with each individual person. Overall this book is full of great information on the subject of counseling and practically working with the different theories, however it is an instructional book, and not exactly the most fun thing to read (and let’s not even get started on the price of textbooks today. My heart weeps at the thought of it).

[As always, this review can also be found posted on my personal blog]