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mrbrownsays's review against another edition
3.0
Interesting enough. I love his reading of the audiobooks.
bgee99's review against another edition
Really not a fan of where the book is going. Don't really understand what's going to come out of it as it didn't grip me within the first 60 pages???
scytmo's review against another edition
5.0
This is an absolutely fascinating book from the investigative journalist Jon Ronson - a glimpse into his journey into what it means to be a psychopath. It starts when he almost gets sued for defamation after getting quoted in the press, ignorantly referring to someone as “quite psychopathic.” This leads him on a journey of discovery, from the accepted measurement and definition of psychopathy, to meeting various people who have been, or could be, diagnosed as psychopaths.
The writing is incredibly engaging, and the stories of the various people he meets range from the shocking, to the poignant. Stories and quotes are used to great effect to illustrate characteristics of psychopathy that he’s discussing. For example, when discussing one psychologist’s experience:
Unsurprisingly, he finds some.
Along the way, Ronson learns about the categorisation of mental disorders, and the “DSM-IV-TR” - the canonical text book listing all recognised mental disorder (all 374 of them). He meets a diagnosed psychopath in Broadmoor Hospital (a high security psychiatric hospital); he discusses some of the eccentric and radical treatments for psychopathy in the mid 20th century; he meets the ex-leader of a far right military group from Haiti; he talks to the one time CEO of Sunbeam in America, responsible for laying off hundreds of people and consequently turning several communities into ghost towns, and he spends some time with someone who believes he is the Messiah, returned to save humanity.
It’s worth bearing in mind throughout the book that this is investigative journalism and not science - and Ronson doesn’t pretend anything else. This kind of material could easily have descended into something resembling a freak show, but Ronson doesn’t do that - the subject and the people involved are all portrayed with respect and sensitivity. It’s a fascinating glimpse into this world, and Ronson is an engaging and interesting narrator.
It’s worth remembering, though, that these are cherry-picked stories to allow Ronson to tell a story, and to paint a broad picture of his journey investigating psychopathy and various related mental disorders. But this itself is knowingly referenced when Ronson recounts a conversation he had with Adam Curtis, a fellow documentary maker:
The writing is incredibly engaging, and the stories of the various people he meets range from the shocking, to the poignant. Stories and quotes are used to great effect to illustrate characteristics of psychopathy that he’s discussing. For example, when discussing one psychologist’s experience:
She was interviewing a psychopath. She showed him a picture of a frightened face and asked him to identify the emotion. He said he didn’t know what the emotion was but it was the face people pulled just before he killed them.The pursuit of a definition of psychopathy leads Ronson to the PCL-R checklist - the titular “Psychopath Test”, devised, used and taught by Ron Hare. Ronson attends a course on the PCL-R and then goes about, armed with it, to try to find some psychopaths of his own - with a specific interest in the extent to which CEOs and other people in power exhibit the same psychopathic signs.
Unsurprisingly, he finds some.
Along the way, Ronson learns about the categorisation of mental disorders, and the “DSM-IV-TR” - the canonical text book listing all recognised mental disorder (all 374 of them). He meets a diagnosed psychopath in Broadmoor Hospital (a high security psychiatric hospital); he discusses some of the eccentric and radical treatments for psychopathy in the mid 20th century; he meets the ex-leader of a far right military group from Haiti; he talks to the one time CEO of Sunbeam in America, responsible for laying off hundreds of people and consequently turning several communities into ghost towns, and he spends some time with someone who believes he is the Messiah, returned to save humanity.
It’s worth bearing in mind throughout the book that this is investigative journalism and not science - and Ronson doesn’t pretend anything else. This kind of material could easily have descended into something resembling a freak show, but Ronson doesn’t do that - the subject and the people involved are all portrayed with respect and sensitivity. It’s a fascinating glimpse into this world, and Ronson is an engaging and interesting narrator.
It’s worth remembering, though, that these are cherry-picked stories to allow Ronson to tell a story, and to paint a broad picture of his journey investigating psychopathy and various related mental disorders. But this itself is knowingly referenced when Ronson recounts a conversation he had with Adam Curtis, a fellow documentary maker:
‘We all do it,’ Adam was continuing. ‘All journalists. We create stories out of fragments. We travel all over the world, propelled onwards by something, we sit in people’s houses, our notepads in our hands, and we wait for the gems. And the gems invariably turn out to be the madness - the extreme, outermost aspects of that person’s personality - the irrational anger, the anxiety, the paranoia, the narcissism, the things that would be defined with DSM as mental disorders. We’ve dedicated our lives to it. We know what we do is odd but nobody talks about it. Forget psychopathic CEOs. My question is, what does all this say about our sanity?’Perhaps. But it makes for compelling reading.