How does one begin to judge the value of a reference book? Such books come in an astonishing variety of styles, serving a variety of purposes for a variety of users. They range from, say, one's personal address book through the telephone directory to a host of almanacs, dictionaries, thesauruses and the like, and onwards to monuments such as Encyclopaedia Britannica So a reviewer of the Dictionary of Psychotherapy must perhaps content himself with comments on its structure and style in relation to the purposes and users for whom it is evidently intended.

The dictionary provides about 850 entries, each typically in the form of one or more paragraphs describing the use of the term and setting it into its conceptual context.