This short book is based on lectures Bollas has given over 20 years to senior clinicians, and is the distillation of his clinical work and thinking about character disorders. It is a fascinating read, partly because of Bollas's compelling prose, and partly because each chapter contains a section in which he imaginatively enters the sufferer's narrative and spells out their core beliefs. Each section also includes the examination of why such a character would seek analysis, and some ideas of how to