Books by sensitive, talented analyst-therapists are always useful, adding to our repertoire of technique and broadening our models of mind and process. Such books are also challenging, since they inevitably reflect the author's particular biases of theoretical orientation and therapeutic style. Frank L. Summers's volume, Transcending the Self: An Object Relations Model of Psychoanalytic Therapy, has both these characteristics; it is useful, thought-provoking and inspiring for clinician or theorist. Yet there are aspects of the book that may annoy or disturb