Violence and Victims. Stefan A. Pasternack, Ed. Washington, D.C.:  Spectrum Publications, 1975.  xiii + 215 pp.

We are trying to understand the upsurge of violence in almost every area of our lives: in the streets, within the family, in schools and prisons, and in political life. Pasternack's book Violence and Victims appears at an appropriate time and should be of great help not only to professionals dealing with emotional problems, but to the general public as well.

There are fourteen chapters in the volume. The book contains papers on diagnosis and prediction of dangerousness, the treatment of dangerous people in clinic settings, and the treatment of people who have been victims of violence, such as those who have been mugged or raped or abused as children.

I shall mention the seven chapters that I found to be the most valuable, because they presented new information or viewpoints or new approaches to treatment. Pasternack's Introduction, Martin Symond's chapter “The Accidental Victims of Violent Crime” and J. Lion and A. Pasternack's chapter “Countertransference Reactions to Violent Patients” were all thought-provoking. In the last, the authors bring out the need for the analyst to be aware of his anxiety and fear of the violent patient. The analyst's denial of his fear can be dangerous for him and also for the patient, since it would keep the analyst from being able to curb the patient's violence. The practical information acquired by the Rape Crisis Center staff described in the chapter “Rape: Medical and Legal Information” was informative and useful. The two chapters on the treatment of Vietnamese veterans by Sarah Haley and William Gault bring out the special problems for the therapist in dealing with patients who have committed atrocities. “The Child Abuse Syndrome and the Treatment of the Abusing Parent” by Arthur H. Green was an insightful chapter. The author concentrates on how the analyst can deal with the parents' problems most effectively. Green describes the development of the personality characteristics of the abusing parent, then he considers the effect of the