Every Fifteen Minutes

Book 42 of my 2015 Reading Challenge

read from July 14 - 16

Every Fifteen Minutes by Lisa Scottoline

Summary (via the book jacket)

Dr. Eric Parrish, a brilliant and caring psychiatrist who is chief of the Psychiatric Unit at Havemeyer General Hospital, has been unknowingly targeted by a sociopath. Eric already has his hands full: He has recently separated from his wife and is trying his best to be a single dad to his seven-year-old daughter, Hannah. Plus, his practice faces a new challenge in the form of a troubled teenage boy who harbors an obsessive crush on a girl.

Because of secrets that the boy divulges in his therapy sessions, Eric grows concerned for the girl's safety and finds himself embroiled in the dilemma that every psychiatrist dreads - the Tarasoff issue; that is, whether to report a potentially dangerous patient to the authorities.

Just as Eric reaches his decision, the unimaginable happens, and the game is on. The clock begins ticking, and the most worthy adversary Eric has ever encountered is about to make sure things go from bad to worse. Eric finds himself plunged into a professional and personal maelstrom at the hands of a sociopath bent on destroying his practice, his family, and his life. 

Can Eric match wits with a sociopath? How can he defend himself against an enemy he doesn't know? Can you ever win a game you don't even know you're playing?

My Opinion

I have a confession...I almost had to stop reading because it was triggering my anxiety.  To get some relief, I gave in about halfway through and skipped to the end to find out the resolution.  Once I knew that, I was able to go back and read the rest of the book to find out how they got there.

I liked Eric, both as a psychiatrist and as a realistic character but as I mentioned above, his anxiety and personal life agitated me so much I had to take breaks while reading.  And before knowing anything, I made a complete snap judgement that someone with the name Max Jakubowski would be sullen and worrisome; it just had that kind of connotation for me.

For my own curiosity, I researched the Hare test and there are a few people in my life I would be very interested in giving it to (although do I really want to know if someone is a psychopath?  Maybe not.).

A Few Quotes from the Book

"I role-play every day in real life, so I'm very good at gaming.

 I'm always a step ahead, maybe two.

 I plan everything. I set everyone in motion, and when the moment comes, I strike.

 I always win in the end.

 They never see me coming.

 Know why?

 Because I'm already there."

"Eric could feel a lecture coming on. He'd observed that doctors in hospitals tended to become their specialty. He'd become more cerebral as a psychiatrist, but Laurie had morphed into an emergency room doctor to the max. She went right for the wound, exposed it, and flushed it out, no matter how much it hurt."

" "So you're standing here, like, you're going to save me?"

  "No, I'm standing here as a placeholder. Do you know what that means?"

  "No."

  "It means I'm holding your place, until you are ready to stand for yourself. You don't need me to save you. I can help you, and you can save yourself...That's my job, to get you over the times when you believe there aren't any alternatives, to help you through the time you don't have any hope. To make you know that you can be happy again, and that you will be." "