I first heard about Dr Gwen Adshead when she was the lecturer for the BBC’s Reith Lectures. Her four talks on the problem of violence were so insightful that after I immediately put a reservation for a copy of her book: The Devil You Know.

For me, the book and the talks complemented each other. Dr Adshead’s talks were a more general overview on the problem of violence, though she weaves in the cases that she has seen. In contrast, her book focuses on a number of patients (or composites of patients) and her experience with them. Both the book and the talks, however, make a persuasive case for why therapy is needed for not just the victim but also the perpetrator. The most convincing point for me was that by “monstering” the other, we give them an excuse to stay as they are. The harder thing is actually to get them to the stage where they understand that even given the circumstances they were in, they made a choice to commit a horrific crime, and it’s only after taking personal responsibility that they are able to change for the better.

In The Devil You Know, Dr Adshead manages to cover a surprising number of horrific crimes, from murders to stalkers. She also doesn’t shy away from talking about the cases where she was unable to help her patient, and the cases where progress was made. It was an eye-opening reading experience, and one unexpected thing that I appreciated was Dr Adshead’s frequent references to poetry and other forms of literature. It really is the case that the literary word can express deep truths about the human condition.

There isn’t much for me to say except that I really recommend this book. The book and the delivery of the talks are both very similar, so I could “hear” Dr Adshead’s voice as I was reading and listening to one and reading the other felt like a one experience rather than two. While the subject matter can be disturbing, I thought the book was a compassionate and thoughtful look at how even the worse people can change, and made me think more broadly about how we should be treating one another.