THE SPIRIT OF THE PLACE(2008) From the first line--"Even a shy American can be happy in Italy, and Orville Rose was about as happy as a childless man can
be"--this is a novel of love and death, of mothers and sons, of doctors and patients, and, above all, of "The Spirit of the Place", a quirky small Hudson River town "plagued by breakage"--a novel filled with the ineffable "Shem-humor" and pointed insight and drama. Dr. Orville Rose returns to visit his hometown of "Columbia" upon the death of his mother. Despite being in love with a Buddhist yoga teacher in Italy, he is forced by the bizarre terms of his mother's will to stay for a year and 13 days, and, seeing the declining health of his mentor, the old doctor, winds up working as the doctor to the town he had fled, facing his past friends and demons, challenged to find understanding, love, and a home. Read More >
THE HOUSE OF GOD (1978)
"Bawdy, blistering... This is Catch 22 with stethescopes." -Cosmopolitan
The outrageously funny, bitingly brilliant novel of Dr.
Basch's training to be a doctor in a hospital called 'The House of God.' The
story of survival, heartache, love, death and sex--a novel called "an
American classic," "one of the two most significant American medical novels
of the 20th century," "The book to read about becoming a doctor,"
"Rabelaisian," and "a small masterpiece."
MOUNT MISERY (1996) "Outrageously funny, a sage and important novel by a healer and a Shakespearean"-Boston Globe
The sequel to THE HOUSE OF GOD, Dr. Basch entering his training to be a psychiatrist at a large mental hospital called "Mount Misery." The same outrageous humor, gut-wrenching drama, love and death, as Roy seaches to become not just a doctor but a healer-a novel called "another medical classic," "outrageously funny, a sage and important novel by a healer and a Shakespearean," "supberbly incisive and witty, a carnival of fascinating secrets and terrible abuses."
FINE (1985)
"Funny...Full of dazzling, zany intelligence...energetic and exuberant." --New York Times
The story of Dr. Fine, a young man learning to be the complete psychiatrist: doing scientific research on memory (teaching grasshoppers to lift their legs and eat calcium pills), becoming a psychoanalyst, caught up in a mystery involving a killer patient, and, above all, trying to find the answer to two questions: "What is love?" and "How do people change?"--"Exhilarating, a glittering gemstone, dazzling," "full of dazzling, zany intelligence," "a story filled with metaphysical overtones," "a rolicking journey of self-discovery and love."
