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Cover of Good Morning, Monster

Good Morning, Monster

Catherine Gildiner

368 pages

An intimate, harrowing, yet profoundly hopeful exploration of the human mind's astonishing capacity to survive and heal.

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What it feels like

Reading this book feels like sitting in a quiet, safe room while listening to the most astonishing secrets of human survival. It is a steady, deeply intimate experience that plunges you into the harrowing depths of severe childhood trauma, yet never leaves you to drown in the darkness. Instead, the narrative is anchored by a profound, warm empathy and a clinical curiosity that transforms unimaginable suffering into a testament to human resilience. The prose is accessible and reads with the gripping momentum of a novel, making the heavy subject matter digestible without losing its emotional weight. It will deeply move readers who are fascinated by the therapeutic process and those who seek cathartic, awe-inspiring stories of people doing the grueling work of healing.

Mood
  • harrowing
  • intimate
  • cathartic
  • hopeful
Tone
  • empathetic
  • candid
  • reflective
  • respectful
  • warm
Pace
steady
Themes
resilience of the human spirit · healing from severe trauma · the therapeutic alliance · psychological survival · confronting the past
The writing
Accessible and narrative-driven, blending sharp clinical insight with the compelling, empathetic storytelling of a seasoned novelist.
The arc
Journeys from the shocking depths of profound childhood trauma through the grueling, courageous work of therapy, culminating in hard-won healing and awe-inspiring resilience.
Who it's for
Readers fascinated by the intricacies of psychotherapy and the astonishing capacity of the human mind to survive and heal.
Content notes
  • child abuse
  • sexual assault
  • severe emotional abuse
  • childhood neglect
  • trauma from residential schools

About the book

"Catherine Gildiner is a bestselling memoirist, a novelist, and a psychologist who practiced privately for 25 years. This book focuses on five brave men and women who overcame enormous trauma--in her view, heroes who should be celebrated. With a novelist's storytelling gift, Gildiner recounts the details of her patients' struggles and their paths to recovery and weaves in her own tale of her growth as a psychologist. In therapy, patients have to become vulnerable by stripping away their defenses, but so do therapists, who cannot hide behind a title, a desk, or even their specialized knowledge. The five cases described include a successful but lonely musician suffering sexual dysfunction; a young woman who, at the age of eight, had looked after her two siblings after her father, likely a murderer, abandoned them in a rural cottage; a glamorous workaholic whose wealthy, hideously negligent mother had greeted her each morning with "Good Morning, Monster"; an indigenous man who'd suffered greatly at a residential school; and a young woman whose abuse at the hands of her father led to a severe personality disorder. Each patient presents a mystery at first, one that will only be unpacked over years. They arrive, sometimes unwillingly, to try to overcome an immediate challenge in their lives, but discover that the source of their suffering is an entirely different matter. It will take courage to face those realities, and it requires creativity and resourcefulness from their therapist. Each patient embodies the virtues of self-reflection, stoicism, perseverance, and forgiveness as they confront the real source of their problems and work unflinchingly to face the truth. Gildiner's account of her journeys with them is moving and insightful and sometimes humorous. It offers a behind-the-scenes look into the therapist's office and explains how the process can heal even the most unimagineable wounds."--

Description from Open Library.

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