Interpersonal: Another novel of half-truths

by Jennifer Kinsel

"Interpersonal" follows twenty year old Erin after her stays in the Intensive Outpatient Program for Eating Disorders at Stafford Hospital. As she tries to navigate through life without acting on eating disordered behaviors, readers are shown what's most important in relationships between patient and professional. While expressing her emotions and fears, her treatment team explains things from their points of view. Just when Erin becomes more comfortable in sharing her thoughts, an unexpected change occurs, with the potential to derail her track in recovery.

Genres: Fiction

216 pages, Paperback

First published November 10, 2011

About the author

Jennifer is a twentysomething artist/designer/creative/dreamer. "Restricted: A novel of half-truths" is Jen's first book, a challenge she took upon herself for National Novel Writing Month; although, writing a book had always been on her long list of things to do before she dies. Born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland, she attended Stevenson University and earned a bachelor's degree in Visual Communication Design. Since college, her life has taken a different direction than most her age, due to her battle with an eating disorder. Although overcoming an eating disorder is a very difficult process, Jen is hopeful that the obstacle was put there for a reason. According to the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, she is an INFJ, one of the rarest personality types. On a less serious note, she stays awake much too late for her own good, enjoys thrill rides and the rush of adrenaline, and watches The Golden Girls every morning while eating breakfast.

Reviews

[Liralen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hmm. As with Restricted, I appreciate what Interpersonal is trying to do here, but it falls pretty flat for me. In Restricted, Erin was in intensive outpatient treatment (spending daytime in hospital but nights at home, basically) for an eating disorder; in Interpersonal, she's doing well enough to have stepped down to regular therapy appointments.

What works for me: Too few books about eating disorders talk about the reality of recovery, the way it doesn't end when one is discharged from hospital or residential treatment or outpatient treatment; that it's too easy to slip back into unhealthy habits; that there's a lot of ambivalence involved. In some ways Interpersonal is nothing but ambivalence, as, for all that Erin wants to feel better, she's not sure she's ready to make the changes that she still needs to. There's also a clear effort to demystify the provider perspective, which isn't something I always see.

What doesn't work so well: For all that Erin talks about being upset, et cetera, there's very little emotion in the writing. Lots of talk about feelings but little by way of...feeling them. This isn't helped, I think, by how little actually happens in the book. Erin goes to therapy, and talks about her feelings; we see the therapist's perspective on what just happened; Erin goes to her dietitian, and talks about her feelings; we see the dietitian's perspective on what just happened; Erin goes to therapy...and on and on and on. That's kind of it. Lots and lots and lots of therapy.

There's a point to which this makes sense. Erin's living in a kind of stasis, not really interacting with the world around her. It happens, with eating disorders. It's not that it's unrealistic. It's that...in fiction, it's not that interesting. I suspect there's probably a fairly specific audience for this book, one that just straight up needs unemotional information about eating disorders and treatment and reassurance that their experience is normal, and I'm not that audience.