Fiction and Psychology: A Selected Reading List

* All titles are available in the Baddour Library

Alcott, Louisa May. A Long Fatal Love Chase. New York: Dell Publishing, 1997.
A recovered manuscript written in 1866 deals with a young woman seduced by a 
passionate, obsessive lover. Deals with the subject of relationship addiction.

Bronte, Emily. Wuthering Heights. New York: Knopf, 1991.
The classic brooding love story of romantic triangles and rejected love. 

Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. N.Y: Frederick Warne and Co; 1891.
Classic tale of romance and vivid portrayal of the devastating effects of mental illness left untreated. 

Diehl, William. Primal Fear. N.Y: Ballantine Books, 1994.
Suspenseful novel about a young man who commits gruesome crimes because of a 
disassociative disorder. 

Faulkner, William. As I Lay Dying. N.Y: Modern Library, 1967.
Centers around the effects of the death of a family member and the emotional 
abnormalities of other family members that surface as they cope with the arrangements for a funeral.

Fitzgerald, F. Scott. Tender is the Night. N.Y: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1933.
Effects of alcohol on relationships. Focuses on the doomed relationship between the emotionally fragile Nicole Warren who suffers from recurrent breakdowns, and Nick Diver, the tumultuous alcoholic psychologist she falls in love with. 

Harris, Thomas. Silence of the Lambs. New York: St. Martins, 1988.
Superb portrayal of antisocial personality in the character of criminal Hannibal Lector, cannibal and psychiatrist.

Irving, John. The World According to Garp; A Novel. N.Y: E.P. Dutton, 1978.
Popular novel where sexual identity problems are commonplace.

Kesey, Ken. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. New York: Penguin Books, 1976.
Classic novel about life in an inpatient psychiatric ward.

Maugham, W. Somserset. Of Human Bondage. Garden City, New York: Doubleday,
1936.
Sexual obsession of a physician for a cruel, vulgar, and manipulative waitress.

McCullers, Carson. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. Boston, Ma: Houghton Mifflin, 1967.
Focuses on the relationship between two men; one is deaf; the other mentally retarded. 

Nabokov, Vladimir. Lolita. New York: Berkeley, 1966.
Novel about pedophilia and murder.

Plath, Sylvia. The Bell Jar. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.
Autobiographical novel of the authors suffering from depression and her subsequent suicide attempt. 

Schaeffer, Susan Fromberg. Mainland. New York: Linden Press, 1985.
Novel dealing with the relationships between different generations of a family.

Styron, William. Sophie's Choice. New York: Random House, 1979.
Portrait of a concentration camp survivor infatuated with Nathan, a paranoid 
schizophrenic.

Theroux, Paul. The Mosquito Coast. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1983.
An eccentric millionaire flees the U.S. for Central America because of his 
paranoia.

Tyler, Ann. The Accidental Tourist. N.Y: Knopf, 1985.
A withdrawn, unemotional writers isolation is further compounded when his young 
Son is murdered.