Body Self & Psychological Self:

of shame in survivors of sexual abuse and Roland Summit's chapter on the centrality of victimization , which presents a historical documentation of the mental health profession's ambivalence toward recognizing child sexual abuse as a legitimate clinical entity, as evidenced by its cyclical discovery, rejection, and rediscovery by psychiatrists . A chapter discussing the cultural dimensions in sexual abuse written by Richard Mollica and Linda Son describes the sexual torture and rape of Indochinese women who were refugees from the war. Additional chapters by Michael Durfee and Maria Sauzier focus on prevention and disclosure of the sexual abuse of children, respectively, and are timely and of practical interest. Diane Schetky and Elissa Benedek's chapter on legal issues reviews the impact of court procedures on victims of sexual abuse and provides a guide for the forensicevaluationof sexuallyabusedchildrenand adults. Of special interest are the chapters on the "victim to patient" process by Elaine Carmen and Patricia Rieker, which describes the evolution of psychiatric impairment in incest victims, and Richard Kluft's chapter dealing with the sexual exploitation of incest survivors by their therapists. A most rewarding and fascinating chapter by Bessel van der Kolk on revictimization and the compulsion to repeat the trauma explains this phenomenon on a psychodynamic, behavioral, and neuroendocrinological level. This volume provides a wide range of information about different aspects of child sexual abuse, which enlarges the clinician's understanding of the victimization process inherent in child molestation and suggests a variety of intervention strategies for the victims of sexual abuse and their families. The chapters are from good to excellent in quality and are generally well written. One advantage of this volume is that it is not organized in a textbook format, so that the chapters may be read independently from one another. On the other hand, this is not a work to be read from cover to cover. I would certainly recommend this book to child psychiatrists and other mental health professionals who want to learn more about child sexual abuse and its sequelae. Perhaps child psychiatrists will lament the fact that most of the case vignettes deal with adult incest survivors rather than child victims, but this does not detract from the important information dispensed in this volume and its overall excellence. As guest editor, Richard Kluft deserves to be commended for his selection of interesting subject matter presented by knowledgeable clinicians and researchers.