Confessions of a Sociopath by M.E. Thomas

Depressing  --  Negative  --  If one wasn’t a self-diagnosed Sociopath, it would lead to suicidal thoughts.  This book was dull, boring and somewhat useless, … possibly even pointless.

There was no question in the 40’s; sociopaths were shunned at best.  50 years later, at the turn of the century, America was the land of GREED, survival of the fittest.  She, the author, hasn’t changed – the tenor of society around her has changed; society now loves her.  She’s a Tea-Party icon.

I look at these sorts of books as merely a secondary income stream of people on the speaker’s circuit.  I’m sure she makes a lot of money on lecture tours, but she needs some sort of creditability which the book gives her.

This book should not be touted as non-fiction -- and she doesn’t; others do though.  She leaves any categorization out of the cover and title page: no “novel”, or “memoir”, or even “fictional memoir”, which might be closer to what it really is.  She, and I can’t say Thomas since that is a pseudo name, uses the word “Confessions”, which implies memoir; and she calls it a memoir as the first line of the book; then continues in the succeeding sentence to cut away the underpinnings of many things that are memoir: anonymously written?, invented memories?, and narrative discretion?.  She pompously psychoanalyses her parents and her childhood with no medical background to back up her analysis.

The major flaw in her hypothesis lies in trying to identify sociopathy as a genetic trait, somewhat like the X-chromosome controversy raging in the world of genetic research about homosexuality.  Unfortunately she is not presenting research results, merely anecdotal vignettes, and hinting that her parents made her do it.  Her vignettes are cute and fun, but meaningless.  All her stuff about school years high jinx could equally be attributed to her being a bully and a “mean girl”.  She liked the “power” of driving a car as a teenager? Duh, so do most teenagers.  She hated her father as a teenager, double Duh.

Her exploits were trivial; maybe even the acceptable side of sociopathy: “She’s heartless, but we love her”, “He doesn’t understand me, but I still love him”, “She’ll stab you in the back, but she’s brilliant with clients”.  I think the author has stretched her story a bit too far to equating herself with the rebel-like, bad-boy James Dean. 

The family story around me was that my 1-year-old baby sister “fell” out the second story window, when I was 3, but was it psychotic or sibling-rivalry?  One of my teen age incidents involved my short football career.  I was the littlest guy on the team, but a ferocious middle-linebacker with a license to stop anyone going to our goal.  My coach was profuse in his joy when I angled across the field at an escaped, opposing half-back; hit him mid-thigh; and drove him through the sideline bench; leaving his leg at an odd angle.  I loved the adulation and the feel of the hit.  Psychotically vicious temperament or football mania?