Title: Neutral

Author: Rachel Glass, MA

Agent: Nancy Ellis

PO Box 1564

Willits, CA 95490

707-456-9441

Personal Goals: To tell an entertaining story while educating the reader about a myriad of psychiatric diagnosis, and treatments. To explore the relationship between psychology and theology. To challenge the readers own ethical precepts.

A Description of the Book: Neutral is the story of a psychotherapist named Elizabeth. Elizabeth has no core personality or judgments. She is pathologically neutral. Due to her distant and empty personality, as a child she was given over to be raised as an in-patient. Her symptoms, coupled with her life long indoctrination in psychology, actually make Elizabeth into a genius clinician. She has a full and varied counseling practice, and heals many clients. The book is divided into her client sessions. As the story begins Elizabeth gets a new court order client who is an evil pedophile. She cannot change him and finds herself disturbed on a new level. She begins to absorb her other clients’ personality traits to cope. She finally manipulates another one of her clients into murdering the pedophile and then gets him acquitted on the insanity defense.

Neutral’s Competition Analysis

For Neutral’s competition analysis I conducted a search under the topics of murder, therapy, psychopathology, pedophilia, dissociative disorder, transgender, depression, anxiety, ethics, theology, and coping with the unknown. Most New York Times best sellers contain some of these elements. I have attempted to narrow the search by release date, market, and style. I have also included a films and television programs that have a similar audience to Neutral.

Here is a brief list:

Fiction:

The Delivery Room by Sylvia Brownrigg. The therapist sessions are part of the book, as is how the clients affect the therapist, and how the therapist’s own dark issues sever her practice. This book also shares Neutral’s appeal in that the reader sits in on sessions. However the dilemma in Neutral is very different, as are the characters and their variety of psychopathology. The plot of Neutral is not only unique but challenging to the reader in a different and more personal way.

The Chosen Abductor by Heidi Julavits. A black-humored tale of psychoanalysis, Yankee repression and prep school angst is either a victim or a false accuser. Clearly the dark humor and ethical guesswork match Neutral well, as does its foundation of psychoanalysis. While these are ultimately different novels in plot and setting, I am sure they would share an audience.

The Believers by Zoë Heller, Ed Park and Vendela Vida. Each character has their own brand of self-righteous certainty about their beliefs and ethics. Some of the characters are believers in religion. Others worship self-help. This is the conflict Elizabeth experiences with the priest, the pastor, and with herself. Also Heller’s characters are not all pleasant, simple, or even likable as are several of the clients in Neutral.

Therapy by Jonathan Kellerman. A best seller with intriguing secondary characters and unpretentious writing. In it the topics of psychopathology and the power of a therapist are explored. Despite some dark humor and complex issues, this is the kind of mass market appeal Neutral is capable of based on its style and subject matter.

When Bad Things Happen by Ann Packer. In this novel disaster strikes a placid, ordinary family. Neutral also has a plot that causes the reader to ask themselves what they would do under such circumstances, and what they are really capable of. This gives Neutral the same kind of hook and reader buy in as an Ann Packer novel.

The Shack by William P. Young. A man whose daughter was abducted is invited to an isolated shack, apparently by God. This book shares with Neutral the powerful elements of justice, child abuse and the question of where is God in a world of evil and madness. Neutral would likely attract many of the same readers.

Non-fiction:

Musicophilia by Dr. Oliver Sacks. In this book he focuses on people afflicted with pathologies that relate to their memory for, and relationship with music. While the characters’ illnesses in Neutral are not this extreme, In Neutral I have described accurately but with compassion the psychopathologies represented. The non-fiction works of Dr Sacks are reflected in my fiction in this way. I wish to inform the reader of fascinating mental illnesses without exploiting, and to illustrate the humanness of practitioners.

Still Crazy After All These Years by Scott Stossel. This book is a history and analysis of psychotherapy from Freud’s couch to the present. The main character in Neutral breaks down the evolution of therapy during her attempt to reconcile her beliefs with her actions. Stossel’s selling point is that the history of psychotherapy is truly compelling.

Checking In by Norah Vincent. In this book she reports from inside three mental institutions. While her ultimate conclusion of mental health practices was very negative, it does show the desire people have to know what goes on during treatment, and the general fascination with the topic of mental illness.

She's Not There: A Life in Two Genders by Jennifer Finney Boylan describes the process of going through gender reassignment surgery. I feel that I have respectfully and factually captured this process in Neutral. (Along these lines the less florid diagnoses of depression, anxiety, personality disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, and phobias have been written about in countless biographies. Those and other psychopathologies are represented in Neutral as well. Anyone interested in any of these disorders is a potential reader.)

Films:

Therapy

Rachel Getting Married

Smother

The Wackness

Over the GW

The Keys to the House

Group Therapy

Doubt

Zelig

Being There

Trans America

Television:

HBO's Therapy

Oprah

Dr. Phil

Sex and the City

Frasier

(Also the sessions represented in Neutral may have a similar appeal to that of Reality TV in that realistic intimacy and private lives are shared.)

Target Audience:

Women and Men who read contemporary fiction

Readers of crime novels

Students and laypeople interested in psychology, and psychopathology

Readers concerned with social issues

Positioning Statement: This first novel has characters that are pathological and yet powerful as might be found in a Mark Haddon novel. The main character is a psychologist facing a truly evil pedophilic client. The psychologist overcomes her own deficits, reevaluates her entire belief system, and lets go her ethics to stop this villain and save a child.

Author’s Professional Bio: I earned my bachelors degree in psychology from Marymount at FordhamUniversity, and my masters degree in clinical/counseling psychology from ColumbiaUniversity. I have also formally studied theology.

I currently work in the RoaringForkValley, and Aspen, Colorado as a crisis counselor and therapist. I was a professional actress for over a decade, and a member of Screen Actors Guild from 1997 to 2003. I was a staff writer for the magazine DGNY, and have written the yet to be published novel's Neutral and Wedding Wine

For my novel Neutral I incorporate my education and experience in psychology. My course work included forensic psychology, diagnosis, and research. I have a wide range of experience in the field which includes crisis evaluation in prison and hospital settings, private practice, and inpatient development. I have also worked for the New York City foster care system.

I was chosen to write the content for ColumbiaUniversity’s online abnormal psychology course through my employment with Cognitive Arts. Writing this content involved translating relevant research and technical language into easily digestible content for freshman online students. I employ this skill in Neutral so that the reader effortlessly learns about the diagnosis and treatment of many psychopathologies.

Sales Handles and Media Angles: I can participate in, or facilitate, discussions about social services, many psychopathologprotection for society.

Ideas for Marketing Strategy and Campaign:

Any undergraduate or graduate psychology program could easily incorporate this novel rather than the usual case study text. Case studies only represent one orientation and are absent the ethical perimeters that one must practice within. I will do a mailing to psychology professors around the US to consider this interesting alternative to case study text, or to add it to their suggested reading list.

Anyone interested in psychopathology, psychotherapy, or the legal, social and ethical issues surrounding mental health in America would be a likely reader of this book. I plan an e-blast campaign not only using the mailing list from Invision Marketing Service, but also my alumni and hospital list which alone total over eight thousand addresses. I am also involved with the Givens Institute and attended the 32^nd annual Aspen Psychiatric Conference where additional contacts were made.

In addition to using MySpace, I will create several blogs not only about the book, but also about the legal and ethical mental heath issues that are represented within the book. I will host online chats about these topics while promoting Neutral.

Mailing list: (these are lists of names I can provide for any publicity mailing)

Members of the Givens Institute

Participants in Aspen Summer Words Festival

Columbia University: faculty, staff, students

Teacher’s College: faculty, staff, students

Fordham at Marymount: faculty, staff, students

Columbia PresbyterianHospital: staff

Aspen ValleyHospital: staff

Undergraduate and graduate psychology professors nation wide

Newspaper Coverage: (newspapers with local interest or contact)

Aspen Times

Glenwood Post

Houston Chronicle

Westchester CountyWeekly

Book Store Author Signings:

Explore Books: Aspen, Colorado

Town Booksellers: Basalt, Colorado

Books & Things: Bruster, New York

Columbia University Book Store, New York, New York

Fordham at Marymount Women’s Day Festival, Tarrytown, New York

Summer Words Festival, Aspen, Colorado

Press Materials Author Will Help Write

Blogs

Press Release

Pitch Letters