Le Marquis de Folie

Your therapist is insane. Iosef Guerrero-trepid, odious, and clumsily intelligent-loathes every breath, every tick of the clock, as he bites and scrapes his way through his days at the mental health clinic. His clients, eternally garrulous and spiritually violent, chain themselves to his ears while his fingers find themselves chained to his keyboard. Nevertheless, Iosef smiles, teeth bared, friendly. He speaks softly, his empathy tubercular. Perhaps he saves lives but this he would not know. Everything is ephemeral and the only thing that is real is his emaciation at the feet of truth and meaning. Then it happens. Something grave, inevitable. His quest for significance renewed, he lunges into the fight. With one of his clients threatening to kill, Iosef struggles to find an answer. He works to heal. He works to transcend. But the shadows are closing in and his mind rumbles to the dull whimpers of his strangled meditations. Iosef wants to tell you his story. He wishes to take you on a tour of the modern-day clinic. This is a tale of mystery and murder, but in a different sense altogether. Iosef wants redemption-he wants justice. Will you hear him and grant it? Or will you capitulate to the very same disease that plagues him? Incisive yet maddening, Le Marquis de Folie is a powerful literary debut with an infectious bite that pushes the boundaries of not only existential literature, but what it means to live and think authentically within the conventions endemic to contemporary mental healthcare. Written by a therapist, there is no other narrative quite like it. "Le Marquis de Folie is both a terrific homage to existentialism and a persuasive indictment of the mental health field and modernity in general. A rare book like this is for everyone and nobody. A must read." - Eric M. Greene, Ph.D.

Shane Sparkes is an author, social worker, and advocate. He serves on the board of directors of the Mental Health and Mathematics Institute of Los Angeles, a nonprofit organization committed to the advancement of quantitative methods in psychology, and is the CEO of Adducio, Inc., a company focused on innovation in evidence-based clinical assessment. Having earned his Master of Social Work degree in 2011, Shane worked as a psychotherapist in public mental health before experiencing hearing loss. Currently, he is in pursuit of a graduate degree in mathematics. Fiction, politics, philosophy, and mathematics are his interests. Contact him on Twitter at @shane_sparkes!