In Braided Selves, Cooper-White engages the ongoing conversation of ‘what it means to be an “I”’ in postmodernity. Writing from the perspective of pastoral theology, and inspired by relational-psychoanalytic theory, she uses the image ‘braided selves’ to speak of the ‘multiplicity of persons’, and the formulation ‘creative profusion, incarnational desire, and living inspiration’ as her pastoral approach to the Trinity (p. 9). Cooper-White explains that both psychological schools and Christian theology have used the language of integration to describe healing and salvation (pp. 100–1). By contrast, Cooper-White speaks of a psychological and theological anthropology which regards ‘multiplicity as internally constitutive of each individual mind/self/subject, at both conscious and unconscious levels’ (p. 103). Her trinitarian formulation has the purpose of bringing into question the paradigm of integration and, through a kind of ‘psycho-spiritual dissent’, increase consciousness of the ‘dappled, fickle, freckled multiplicity of both of ourselves and the real persons who come to us for care and healing’ (p. 119).

Throughout her book, Cooper-White interweaves several images to illustrate the meaning of multiplicity. In chapter 2, speaking of the ‘diversity and complexity’ of human development, she argues that time is not linear, and thus an appropriate symbol to represent time would be a Moebius strip, a symbol of eternity (p. 42). In chapter 4, the author incorporates Deleuze's and Guattari's image of the rhizome to challenge the ‘classical psychoanalytic assertion’ that all behaviour comes from a ‘deeper route cause, in the past’ (p. 111). While she does not dismiss the psychoanalytic significance of tracing associations (roots), she explains that the rhizome image can be helpful in tracing a horizontal ‘associational chain of events’ which incorporates both present and past conditions (p. 111). In chapter 6, she uses the image of a quilt as metaphor to convey the complexity, messiness and ‘colorful pattern of consciousness and identity’ of human persons (p. 138). In this same chapter, Cooper-White speaks of a ‘threefold-braided thread’ to illustrate her understanding of wholeness, not as ‘monolithic oneness’ but as a ‘thread that holds the quilt of our lives together’ (p. 152). In the last chapter, she suggests an addition to her ‘three-braided thread’ and concludes by discussing the four strands which contribute to a sense of wholeness without erasing multiplicity: our bodies, our relationships, our spirituality and our embodied ethical practices (p. 214).

Perhaps one of the most outstanding merits of this book is the author's insightful ability to interweave elements from the classical analytical tradition with contemporary psychoanalytical theories. At times, however, her critique of the linearity ‘traditional models’ of human development (Freud, Erikson, Piaget) seems to overlook the complexity and ‘thickness’ of those models and their authors. Speaking of Erik Erikson's developmental theory, for example, I find it interesting that Joan M. Erikson, Erik's wife, referred to the eight stages of human development precisely as ‘the woven life cycle’ and used the image of weaving to describe the colourfulness (a kind multiplicity?) of human development (Erikson, Wisdom and the Senses). Nevertheless, Cooper-White does an outstanding job in critically evaluating the ‘carefully articulated theories’ of classical authors and constructing her own model of psychology and pastoral practice (p. 22). Ultimately, the author is not interested in disposing of classical theories or concepts per se, but in discovering and reclaiming what they have excluded, most notably, ‘the inherent relationality and interdependence of persons’ (p. 207).

In sum, Braided Selves is an invitation to explore our own ‘alien self-parts’, and by recognising our constitutive relationality and multiplicity, make room for those who have traditionally been excluded by hegemonic models of selfhood. Additionally, this book functions as a helpful bridge in exploring coincidences and divergences between classical psychoanalytic models and postmodern psychoanalytic schools. Undoubtedly, the implications of this book for pastoral care, counselling and ethics are multiple.