In author Russell J. Sanders' maiden voyage as a novelist, we make a visitation into the lifestyles and mores of the rich and privileged. Our nearest Chicago station stop: the family Hardaway. In particular, our main protagonist, Aaron Hardaway. Despite the excess and egos of those closest to him, young Aaron will have none of it. He is a refreshingly `normal' teen who doesn't put on airs or walk the unmistakable bop of the self-entitled. But for the spoils (i.e. a fly, new Mercedes), he is a young man with his eyes wide open and a secret or two under his Gucci belt.
The title describes the number of shrinks young Aaron has been directed (or misdirected) to, via his mumsy, the very proper, haughty and distant Sylvia Karnes Hardaway. However, it is Aaron's thirteenth doctor that clicks, fits, and who gets him in a way the others have not. It is she, Dr. Moira Fairchild, whom he trusts, and she that he tells his story.
The Hardaway family is one of high achievers, and for the most part, his parents and siblings have achieved, and yet all Aaron really desires is to love and to be loved. As a reader, we like him. We feel for him. Although Aaron's relationship with his brittle socialite of a mother is strained, distant and cold, there is a warmth and a palpable love he shares with his three siblings, especially his older brother, Marty, a soldier deplored in the Middle East who, although only four years older, had long taken on the more parental role in Aaron's life.
Mr. Sanders also weaves a stirring portrait of young passion as Aaron navigates his way through the precarious fields of love and the tripwires of heartbreak. We get to ride shotgun, reliving those heady days and nights of thrilling new emotions, and the freedom in finding a kindred. The author leads us into the waltz of taffeta and tuxedo cotillion balls and emotional blue balls of youth, where even privilege offers no buffer from pain and angst.
At heart, Thirteen Therapists is a different kind of love story. Sure, it follows the reliable premise of opposites attracting, only in this tale, it is a same sex union. Aaron is a decent chap; maybe just a bit too sanitized until his young world is rocked by the appearance of Derrick. If Aaron is summer, with his light blond locks, pale skin and patrician exterior; Derrick is clearly winter: dark, with smoky eyes, and a slight hint of something dangerous lurking just beneath the beauteous exterior.
Love takes over. But to get in where he fits in, Aaron's infatuation leads him into a waiting subculture of drugs, reckless partying and amplified decibels of rebellious sex. The author skillfully handles the dualities of these worlds young Aaron inhabits: the staid, finely coiffed, costumed and furnished, yet stuffy landscapes of repression vs. the lively vistas of vice, wickedness, bliss and carnality. And while, as a reader, you may want to warn Aaron to tread lightly, and other times you feel the urge to shake some sense into him when he's about to make unwise, even hazardous moves, you realize, much like the journey of life itself, one has to make their own mistakes, dance along those edges, experience heartache and even tumble a few times in order to learn the necessary lessons.
There is heartbreak here, yes, and yet there is light and humor, studied subtext and subtle wit. I enjoyed visiting Aaron Hardaway's world, and that is largely due to the writing in Thirteen Therapists. As a novel, it captures and holds one's attention, making this a sparkling, and most perceptive debut by author Russell J. Sanders.