The Celestial Bed is a book which evokes mixed reactions. I don’t really remember why I read this book, except probably that the book was lying around in my brother in laws house and I had nothing better to do..........
I cannot call myself an Irving Wallace fan, with the Celestial Bed being the second and most recent book of his that I read.
The story is basically about sex surrogacy - the treatment of sexual disorders (not diseases) like impotency, premature ejaculation etc., through the use of trained therapists, who actually have sex with the patients as a part of the therapy. The therapy is a combination of physical and psychological treatment.
The story revolves around a doctor who sets up a clinic to treat sexual disorders through surrogacy - with the help of his trained and experienced therapists - Paul and Gayle.The book is basically a description of how several patients are treated for their problems, successfully, from Adam who suffers from impotence due the small size of his penis, to Nan, the girlfriend of a local mafia boss, who suffers from vaginismus. The descriptions are graphic, without being obscene or prurient.
There is an uproar in the town when the clinic is opened, and the doctor has quite a few enemies. The plot revolves around the good doctor and his therapists, and the efforts of some to close down the clinic. The attempt is made through a journalist, Chet, who enters the clinic as a patient to run an expose on the clinic. He suffers from premature ejaculation.
Towards the end, he has guilt feelings about the double game he is playing in trying to expose the doctor, which is driven by the fact that he is successfully cured and that he feels that the doctor is running a legitimate therapy clinic, and not just a racket of prostitution.
The book generally drags - especially the first 75 %- it gets interesting towards the end when you would like to know what happens in the end, and whether Chet exposes the clinic in the wrong light, whether the court orders it closed down, and whether the mafia boss, who thinks his girlfriend is having a good time at the clinic exacts his revenge.
Maybe Irving Wallace fans would like this book - I don’t really know - I didn’t particularly enjoy it myself, and have read it only once and have no intentions of reading it again, even if I am bored.
If you would like to read a good book by Irving Wallace, Read ’’The Seven Minutes’’- A much much better read