Mortal Secrets is a book constructed from intersecting stories. The story of a man (Freud), the story of a movement (psychoanalysis), the story of a city (Vienna) and the story of that city's most colourful characters.

Mortal Secrets is built around Freud's biography and given cultural context by discussion of the revolutionary art, philosophy, and science of Vienna around 1900. It is both human and epic in scale, insofar as Vienna's story of glamour and profligate brilliance was played out in coffee houses as well as battlefields. Most important of all, Mortal Secrets is an account of how we came to be who we are and why we live the way we do. It is the story of how Freud excavated and laid open the machinery of your mind. This is an entirely fresh approach to Freud. There has never been a book that both contextualises Freud in his time while offering a scientific evaluation of his ideas for our time.