Although interesting to those who find it necessary, for whatever reason, to make physical contact with their clients, Kepner's book does not reflect the current clinical applications of Gestalt therapy nor its fundamental theoretical thinking. It wanders off into other schools of psychotherapy and pays little attention to the theoretical and clinical rigors of Gestalt therapy.
I have no objections to what Kepner proposes as long as he doesn't try to wedge his thinking into another "Gestalt and" approach.
Reich, Lowen, Selver, Gindler, and all the other "body" therapists who influenced the development of Gestalt therapy did just fine without raising the specter of the physical invasion of a client. When we permit physical contact between therapist and client we open the door for abuse. Gestalt therapy does not, as Brownell suggests, pay attention to what manifests itself through the body. Rather, it recognizes that there is no mind/body but only the whole. We pay attention to what is, not what is body vs. mind.
What is and what is not Gestalt therapy is a focus that needs our continual attention and the fact that a book may have had "Gestalt" in its original title (removed, when reprinted, for good reasons) does not make it a book that explicates Gestalt therapy theory.
Joe