I was nervous before reading this book.
Last year round April I had read a lot of depression books by accident like The Bell Jar, The Virgin Suicides, everything I read contained suicide in it, Every Day, A Working Theory of Love. I didn't like this. I just went off these books because I didn't want to read about suicide over and over again. So I knew Ned Vizzini had recently passed away and I was scared this would be another Bell Jar.
It was beautiful. It wasn't depressing, it was uplifting. It gave me hope and still was about depression and I loved this.
He spoke so truthfully and I recognised myself in some of the earlier passages of the book even though I haven't dealt with most of the things in the book. There were just these parallels with my lifestyle, especially last year and the schooling and I did relate to Craig. I think that is the most impressive part of Vizzini's writing. He paints people as people, not as characters, not as people who have a mental illness but people.
I loved loved loved the maps and the references to his childhood and just this beautiful enthusiasm for art and creating which I lost last year in the midst of Art GCSE. It reminded me of what I'd lost. I used to be so creative and all I did was create art and read in my spare time and that's not there anymore.
Could this become the world's top depression-novel-with-authors-that-ended-their-life-afterwards? I think if people stopper heralding The Bell Jar as this beautiful piece of fiction (and it's really not) then I think that, yes, maybe this could. I would love it if it did. This book is made from sadness but it makes you feel like it is about happiness. And isn't that what we need from a depression novel? Not electrocution, not a slow decent into whatever you can call the second half of The Bell Jar, but happiness.
I just think that matters.
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