Reviews

This was such a real story for me. A real story about dealing with mental illness. The author captured the feelings those with mental illness and the people in their lives so perfectly through the character of Martha and her family.

Martha broke at age 17. She had no idea what was wrong with her, and her family was hard pressed to be able to figure it out either. This is just how Martha is. She's self destructive, a little numb, and flowing through life and everyone takes care of her, because she's Martha.

Patrick has always been there, he's a wallflower, the extra person that's always around. But Patrick loves Martha. Martha loves nothing because of her illness. Until one day she is diagnosed properly and everything begins to fall apart. When something has a name, and an ugly name at that, perspective over your entire life begin to shift. The pills help, they help a lot. But they have not helped with the attitude, the outlook on life, the perceptions Martha has built up over 40 years of her life. Everyone is to blame for her life turning out the way it did, except Martha.

The story takes the reader on the adventure of Martha figuring this out and I loved it as a reader. This is a story about how one can overcome a big mental illness diagnosis, receive treatment, and begin to repair what was destroyed in their lives.

owlwaysthinking's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? N/A
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

pauline_stof's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

_nicolesbooknook's review against another edition

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emotional medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

easyvisionary's review against another edition

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5.0

I appreciate this is not meant to represent a specific mental illness but I am adopting it as symptoms and experiences of mine anyway. I don’t want to hear any counter arguments.

The way this book extracted my relationship fear out of my mind and made it an entire book. This is why I don’t date. I’m terrified.

I couldn’t finish this fast enough. I wanted to take it all in every word every page every chapter. Fuel my entire being. As fast as I could. I don’t know what to do with myself now this was something else.

I need to go steer at the ceiling for several hours. This was unbelievable.

dinasamimi's review against another edition

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3.0

Didn’t connect with this. Very much in the same vein as Eleanor Oliphant, but not much else there for me.

lime_soda's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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