A review by maureenstantonwriter
No One Cares about Crazy People: The Chaos and Heartbreak of Mental Health in America by Ron Powers

4.0

This book is just heartbreaking, as it details the writer's sons descent into mental illness (schizophrenia to be specific). There's lots of interesting history, background, and research into schizophrenia and mental illness, including how Western cultures treat the mentally ill, the history and mistake of de-institutionalization (which I recall vividly in my college town when a nearby mental institution was closed and suddenly there were many clearly mentally ill homeless suddenly wandering the town). At times, there was too much information, and some of it seemed disconnected from the family story (i.e.,the history of lobotomies -- a great book about this is "Patient H.M." by Luke Dittrich, grandson of the man who performed the most lobotomies in the U.S.). Most affecting in this book was the portrait of the sons, the younger son specifically, who took his own life. A brave, courageous, well-written, important book about the challenges of mental illness, from a personal and cultural perspective.