 Photo by Christa Rittberg This month, the Book Club read Dr. Birds Advice for Sad Poets by Evan Roskos. In this book, James Whitman finds himself overcome with suicidal ideation, anxiety, depression, mania, and family issues such as abuse and his sister’s self-injurious behavior. The book is written for older teens, and it poses questions such as if you feel yourself struggling, would you feel comfortable reaching out? In the book club discussion, there was talk about how the teens were seen as more resourceful than the adults, as James was able to find therapy on his own to deal with the issues he was experiencing. James also found himself in an investigation about his sister Jorie’s expulsion from school. You could see James’s getting stronger and more vocal as the story went on. James finds inspiration from Walt Whitman, and sometimes uses the famous author's writing to sum up his own thoughts, such as, Dazzling and tremendous how quick the sun-rise Would kill me If I could not now and always send sun-rise out of Me Please join us for the next NAMI Ramsey Book Club! Find more information at https://www.namiramseycounty.org/bookclub.html
 Photo by Christa Rittberg This month’s book club featured a wonderful Zoom discussion about a book called Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman. The book is about a teenage boy who begins to exhibit odd behaviors. The story walks the reader through the initial onset of his symptoms, with an emphasis on his thoughts and reactions and the responses of his friends and family. The author jumps between the boy’s real life experience and a story about a pirate and his crew. As the book continues, the reader picks up on the connection between these two narratives and realizes the author’s purpose for writing in this way. In our group discussion, we all agreed that the book was initially difficult to read because of the jump between the two stories and not knowing how they fit together. However, as we got deeper into the book, it became clear that the author wanted us to also experience the distress and confusion of the main character’s behaviors and thinking. It helped us understand a small piece of what individuals with this type of mental illness (I won’t share more details and risk spoiling part of the book) experience, especially when symptoms are first starting. Many of us discussed our own experiences with mental illness and how we relate to the feelings sparked by the author and the book. Overall, this was a very uniquely written book that illuminated aspects of mental illness in new ways. It sparked a great discussion about severe mental illness and allowed the reader to grab onto different aspects of the main character’s experience. Please join us for our next Ramsey County Book Club! Find more information at: https://www.namiramseycounty.org/bookclub.html
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