It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini - review

This book was fantastic. Anyone dealing with any kind of mental illness needs to read this. Heck, anyone who knows anyone or knew someone who had a mental illness or saw someone with one on TV or in a movie or even just walked past someone who looked glum, needs to read this.

The novel follows 15-year-old Craig: he is depressed and suicidal. He attends a prestigious school which he spent months and months studying and working towards however, since the day of his welcome letter, he's never been happy. The school is just stress and grades, he's struggling to keep his head above water and admits himself into the mental health ward. The synopsis sounds cringey, teenagery maybe even predictable but it's not. The title sums it up perfectly: 'It's Kind of a Funny Story' because it is. Never have I wanted to laugh at a character's cynical humour while wanting to cry over the bleakness of his life. I was emotionally invested and, more so, emotionally torn.

Reading this book was beneficial to me, I felt like I could entirely relate to Craig and that he was just a male and American extension of myself. Vizzini's writing was immersive and real to the point where three days since I started this review, I'm still trying to write it and give it the justice it deserves. Craig felt like an actual teenager instead of an adults idea of a teenager which, in reality, is just plain wrong: his friends were relatable and problems were ones thousands and thousands of teenagers have to deal with.

I understand that nowadays mental illnesses are faked and glamorised into a perverted way of attention, this book shows the harsh reality of depression, bi-polar disorder, schizophrenia, self harm and so many other mental illnesses which nowadays are just worn as a token for attention by people who just don't understand. Everyone needs to read this book and see what its really like to have these life preventing illnesses. I especially liked the concentration on depression being an illness, the same as cancer or chicken pox. It's not just a person deciding 'oh hey, I want to be sad today', it's a chemical reaction and should be treated with the same care and dignity as any other. I think that people forget this so much and, especially with teenagers, blame other things or rule it off for you just being 'moody'. Mental illness is not something to dismiss, it's life threatening, and this book showcases this in such an amazing way which needs to be shown more widely in every day life.

Shortly before I finished the novel I discovered that Vizzini committed suicide himself: my heart sunk and I couldn't help but cry. In a way I felt like I shouldn't have benefited from the book and that I shouldn't have enjoyed it. It just shows that depression has an effect which can stay with you for life and I hope that this book will continue to prevent such sad endings.

Buy this book at the Guardian Bookshop.

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