Book Report

Book Report

Madness: A Bipolar Life By Marya Hornbacher

The book selected on the topic of bipolar is the Madness: A Bipolar Life. The book is written by the author of the ground breaking memoir Wasted in which the author highlighted her struggle with the eating disorders. However, Marya Hornbacher is back with the new book in which she highlighted her struggle with the bipolar disorder (known as manic depression). The book based on lively biographical tale based on author's experiences from the age of 4 to the present and the stories that mentioned in the book are purely related to her bipolar disorder.

As far as, the writing style of Hornbacher is concerned, her style is raw and in the moment and also she does not possess the ability to mince words with detailed descriptions of her thoughts, behaviors and feelings. Thus, as per the critique, some of the behaviors that mentioned in the book is too much for the readers that easily triggered, for instance, the self injury and the cutting scenes, which are part of the prologue, therefore, one must keep in mind that book has more self injury and possibly triggering the violent behavior thoughts throughout the book. On the other hand, Hornbacher provided a detailed description regarding bipolar disorder that it is characterized by mood swings from depressing lows to elated highs. And secondly, in the rapid cycling, such mood swings occur more frequently as compared to normal conditions. Thus, a person who diagnosed with bipolar lead to a very difficult and challenging life, therefore, proper treatment is required (Youngstrom, 2009).

On the other hand, as per the reader, the book has a joy for readers like the book laid extreme focus on woman's life and the struggle that she need to face because of mental illness, which rarely faced by the women. Another plus point of Hornbacher's writing is that she makes feel the readers that she is there with them, in their mind, in their life and thus make the readers to feel all the experiences that she highlighted. The characterization of book is so interesting that it provide a close up to look bipolar disorder and also the attempts that made by Hornbacher in order to diagnose and treatment phase based on hospitalizations. The scenes that created by Hornbacher painted a picture that how difficult is to be straight and getting simple answers for one's ...