We’re (meaning, I am) going to talk about this book as if I
hadn’t read the synopsis beforehand, okay? I mean, technically, I did, but I
forgot that synopsis by the time I received the book so it’s a fresh start.
Except I read it again after reading a few pages and was quite surprised by a
few things. Anyway…
Mel Hannigan starts out remembering her big brother. From the sound
of things, it seems like he may be bi-polar, but a fun-loving bi-polar, most of
the time. The memory is from when she was 13 and he was 16 and he takes her out
of school on a grand adventure turned tragedy not disclosed. We are left to
assume that he robbed a bank or something equally sinister before she comes
back to current day events.
She has one friend, a Black girl named Holly, and
subsequently, a friend by association, Holly’s boyfriend, Declan.
*I totally love when non-minority authors include minorities
as close friends and such. It’s not so farfetched and I think everything
shouldn’t be so whitewashed. When I was in elementary school my best friend was
Malaysian and I still miss her till this day. Good old Sue Zulkifli, but I
digress. I guess, in actuality we were both minorities. See where digression
takes you???
Carrying on.
At some point, our girl was out of school sick during her
freshman year of high school. Not just a run-of-the-mill cold, flu, or, from
what I gathered, even mono. She was out for months which caused her to lose her
friends somehow. That’s how she came to be rescued, her sophomore year, by
Holly. Right now though we’re reminiscing because one of her old friends,
Connor, has come to ask about another old friend, Annie, because the last old
friend from the old group, Zumi, is worried about Annie missing school,
supposedly sick, but not letting anyone visit her. From there we go back through
Mel’s memory to find out how the three friends were four for a brief moment in
time. We find out that a group of bullies tried to, well, bully Mel during the first
week of high school and Annie, Zumi, and Connor thwarted them on the third day.
After that, they all soon became fast friends. How does it all fall apart? We
shall see.
*Aside: Zumi is Asian. Eeep. My heart is full.
Our little Mel is good with elderly people even though she’s
not good with her younger counterparts. Not too shabby for a teenage girl. She
is currently working at a nursing home after having been a volunteer at the
same home.
We also find out that Mel is bipolar. Maybe it’s in the
genes. No maybe about it, it’s definitely in the genes. We meet her aunt HJ,
short for Hurricane Joan, who is also bipolar, but a milder version than Mel or
her brother. The aunt doesn’t seem to fully understand Mel’s version because
she thinks Mel should ditch her meds and just be whoever.
Thankfully, Mel doesn’t take things lightly and understands
that the mood swings shouldn’t be as severe as they are without the meds. At
the top of each chapter there is a list of animals that she describes how
they’re doing: describes how her bipolar feelings are interacting with one
another. Previous psychiatrists didn’t believe, or at the very least had never
seen, bipolar personality (disorder???) manifest in this way. One of the
psychiatrists she meets at the nursing home helped her come up with the chart
and it proves to be very useful to her. She presents it to her new psychiatrist
who understands its importance without trying to downplay Mel’s feeling. I like
this psychiatrist.
Hamster = Head; how clear her thinking is
Hummingbird = heart; how much energy she has
Hammerhead = physical health also when she’s on her period; Shark
week
Hanniganimal =
Mel overall; her mood plus the combo of all other animals
Mel’s old friend, Annie, sounds like a real asshole, is what
I’ll say. She knows that Zumi, likes
her, but she continues to be her “friend” while also being mean and stringing
her along. THEN, she ups and moves to Paris and instead of telling Connor and
Zumi, with whom she is STILL friends, she drops off their leftover things,
including a picture of the3 friends sans Mel, at Mel’s house, WITHOUT saying
goodbye to Connor and Zumi. Just like a piece of shit coward who was never
really anyone’s friend to begin with.
* I can’t stand a half-ass person. Use your whole ass for
things at the very least even if you are a piece of shit!!
Anyway, we find out that Annie is also gay, or perhaps
bisexual, but is just dicking Zumi around just to prove she can instead of
telling Zumi there will never be anything more between them. Little heifer.
While Mel is helping a new patient adjust to nursing home
life, in walks the new patient’s grandson, David, who is around her age. Guess
what happens? Of course, old granny and Mel’s long time psychiatrist pal in the
nursing joint decide they are fated. Let’s see where this takes us, shall we?
After Annie’s distasteful departure Mel tries to console her
old friends, Zumi and Connor the best way she knows how. The way that Zumi
requests help is that she wants Mel to come to the beach and bring vodka with
her. Mel asks her bartender aunt, who obliges, and heads for the beach to alleviate
the hole left in their hearts by Annie, as best she can. When she gets there,
Zumi convinces her to drink even though she knows she shouldn’t mix her meds
with alcohol. But to refuse would be to reject her friends yet again at a time
when they need her.
Now I don’t believe in giving in to the demands of peer
pressure and all that, but I certainly understand why she did it. She’s not a
bad person and doesn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, any more than she
already has.
The next morning is when things start to get dicey. Mel decides
to forego certain pills since she missed taking them the night before on her
drinking binge and decides that she will just take the correct dosage a few
hours later and get back on track. Except, in her mind she knows how quickly
her particular brand of mental illness devolves when she’s not on her meds.
Zumi and Connor stop by the next day while Declan and Holly
are there to do homework. Zumi is in a huff because dear old Annie told her to
get over her and included a video of Anne and Mel kissing that she had recorded
unbeknownst to Mel. Mel is beyond
remorseful and beyond anxious about the fall out. She also threw up and
probably included her pills in the upheaval.
Her mother takes her to her counselor because she is already
suffering the side effects of missing 2 days’ worth of pills. Also, the memory
of hooking up with Annie, finding out Annie was only doing it to keep Zumi
attached while simultaneously keeping Zumi and Mel from becoming closer, plus the confusion of knowing she only hooked
up with Annie during what she later realizes was the first onset of her bipolar
disorder, is causing her major distress.
So, it starts. Her psychiatrist gave her meds in at the
session and told Mel to take her regular dose as usual, but Mel doesn’t want to
since the appointment was later in the day. She emails her friends about her
mental illness and no one distances themselves as she thought they would.
Except Zumi. Zumi didn’t read the email. She tries to calm herself, but is
unable to since she’s being so dicey with her meds. She ends up worrying her
family and friends by walking 20 miles without shoes, for no real reason. While she’s doing this Connor finally forces
Zumi to read the email in an uncharacteristically show of very un-Connor like
anger, Zumi reads and understands.
She eventually walks back, but heads to the Golden Gate
Bridge; not to kill herself though. She goes because during that adventurous
day, before she lost her brother, they had gone to the bridge and he has carved
their initials in the cement and she feels most calm in its presence. Yet, we
know she’s not thinking clearly.
Why did she walk 20 miles
anywhere without shoes, no less? Our girl is on a fast looping downward spiral.
Her parents call and call and call. She picks up once to
tell them she’s okay, but then turns the phone off. After she gets to the
bridge she realizes she’s in a downward spiral, but doesn’t want to be
institutionalized again. (We find out that’s why she was out of school so long
before.) So, she calls her boo, David, to ask him to come get her and take her
to his house so she can get herself together. Turns out he colluded with her
parents, psychiatrist, and the psychiatrist from the nursing home she works at
to have her committed. She goes kicking and screaming.
I think this is when her aunt realizes that Mel’s illness is
much worse than she ever imagined. She gets there, gets help, and goes home.
Zumi and Connor actually camp out on the lawn outside the
psych ward counting down the 72 hours that Mel is involuntarily locked up. After
she is released, David apologizes profusely and Mel accepts, but tells him that
she really can’t trust him with the knowledge that he’s bipolar because he
might think she’s having an episode when she really isn’t.
This I can understand. I don’t like it, but I understand.
How can you trust someone who has broken your trust? Even if he was strong
armed into it himself? Even if it was
with good intentions?
She realizes that she
still isn’t completely on track, but doesn’t tell anyone nor take an Ativan as
she normally would have if she hadn’t gotten so off course. The animals are
running rampant now and she has a new mission.
At some point she sneaks out and decides to bike the 100
miles to her old town and to the bank where whatever happened to her brother
happened which also caused her own psychotic break. Once there, we finally
figure out what happened. Her brother was having a manic episode and took her
to the roof of the bank (he didn’t rob the bank as I had originally imagined)
and shows her the view or whatever he wants to show her, but she feels nervous.
At some point, she begs him to leave and he agrees. However, he decides that he
can jump over a glass skylight type structure to reach her. She begs him not to,
but because of his manic mindset he really believes he can do it. Yet he can’t.
His foot hits the lip of the glass, stunting his jump; he falls on the
structure, then through the structure.
After this flashback, Mel decides that she will prove her
brother didn’t commit suicide he just overestimated his abilities because of
the manic episode he was enthralled in. She decides she will complete the jump
and show them that it can be done. Before she can get herself completely geared
up to jump, David shows up and begs her not to. He followed her using the same
tactic as before by following her phone tracker. After some back and forth between
them, he tells her that HE will complete the jump since he drove and she rode
her bike all night, and he’s not tired. At that point she realizes how deadly
this idea is because she feels nothing but fear imagining him trying to make
the jump. Finally, they decide NEITHER will make the jump and leave without
incident.
Mel is able to get back on track with her meds, so she and David
decide to have their first date. The first date takes place at The Gold Gate
Bridge per Mel’s request. She shows him the reason she likes to visit: her and
her brother’s carved initials. She finally tells him that Mel is a nickname and
provides him with the letters of her whole name, Amelia, which she asks him not
to use just yet. She’s not ready to hear the name only her brother after called
her for at least the past decade. He agrees.
At this point, we know they’ll be
just fine. He likes her as is and she feels the same way.
My rating:
I really enjoyed this book. I like how Eric Lindstom wrote a book that made a widely stigmatized mental health issue more of a human issue instead if something to be ashamed of and shunned for.
I purchased this book from the book depository before it was
available in the U.S. I have included the link below. It has since been
released in the U.S. I have enclosed the amazon link to it as well.
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