Review: MY FRIENDS ARE ALL STRANGE by M.C. Lesh

MY FRIENDS ARE ALL STRANGE

by M.C. Lesh

Publication Date: October 18, 2016

Published by StoryRhyme.com Publishing

Pages: 230

Source: Xpresso Book Tours

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Synopsis

My friends are all strange.

Right now I’m living at Brookside, a place for people like me. I’ve met a kitty girl, a brooding beautiful boy, one who can’t be touched, and others. My new friends. Strange people. People like me.

I’ve always been different, but lately, more so. My hands sometimes don’t seem to be attached to the rest of me. I cut up all of my clothes. I’m hot, so hot, all of the time. If I sleep, a wizard haunts every dream. I don’t sleep. Sometimes I want to run, but where do you run to when you’re trying to escape your own mind? I don’t know if I’ll ever be the same. I’m smart. I’m nice, sometimes. I just want to be normal(ish). But, right now, my friends are all strange… Like me.

Dark, funny, snarky, seventeen-year-old Becca struggles to cope with mental illness in My Friends Are All Strange, the gripping contemporary young adult companion novel to Normalish.

My Thoughts

The title MY FRIENDS ARE ALL STRANGE grabbed my attention and I just knew this was a book I needed to read. 

MY FRIENDS ARE ALL STRANGE captures Becca's experience - one experience and her relationships with the people she meets. Nothing is simply explained - the doctor's aren't quick to diagnose. She can't be categorized and easily understood and this scares Becca more than anything.  Her wellness is a process - without a quick fix. 

One of the most touching things about this MY FRIENDS ARE ALL STRANGE is Becca's realization that the people she meets are worthy of friendship and of love. Their illnesses aren't easily explained and yes it affects their behavior, but that doesn't make them any less deserving of companionship. And she realizes it doesn't make her any less deserving either. 

I found MY FRIENDS ARE ALL STRANGE to be touching and moving with moments of joy and happiness. When I started reading it, I didn't realize that it was a companion novel to the book Normalish about Becca's younger sister Stacy. I enjoyed this book so much that I'll have to check out Normalish too. 

A great read!

Disclaimer:  I received this e-ARC from XPresso Book Tours for review.  I was not compensated in any way other than the e-ARC provided. Thoughts and opinions are my own.

AUTHOR BIO:

California native Margaret Lesh lives in a narrow canyon populated by herds of wild burro and packs of coyote. The canyon is also populated with her creative, handsome husband, her feisty mother-in-law, her not-brave-at-all Border Collie, Echo, and sometimes her son (who is away at college. And she is not quite sure how that all happened so fast).

She writes books to entertain young and not-so-young readers as well as herself. She believes tacos are magic.

Author links:

www.margaretlesh.com

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6520784.Margaret_Lesh

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Margaret-Lesh-Author-Page/275437492511550

https://twitter.com/margaretlesh

Life Is But a Dream by Brian James

Life Is But a Dream

by Brian James

Published by Feiwel and Friends

Publication Date: March 27, 2012

Pages: 234

Source: NetGalley

Sabrina, an artist, is diagnosed with schizophrenia, and her parents check her into the Wellness Center. There she meets Alec, who is convinced it's the world that's crazy, not the two of them. They are meant to be together; they are special. But when Alec starts to convince Sabrina that her treatment will wipe out everything that makes her creative, she worries that she'll lose hold of her dreams and herself. Should she listen to her doctor? her decision may have fatal consequences.(from Goodreads)

My Thoughts

After reading this novel, it is easier to comprehend why mental illness can be easily misunderstood. From the beginning I know that Sabrina is checked into the Wellness Center after being diagnosed with schizophrenia, but what I don't know is what were the circumstances that placed her there. It is a mystery not shared with the reader but something did happen as Sabrina's doctor tries to get her to talk open up and talk about it. Keeping this event a mystery is what drew me in so completely because it made me unsure if there really was anything wrong with Sabrina. Like Alec, it is easy to believe that everyone else was crazy because all of the beauty that Sabrina saw. And this is what makes this book so special. 

When Alec arrives at the Wellness Center, I wasn't too sure what too think about him. I didn't know if he was there because he suffered from a mental illness too or if he was there because of behavioral problems and this was the alternative to juvenile detention. In the beginning,  I could never trust what he was saying. It is when he convinces Sabrina to stop taking her medications, her world before the treatment center begins to reveal itself. He revels in the way she describes the world she sees and encourages her to explore it more. He sees her beauty in this creativity. But what he doesn't understand that he is harming her. He clearly doesn't understand her illness or that what he is doing is damaging her - making her world unsafe. Yet it is in these same moments that you see that he really begins to care for her. This is what makes their relationship so confusing and dramatic.

One of my favorite parts of the book is when Sabrina first sees Alec. It offers some insight about her perspective of reality and how her dreams are intertwined with her waking moments:

"Strangers make me shy. Usually their smiles make me turn away, but he isn't like other strangers. He's a familiar stranger. I've seen him before in a dream. I believe sometimes my dreams are of memories from the future. Sometimes they are about places I will go someday or people that I'm going to know but don't know yet." (pg. 15) 

Passages such as this make me believe that there is some truth in what Sabrina is saying. And there is.

I've said it here already, but Brian James has written something really special. He paints pictures with his words making me desperate to see the beauty in the world that Sabrina sees.  He allows me into a world I don't completely understand but want to take the time to consider. I wanted to read this book as soon as I heard about it and am excited to share it here. I would recommend Life Is But a Dream to readers who enjoy contemporary young adult and want to read more stories involving mental illness.


Disclaimer: I requested this novel for review from NetGalley and this review is based on the Advance Reading Copy. Quotes are taken from the ARC and may differ from the final version.