It's a Kind of Funny Story, by Ned Vizzini

Title: It's a Kind of Funny Story
Author: Ned Vizzini
Publish Date: April 3, 2007
Publisher:Disney-Hyperion
Pages: 448 pages
ISBN:0142401757
Classification: Fiction
Genre: Fiction
Age Range:Young Adult
Price: $8.99

Annotation: After being accepted into a prestigious high school in Manhattan the pressure mounts and Craig becomes increasingly depressed. He checks himself into a facility after calling a suicide prevention line and he finally begins to understand himself and his talents.

Summary: Like many determined NYC teens, Craig sees being accepted into Manhattan's Executive Pre-Professional High School as the one way all exclusive ticket to the success he dreams of. Craig studies excessively to get in and that the beginning of his life spinning out of control. Once he is in he begins to feel the pressure and begins to see himself as average and maybe even not capable of being as successful as he see himself in his head. He get seriously depressed. He stops eating and sleeping and even ends up almost killing himself under the weight of the depression. The breakdown winds him up in an institution where he meets all sorts of people and begins the upward climb to rehabilitation and facing what's really crippling him.

Evaluation: I have a special place for this book. Something about the character's relatable sadness and they way he comes back from it was awesome. I heard this was being made into a movie and I can see why. You can tell it's authentic and comes from actual experience which makes it all the more endearing.

Also a realistic view of the increasing pressures of school and success in todays world.

Bibliotherapeutic Usefulness: Returning from the brink of suicide. There is a point to picking up that phone and calling for help. It's not pointless.

Reason this book was chosen: There are more teens then we think that go through recovery institutions for many things like depression, drugs, or suicide and I think its refreshing to read a story with humor and pathos and it gives hope to those with crippling depression. Sometimes a little spark is all it takes to keep fighting.

Cut, By Patricia McCormick

Title: Cut

Author: Patricia McCormick

Publish Date: January 2002

Publisher: Scholastic, Inc.

Pages: 160pp

IBSN: 0439324599

Classification: Fiction

Genre: Realistic Fiction

Age Range: 12 and up

Price: $16.95

Annotation: Callie is hiding a fatal secret, she a cutter. When she is found out she is sent away to an institution where she meets many different people with all sorts of issues and she begins to finally understand herself.

Summary: Callie is a 15 year old girl who is seemingly normal. But she is hiding a scary truth. She deals with her pain by cutting her own skin. When her parents find out they send her to get help. But she won't talk. Not to anyone. her parents deal with her in different, hurtful way. Her dad begins to drink and folds into his work as an escape. her mother a frantic, frail mess who is a hair short of agoraphobic. The family problems that lead to her pain in the first place need to be dealt with and until finally she begins to let go, she can't begin to heal.

Bibliotherapeutic Usefulness: psychology of cutting a form of self-abuse, family dysfunction, therapy

Evaluation and reason this book was chosen: I loved that this was a quick read because I had trouble connecting to it. I felt like it just ok. I didn't think the writing was that sophisticated and the the plot kinda under developed or something. I was excited to read it but in the end I didn't connect. However, it is accessible and there are levels of hope and change and possibilities of being healed which is good for people who are looking for a book who aren't generally into reading 500 page novels. For that this book may really hit the spot. I have heard people say they really responded to this book so that is why I included it.