Rating: 
Summary: A MUST READ FOR SPOUSES
Review: This book is invaluable to spouses & loved ones of persons suffering from depression, especially if you are just beginning on this journey with your spouse. The saying goes you never know how a person feels until you walk a mile in his shoes. This is as close as we can get to realizing what our loved ones go through. I recognized so much of my husband in this book. It has given me a better understanding of what he is dealing with. I truly feel enlightened by this book and better equiped to give the kind of support my husband will need. I think this book is especially helpful for people whose loved ones have not reached the point of success that Tracy has with her medication. It helps us to see a future full of possibility!
Rating:
Summary: A MUST READ FOR SPOUSES
Review: This book is invaluable to spouses & loved ones of persons suffering from depression, especially if you are just beginning on this journey with your spouse. The saying goes you never know how a person feels until you walk a mile in his shoes. This is as close as we can get to realizing what our loved ones go through. I recognized so much of my husband in this book. It has given me a better understanding of what he is dealing with. I truly feel enlightened by this book and better equiped to give the kind of support my husband will need. I think this book is especially helpful for people whose loved ones have not reached the point of success that Tracy has with her medication. It helps us to see a future full of possibility!
Rating:
Summary: Puts my problems into words
Review: This book put into words the problems & symptoms that people with depression encounter. If you suffer from depression, this book will help you to understand yourself. If you know someone who suffers from depression, this will help you understand that person and will help you understand that this is an actual illness not just a state of mind.
Rating:
Summary: Brave and Insightful
Review: This is a fascinating first-person account of grappling with a lifelong pattern of depression. Tracy Thompson is tough and honest in looking at herself. She fearlessly searches to find out why this happens to her and what she can do to stop it.With her training as a journalist, she turns an objective eye on herself. It is this honesty that gives the book its strength. The portrait she paints of herself is not flattering. She sees the manipulative and deceptive behavior that she carries on in an effort to keep others near her, to secure herself from falling into another episode of depression. We watch her growth and her setbacks. We go along with her to therapy and to the hospital. It is not an easy book to read; it is painful at times, but it is also a remarkable achievement.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful as a beast
Review: This is a very powerful book- well-written (as you might expect from a journalist), thorough, and interesting. It reminded me a little of Solomon's "The Noonday Demon" in that it was so well-researched and thorough. I'd recommend this book to anyone who is in any way interested in or affected by depression. Highly recommended. Avery Z. Conner, author of "Fevers of the Mind".
Rating:
Summary: brings the human dimension to the disease
Review: This is an extraordinary book which moved me deeply. Kudos to Ms. Thompson for having the courage to share her life with us, especially since there is still a stigma to having mental illness in our culture. Until I read THE BEAST I had never read a personal account of what it is like to have depression. Ms. Thompson allowed us to see her day-to-day struggles that depression causes, the affect it had on her work, and on her personal relationships. These are things no doctor can convey to a patient. Presented are the human aspects of the disease which I never read in any book or article about depression before. Everything I read on depression up till this book had been sterile, clinical, totally unemotional, totally "unhuman," and hard to relate to as a patient. To hear the patient's voice, concerns and pain - a blessing! A remarkable book. Read it more than once for additional doses of strength and courage to fight your own way thru. The second book I read that told about mental illness from the patient's point of view is the incredible, but very different, journey of Kay Redfield Jamison in the exquisite "An Unquiet Mind." I can not recommend this book highly enuf. Although Jamison's journey is thru manic-depression/bipolar illness, her book is for anyone braving it thru any form of mental illness too. She takes us thru the time leading up to her "episode," the progression of the illness as it becomes more severe, her recognition of what she has to deal with. She too allows us to hear her internal voices, feel her pain and anguish, share her incredible ups and downs as the disease plays havoc with her. And she shares her fear of loosing her career if anyone finds out that she has the condition. And yet Dr. Jamison, yes Dr. Jamison, M.D., had no place else to go than the very people she works with every day: her fellow psychiatrists and doctors, and fellow faculty members at UCLA medical school. So here we have the patient as doctor, the doctor as patient. Even as she is able to tell us her personal history of struggle, she is also able to gently explain what has clinically happened to her; and she shares her search for, if not a cure, medical relief and a full purposeful life. Both of these books by women are truly amazing!! If you or someone you know is suffering with a mental illness, read these to find out what is happening to you or your somebody. You will not regret it I can assure you. GOOD MENTAL HEALTH to us all.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding!
Review: This is one of the best books I've read on depression, and I've read plenty of them. It's a real page-turner; I found it almost impossible to put down.
Rating:
Summary: Like reading my life story
Review: Tracie beautifully captures the world of a person experiencing depression. She sends a clear message to people everywhere that depression is a disease that one can't just "snap out of" or "get over it" much like cancer or heart disease. It needs treatment. I enjoyed how she explained how a person's brain is actually shaped by their depression using the fish experiment as an example. When she said that she felt more "normal" and more "like myself" after taking SSRI's it rang very true.
Rating: 
Summary: Difficult Book to Put Down
Review: Tracy bravely discusses her recurrent bouts of depression and the effect her illness had on loved ones. Her writing is top-notch and her attention details pulls the reader into her memoir as if the reader was with Tracy throughout her depression. I found the self-analysis to be a bit confusing at times, but overall it's a book I'd recommend for anyone suffering from depression or with loved ones suffering from depression. I recommend it for anyone who enjoyed "Prozac Nation."
Rating:
Summary: Excellent!
Review: Tracy Thompson has done an incredible job with her writing. She truly captures the emotions and fears of a person suffering with this disease. Thank you Tracy.
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