As someone who has been diagnosed in the past with schizoaffective disorder, I was a bit wary on what this book would be about and how detailed it would be. I was slightly afraid that it might be triggering for me, but that was not the case.

I enjoyed the first chunk of essays more than the last few. I'm not a highly spiritual person, to each their own on that fact and some of the essays delved into more spiritual memoir.

I found it interesting though, reading from another person's perspective on schizoaffective disorder/schizophrenia. She delved into topics that were interesting and the points she was trying to make held true, to a fault.

For example:

She talked about one story that really affected me where a family had a schizophrenic son and the sister shot him thirteen times on the side of the road while the mother waited in the car. They talked about being terrorized by this person. The author then went on to talk about other cases where the family was affected by someone with mental health issues or organizations that cater to families and not the individual person with the issues. I am not sure if she was supposed to offer any sort of comfort or solutions, as she did not do so.

In the various essays she also talked about her personal experiences with mental health and how that transformed into various hospital stays, and psychotic episodes.

She also mentions some movies and television scenes that discuss mental health whether negatively or positively. I really enjoyed that.

I was a little frustrated at the end

it seemed to imply that her spiritual journey is what led to her not having symptoms/hallucinations, which good for her to be honest, but not everyone is like that.

Overall this was good but it was hard to say what I officially got out of this essay collection.

My personal fav essays were "L'Appel du Vide" and "Chimayó"

Esmé Weijun Wang describes how it is to live with schizoaffective disorder, bipolar type, through various vignettes where she recalls her lived experience: from the struggle of getting a diagnosis which then doesn't completely cover the symptoms, to finding ways to cope with the most unsettling delusions. 

I found it a great way to learn more about the collected schizophrenic disorders. Wang's writing style is to the point, easy to understand, insightfully personal and at times quite funny. 

I primarily read this book to mark trigger warnings for my partner so they could proceed with this book in an informed way. Of those triggers, there were lots. Going into the book, certain experiences TW

involuntary hospitalization

can't be left out, but it would have been better to have them collected in their own chapter, so the people who don't want to read about them can avoid them.  I appreciate the fact that the author did do this for a topic that was very triggering for me to read, and which I had to skip altogether a fe pages in. That chapter is called "John Doe, Psychosis" and goes into TW

rape and pedophilia

in a graphic way. 

Advice for people looking to read this book but who know it might be triggering: 
TW

If you are looking to read this book, but know the topic of involuntary hospitalization might be triggering, have a friend read through it first and mark the personal accounts before you do so. Throughout the whole book, Wang provides short, but personal and graphic recallings of her own involuntary hospitalizations.

If I have the time and energy I'll experiment with providing a list of trigger warnings for this book, with page numbers, but it's honestly generally not a safe read. I believe it to be in the authors right to write about these topics, of course, but I think it could've been handled more carefully. There is no use of trigger warnings in the book. I would think a core part of the audience interested in this book is suffering with similar experiences this book details, so it's sad that the book didn't make an effort to be a safe read for that audience.

At times I found the stories in the vignettes boring when I didn't see the connection to the overarching theme of the chapter (yet). When I did though, I found this style of writing fresh and engaging, leaving a certain effort to the audience to link the stories together. I think this book is a succes as a memoir, but lacks in (what I am more interested in) scientific explanation. I know schizophrenia is not a well understood disorder, but I left this read with about as much scientific understanding as I went into it. On the other hand, Wang's personal approach was engaging and informative in its own right. 

In conclusion: a good (albeit unsafe) read on one persons experience with schizoaffective disorder. 

There is a lot of medical content in this book, which I struggle with. So potential readers should keep that in mind. Overall, this is a valuable read with clear prose. I think the strongest portions were the ones dealing with experiences coming up against institutions—higher ed in particular—but of course any medical institution as well. I didn’t feel as much emotional connection as I expected to, maybe because the author does not go in depth into her familial relationships. I don’t think she should have to, it’s just what I’m used to in reading memoirs. 

This book  flew by! Wang weaves her personal narrative into a broader societal and historical context of mental illness smoothly and poignantly. She writes with impressive clarity and reflectiveness. I was so moved by her different descriptions of her own experiences and those of the people around her. She illustrates the detours, rabbit holes, alternative paths, and dead ends of diagnosis and treatment that are so often overlooked around complex conditions. Her writing is frank without being hopeless. I also appreciate how she moves between traditional and non traditional treatment mindsets/approaches/paradigms in a way that’s grounded in her own needs.

Highly recommend this book, especially to those wanting a better grasp of chronic illness and schizophrenia.