SORROW AND BLISS

TW: mental illness, depression, self harm, miscarriageThrough the protagonist Martha’s journey of a troubled childhood, two failed marriages, one miscarriage and acute navigations of relationships in the family— Meg Mason gives us a strikingly emboldened picture of what it is like to live with a mental illness that threatens to snatch anything you held dear, chop off your bonding with loved ones and make you feel like discarded clothing, and what it is like to battle years of wrong diagnoses, mental instability and psychological imbalances that overflows to even the most intimate and private areas of your life. By crafting a narrative that explores mental agony in context of what it can do to you, the book offers a take on a vortex of people around who claim to love you, but the love of whom you can never decipher. To what extent of forgiveness and reconciliation can a person stretch themselves for a person they love? And how does a mental illness ravage any good, ‘normal’, sensitive intersection that you might have with the objects and humans in your life? Martha’s character arc provides just those answers. While moving through the story, the author weaves dry sarcastic humour, cynicism, naked voyages through human personalities, colliding ideals of hope, home and love to craft a simple storyline that challenges the stigma of psychiatric illness, the ghastly aftertaste of it, and the way people around you choose to react to it. ‘Sorrow and Bliss’ largely flows in deep sorrow, with the bliss glinting only after the book has ended. Even with the myriad of ways the book dissects pain and grief, making anyone tear up just a little—the book points towards a hopeful ending that gifts a direction of closure, apology and reconciliation, which once shared, can significantly create happier times.

रस निष्पत्ति - करुण😪, वात्सल्य👩‍👦 (in readers)भाव निर्मिति - शोक😔, भय 😨( in characters)I firmly believed that a book that makes you a part of its own, is the one that will remain ingrained in you forever. But then how do you become it's part - when you find yourself in it, in parts or as wholeBut this book just broke my belief. I haven't ever experienced anything like this script in life, but still this book has my heartThanks for shattering my beliefs, so I have new answers to search forThis is the story of Patrick & Martha & their very demanding relationship. Their love story which is facing the brunt of ruthless challenges that humans face on daily basis. Their ways to support each other yet fail at every step. Their frustrations, expectations, heartaches yet again finding their ways back to each otherIt's beautiful, at the same time so heartbreaking to see1) how some things just cannot be mended, even by love or2) they don't go from bad to worse, only coz of loveThe author leaves it to you to decide what you make out of this story out of these 2For me Martha is such a brilliant character. She is grappling with mental health issues, sibling revelry, marriage & motherhood decisions yet she is fearless & responsible. She is struggling but isn't losing hope. Her ability to fight & forgive, equally, her mom, sister makes her compellingAuthor's writing is very thoughtful, articulative. I was enamored by her vision of not labeling the disease with a name, rather leaving a blank there. Thus making a reader much more integral part of the story, as we all could fill that blank with our word, making it our own narrativeWriting just flows through. Humor is written in a very intelligent way, makes you love the book all the moreWhy will you not fall in love with a book which connects you to harsh realities of life in most beautiful ways"Everything is broken and messed up and completely fine. That is what life is. It's only the ratios that change. usually on their own."Read it coz it is such a relevant take on love of today's time

As the note at the end of the book states; the medical symptoms described in this book are not consistent with a genuine mental illness and the portrayal of the treatment is wholly fictional. In other words, the author wanted to write a book about something she knew nothing about and wasn't bothered with doing any research on the subject. It is a false, inaccurate portrayal of psychiatric illness. To just make this kind of stuff up is actually deeply offensive to people who do suffer from a "genuine" mental illness. There are many existing books on this topic - deeply moving, beautifully written accounts of psychiatric illness and treatment - that are authentic and sometimes semi-autobiographical (some of which clearly provided the inspiration for this book), so why bother to write a book about a made up illness when you clearly have no clue what you're talking about? This book made me upset and angry. If you have any experience with psychiatric illness you will recognise immediately that the author has pulled all of this out of her ar$e and if you haven't, what you are getting is a load of nonsense that has no basis in reality. Either way, I don't recommend it.

An afterword states that this is not based on actual mental illness knowledge. Hence she receives a diagnosis of __ __. Nonsense. Whining self centered main character with a passive husband that would not exist. 100 pages too long.

Quite tedious for much of the book, it's like being an unwitting psychiatrist, hour after hour of outpouring of angst that we all have to deal with in our lives. No fun and not funny at all which was disappointing.

I know I am in a minority but this wasn't for me. The protagonist, Martha, has some kind of mental illness (which annoyingly is never named even when it is finally diagnosed - because, as the author admits, she made it up) and this gives her licence to be utterly obnoxious and self-centred particularly to the childhood friend who is foolish enough to marry her when her first ill-conceived marriage fails. The story is pretty thin and although there are a few funny lines by the end, I was so sick of Martha's whinging that it was a pleasure to finish.

This started of quite promising but on finishing it I have to agree with the other reviews... totally over-hyped and completely unfunny .Anyone who has struggled with mental illness will not identify with this tall, leggy, blonde supermodel who has a loving husband and great creative career even though she spends most of her time hiding under a desk. It was so unbelievaby it was laughable.Don't waste your time on this nonsense. Lots of great books out there on this subject. This isn't one of them