Dear Bibliotherapist, from Too Tired to be Happy

Dear Bibliotherapist, I've been struggling with depression and I need help. I want so desperately to be happy, but I'm just too TIRED to be happy. I want to do plenty of things, but I just don't have the energy and end up sleeping instead. What do I do? Do you have a book or poem for me that might be able to help?

-Too Tired to be Happy

Oh, my dear reader. My heart goes out to you. I'm so sorry that you have to deal with this exhaustion, which I am no stranger to. One of the worst parts of depression is the exhaustion that traps and binds you closer to your sadness. It keeps you from being able to rise above it all, because you only feel safe in the bliss of sleep. It gets better, love, I promise. Please have faith that it does get better.

I have a poem for you, for sure. This is one of my absolute favorite poems, and I used to have it memorized. It's by the great Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Since I'm not sure if I'm allowed to copy and paste a poem on a blog such as this so I'll just link it here. The title is The Day is Done. 

Another book that I have for you, I haven't even finished reading yet but it's done me quite some good for being a self-help book. You Are a Badass: How to Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living an Awesome Life by Jen Sincero was a huge surprise to me. I've laughed out loud at how absurdly simple she makes happiness seem. I have struggled with depression my entire life, and I've just recently started getting out of a slump of depression-induced exhaustion. I know how you feel, Too Tired to be Happy. The author of this book has the same view as most of us 20-somethings(any age-somethings really) do about self-help books: sneering disbelief in their power, and downright disdain for all the touchy-feely crap. This chick is no-nonsense and her tongue-in-cheek attitude has me actually wanting to try her methods, and hey guess what? They work. Her main goal is to get you to love yourself. Which is what we should all be doing, loving ourselves irrevocably and unapologetically.

Two books that just hit the shelves that you may want to check out(they're next on my to-read list) are Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson and Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert (yes the one that we all imagine as Julia Roberts thanks to that movie about eating, praying and loving).

You will overcome this. I promise. Just keep waking up every day, feel the sun on your face, embrace another chance to make things better, and take joy in everything you can. Especially books!


Happy reading!

Best is a book twice read,

Your Bibliotherapist

Dear Bibliotherapist, From Captivated

 (Being a continuation of an IRL personal recommendation)

Soooo I finished Captivating a little while ago and it was oh-so "captivating"! I rather enjoyed it and have been recommending it to all of my female friends!

Now I'm needing a new book to read...and I'm thinking something light and fun, something entertaining. My life has been a bit stressful, but not unbearably so. I think I would like something funny and or enjoyable to immerse myself into so it can take the edge off of the stress stuff. My husband works late and I hate getting sucked into watching TV when there's nothing on, I'd like to fill my mind with fun, happy & enjoyable things! Please let me know what you recommend I read next!

Thanks!

Sincerely,

Captivated

Dearest Captivated,

I'm so glad you enjoyed Captivating! It's a book dear to my heart, for sure.

So you're looking for something light, and fun. That's a tough one for me, because I'm a sucker for soul-shaking books. But I know I've got some entertaining reads in my repertoire, just for you!

Something fun for you might be The Mermaid's Sister by Carrie Anne Noble. This one is about two sisters, one came from a seashell, and the other came from a stork. They are raised by an elderly fairy(human sized, not tiny flittering wing size), and as the sisters turn 16, Maren begins her transformation into a mermaid. The other sister, Clara, will stop at nothing to rescue her sister from this fate. It's a fantastical, wonderful journey, and a really good book. Think Neil Gaiman's Stardust(another one you should look into!) or The Princess Bride. I think you'll really enjoy this one.

If you haven't read Brian Jacques' Redwall series, this might be a good time to do so. It might be regarded as a children's series, like Narnia, but I heartily disagree. Sometimes the lessons we leave for children are lessons people of all ages need to learn and relearn throughout their life. And with Redwall, besides lessons about friendship, loyalty and love, you have talking animals, adventures and life-saving destinies. What more could you want in fun and entertaining?

I saved the best for last. I just started a book that I've been meaning to read for years, called The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón. I don't always like suggesting books before I've finished them, but I think this book merits enough to garner a recommendation. I have fallen deeply in love with this book. It conjures up Barcelona in a beautifully simple way, not overbearing with too many fancy words or names that I don't recognize. The story, though a little bit dark and very mysterious, has caught me in such a way that I can't wait to see what happens on the next page. The protagonist, Daniel, is brought to a mysterious library full of ancient forgotten books. His father tells him to pick one(how in the world could he pick?! I definitely wouldn't be able to), and young Daniel chooses a book by a fairly unknown author, Julián Carax. What he then falls into is a mystery of why the author is unknown(the book he chooses is one of those life-changing types), and why this strange, haunting man follows him, this man who is determined to destroy all of Carax's books and wipe them from all memory. And the best part about this book? It's a series! This is a translation from Spanish, and I feel like a lot of the romance and wonder of this book resides there, in between the two languages. It's extremely well-written and translated clearly. I highly suggest this one, for sure!

Well, here's a couple to choose from, I hope you find what you're looking for in those! From The Shadow of the Wind, I give you a quote about the wonder of universes hidden inside books and why reading is such a great pastime:

“After a while it occurred to me that between the covers of each of those books lay a boundless universe waiting to be discovered while beyond those walls, in the outside world, people allowed life to pass by in afternoons of football and radio soaps, content to do little more than gaze at their navels.” 

Happy reading!

Best is a book twice read,

Your Bibliotherapist

Introducing: Your Bibliotherapist

Greetings and Salutations!

I suppose I should have written this introduction when I first opened this blog, but that train has left the station. Better late than never, right?

Through Google's glorious inter-connected flow, you can find out who I am through my blogger profile(also woefully un-finished, are we sensing a pattern yet?), so this won't be chock-full of personal facts. I just want to tell you, dear readers, why I want to help you and a bit of who I am. I want you to trust me.

I've struggled with severe depression and anxiety issues my whole life. I've had trouble getting them correctly diagnosed over the years, so I don't even care to attempt labeling it any more. My battle is my own personal battle, and that's that. The two main things I have learned throughout this long war is as follows:

1. I love books. I love words, I love reading them, I love writing them. They help me find my purpose, they help me dream and remember better days. They are my solace in the dark. They have been for years. Reading inspires me to write, inspires me to fight against my demons with pen and ink. 
2. I am at my best when I am helping people. It's that simple. When I am taking care of others, and helping them find their hope, their joy, their purpose, I feel like I'm finally myself again, and I'm actually making a difference. 

That's why I started this blog. What better way of bringing these two loves together then by this blog? Huge thanks to the people at Book Riot for thinking this one up. When I read the "job description"(you can see it up there on the top of my page, keep scrolling up, there it is!) I knew I had to do something like this. Talk to people, start a blog, anything. Since I'm a writer, I figured a blog would probably be the best way to go. Not very many newspapers want a second "Dear Abby"-styled column. But I know there are plenty of other bibliophiles and book-lovers out there who struggle with problems, just as I do. And it doesn't have to be about depression, or anxiety. It can be anything. Going through a divorce? I have a book for that. Changing jobs? I have a book for that. Traveling across the world and you need to refill your Kindle to distract you from your fear of flying? I have a bunch of books for that, none of which feature plane crashes. Please, let me help you. Let me give you a new world inside the covers of a worn paperback or on your Kindle, or however you best read. Within the literary world there are a myriad of places to go to find yourself again, no matter who you are. That's the beauty and wonder of reading. 

You might say that you're a picky reader and you want to choose your books yourself. You might say that reading doesn't do anything for your worries and your personal traumas. Fair enough. My word is definitely not gospel. I'm not even a doctor. I'm just a blogger with an English degree trying not to go crazy herself. I'm not even asking you to give me money! Just let me help you. If you don't like the books I suggest, that's fine, you can tell me so and we can try again, or you can go on your merry way. If you think that reading can't possibly help in any way to change your life, I honestly have to ask you if you've ever read a really, truly good book. Just give it a try, okay? You have nothing to lose, I promise. 

Maybe it was the way I was raised, where I taught myself to read at the age of four and devoured anything with words that I could get my hands on. I've always adored books, even when I hated the way the stories went. That's probably when I decided I wanted to write. Then I realized how truly magical the world of writing and reading is. I can make up worlds all my own, and my characters can do whatever they need to do to find their place and solve their problems. It's beautiful. Sorry, tangent. 

Books are stories from eras past or released today. There are billions upon billions to choose from. I believe that throughout the entire history of humanity and the written word, there will be at least one book written for each star in the sky. And they are all written by people like you and me. People with heartaches, people who have gone through incredibly traumatic experiences and suffer from the same sadness that we do. Let them help you. I'm really just the middleman here. I just want to metaphorically see you smile again, and the best way I can do that is read what you send me, and put a good book in your hand that I truly believe will help heal your heart and soul. I might be just an anonymous face on the internet, another 20-something blogger, but I truly just want to help you. Will you go on a book-reading journey with me?

Best is a Book Twice Read,

Your Bibliotherapist

Book Review: "I Murdered My Library"

I Murdered My Library (A Kindle Single) by Linda Grant

28 pages, time read: less than an hour

Alright, dearest readers. Time for a book review since no one wants to make use of my singular and lovely services(she passive-aggressively intoned). 

I picked this title up possibly through the wonderful Book Riot people, or maybe through Amazon seeing I was voraciously devouring books about books. It's definitely a book about books, or a little snippet of a book about a woman's life-long love affair and subsequent murder of her own personal collection of books, as the title delightfully suggests. 

Linda Grant quickly entangles us into her own serious problem(that I and many of you probably so well know). She has too many books. Blasphemy, I cry. No such thing! I also have moved back in at my parents' house and my hobby-loving father blesses me with a new bookshelf at least once a year. Toting all those boxes of books to and from my two small and horrid apartments in the span of one torturous year was not fun. So I have slightly felt her pain. Grant speaks of moving from her Tel Aviv quirky multi-story home(had to look up and see what the hell a maisonette actually was.

Its one of those strange modernistic homes that look like it was designed by a strange Wonderland escapee) to a two bedroom flat. This book takes place mostly in England, by the way, for you Brit-ophiles(I think that's a word in pop culture). So there's a multitude of names and words that are more popular over that great pond of the Atlantic than here, so be prepared to be using your Kindle's word-look up tool a lot. What is that thing called? X-Ray? Whatever. I know I'm not the only one who finds it handy, regardless of what it's called.

Ahem. Sorry for the tangent. Grant draws us quickly into reminiscences of her life as an only child(at least until she was 8 and her sister was born, "but by then the habits of solitude were set in the bone."Loc 83) and her preference for quiet days inside with books rather than loud, messy days outside with children she couldn't and didn't want to relate to. I as an only child can definitely relate to her choice. She goes on to bring us through the years of her book affair and the different stages of literature she waded through. Any born reader who has grown up feeling as if "bookshops were temples, places of worship"(Loc. 122) probably has similar memories. She eventually tells us of the heartbreaking self-inflicted pain of downsizing one's library, a pain I pray I never have to endure.

I Murdered My Library is an enjoyable day trip through the 60's to present day of literature, with an author full of quirks and memorable word structure. I'm definitely looking to pick up another, hopefully longer read by her. This one is free through Kindle Unlimited(whoever thought this program up is a very rich god of a human being), or just $2.99 at the moment on Amazon. It is a Kindle Single so it's only available digitally, but its worth it. 

I'll end with her thoughts on a personal library:

I return in memory and imagination, but I return by taking a book down from the shelf, and reading a few pages. That is a library. A full larder for the soul. - Linda Grant

Happy Reading!

Best is a Book Twice Read,

Your Bibliotherapist 

Dear Bibliotherapist, from Stir Crazy

I find that in the next few months I will be going stir crazy. I'm thinking I may need a book series to carry me through. But I've read most of the classic series, Potter, Ring, etc Any great NEW series that may pull me through?
          - Stir Crazy 

Dear Stir Crazy,


Don't we all yearn for a new series as groundbreaking as Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings or a magical journey like Harry Potter? If they ever create a way to experience something as if you were experiencing it for the first time, I would probably ask to re-experience those two series for the first time.

This one took me longer than I expected, because us readers are hardpressed to find "new" sets of books to slake our thirst. Some of the following that I've suggested may not be new, per se, but they are wonderful (and very long) series that may help you through!

• The Discworld Series by Terry Pratchett: The late great Terry Pratchett is a genius. His Discworld books are practically never ending fun. If you haven't already read these, the first novel in the series is The Color of Magic.  Forty books set in this world are published. Who wouldn't want to read about a world that is a flat disc, set on the backs of four elephants, who stand on the back of a giant turtle? Plus, Pratchett's humour is irresistible.
• The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan: The friends that started me on this series were woe-betide thinking the series would never be finished. This epic fantasy was planned for only six books, but now it runs the length of fourteen books, and counting. Unfortunately, Robert Jordan passed in 2007, but Brandon Sanderson has collaborated with Jordan's wife to finish the series. Sanderson is a great author as well.  If you liked The Lord of the Rings, and have a knack at remembering characters(I had to keep a notebook with the different characters so I could remember who was who, thank the literary gods for Kindle's X-Ray) this series might be a good fit for you. One of the things I adored about this series is the strong female characters, but (hopefully this isn't a spoiler) there is a stark contrast between men and women throughout the series. I'll let you explore it for yourself. The first book is The Eye of the World. Watch for Perrin. His story captures my heart better than the main character, Rand. But perhaps you'll disagree with me and fall in love with a different character entirely. That's the beauty of this series, there's so many characters that people with a multitude of backgrounds can find at least one to relate to.
• His Fair Assassin series by Robin LaFevers: This one is fairly new, but also fairly short. Only three books grace this set, and they are fast reads. But, oh, is it a wonderful and delicious ride. I stumbled upon the first book, Grave Mercy, at the library, and was instantly hooked. The main characters in the series, Ismae, Sybella, and Annith each have their own novel. For what looked like another teen fantasy romance set, this one blew me away. I will never forget these three women and their fictional place in a touch more fantastical Breton history. 
• Anything by Neil Gaiman: It might not be a series, but Neil Gaiman has fast become one of my favorite contemporary authors. He blends fantasy and dark humour so well, he conjures up fairy tales out of the mundane and is so delightfully creative that his books are a joy to read. A good one to start with, which I think I suggested it in a previous post as well, is The Ocean at the End of the Lane. Two more that I highly suggest are American Gods, Gaiman's take on Old World gods being brought over to the New World by their followers and subsequently either dying out or taking power in whatever way they can; and Good Omens, which is his telling of the Apocalypse being fought against desperately by the unlikely team of an angel and a demon, and if the Antichrist was a pretty innocent seven year old boy who just wants to play with his friends. 

In order to keep this response brief enough to be readable, I'll just link a handful of series and authors below that you will hopefully find enjoyable. They include fantasy and historical fiction. 

• The Hangman's Daughter by Oliver Pötzsch-this is a historical mystery series, and there's four books to it so far. Free on Kindle Unlimited! 
• The King Raven Trilogy by Stephen Lawhead- an in-depth, creative journey into Robin Hood, Will Scarlet and Friar Tuck's lives.
• The Dame Frevisse Mysteries by Margaret Frazer-think Agatha Christie in the Dark Ages
• The Paper Magician series by Charlie N. Holmberg
• The Copper Sign by Katia Fox- there are three books so far in this series. Very very good.
• The Roman Britain Trilogy by Rosemary Sutcliffe- a little dense at times, but the Roman legions battle for control over early Britain is such an incredible time in history that it's worth the read.

I hope I have given you enough to choose from! Good luck with your stir-crazy months, and if you run out of books, please let me know and I'll find a whole new list for you. Here's a quote to encourage you through this as well:

“Let the darkness find you if it must. Throw off the quick and tempting escapes, and seek help only from those who would teach you to grow, feed your soul, embrace your heart, but would not steal away your journey.”
― Jennifer DeLucy

Best is a book twice read,

Your Bibliotherapist

Dear Bibliotherapist, from Anxiety Girl

I have an anxiety disorder and lately life has been such a roller coaster that I have been losing too much sleep and unable to quiet my mind much at all. Might you have a suggestion of some sort of fiction that will help me get outside of my own head?

-Anxiety Girl

Dear Anxiety Girl, 
I'm so sorry about your roller coaster life, and your anxiety disorder. I too suffer from both of those, so keep your head up, and know that we both fight the good fight!! As for your request, I have in mind a few books to help, but I would also like to suggest two non-fiction books that will hopefully strike your fancy. 

The first book I want to suggest to you is Heroes and Monsters: An Honest Look at the Struggle within All of Us by Josh Riebock. When I read this about two years ago I had no idea what I was in for. I was often bewildered, in a good way, at the journey I was taking with this book. It's a very entertaining read that doesn't pull the punches. It's gut-wrenchingly honest, but doesn't leave a sour taste in your mouth like some other books that claim "utter real-ness". It may help you sort out your roller coaster ride life by the end of it. 

The second book I want to suggest is a memoir by Rachel Friedman: The Good Girl's Guide to Getting Lost: A Memoir of Three Continents, Two Friends, and One Unexpected Adventure. This one has stuck with me over the years, Rachel's memories of traveling to Ireland and Australia creating a mouth-watering wanderlust in my heart every time I think of them. You say you want to get outside your own head. Whenever that plagued me during my college years, my mom used to tell me to volunteer or do some sort of self-challenging work, and my father would tell me to travel. If you can't really do either at the moment, why not read about both? 

The last bit of fiction I'll offer you are two different authors whom you can choose freely of their works: William Wordsworth and the great F. Scott Fitzgerald. Both of these authors are so popular and so fantastic, I can't suggest just one certain work to you in fear you've already read it. I suggest Wordsworth because his poetry, along with Longfellow's, has always had a soothing effect on my soul. Fitzgerald is such a genius with his novels and short stories that they utterly transport you to another time entirely.

The two non-fiction books I want to suggest to you I will suffer myself to only just mention them, seeing as this post is probably running entirely too long. John and Stasi Eldredge are masters in their field of Christianity and seeking out one's true self. Two of their books may do you some good in this troubled time:  Captivating Revised & Updated: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman's Soul and Becoming Myself: Embracing God's Dream of You. These books have changed my life every time I have read them. I hope they help you.

One last bit of advice, have you tried journaling? Take deep breaths, Anxiety Girl. You'll get through this season. 



Happy reading, and many thanks for writing to Bibliotherapy, etc! I hope that I have helped by guiding you to a good book.

Best is a book twice read,

Your Bibliotherapist

P.S. Totally forgot one more book. The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. He's a god among authors.