It's Kind of a Funny Story

Author:Ned Vizzini
Recommended Age: Young Adult
Publisher: Hyperion Paperbacks
ISBN: 978-0-7868-5197-3
Year Published: 2007
No. Pages: 444
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Main Character Gender: Male
Read & Reviewed by: Nick


  
 Sixteen year old Craig Gilner is ambitious and moving forward—that is until the pressures of his everyday life become too much. He checks himself into a psychiatric hospital because he wants to commit suicide.

His fellow patients include people he would never have met in his “normal” life. There are people who have problems he never could have imagined. Some of the patients are his roommate, who never leaves the room, a girl who cut herself with scissors and a man who once took one hundred tabs of acid in a single night.



With help and support from his newfound friends and his psychiatrist, he begins to find insight into his anxiety and depression. Soon he discovers that he is talented and sees the positive in Six North.
I really enjoyed this book because Craig’s dilemmas could bring me into the story. The book is written in first person making it effortless to connect with Craig and better understand what was going on in his head.

I think a lot of teenagers deal with pressures of school and family. I certainly have so it was easy to relate to Craig. Vizzini wrote using vivid imagery so I could picture what was happening as the story progressed.

Since most of us have not been in a psych ward, Vizzini was able to create a believable setting and characters who I can imagine alive and well in Six North. The dialogue is believable because it isn’t toned down or made to be too sanitized.

I would recommend this book to anyone who can handle reading mature dialogue and about drug use, suicide and strong emotions.