2yrs ago i had a bit of an obsession with "mental health memoirs" ie girl interrupted, the bell jar, i also really loved poppy shakespeare although that was fiction. i picked this book up in HMV for £3 and although it took a while to get into- there is very little punctuation, and any speech is written out like a script.
however. it is one of the most honest and poignant books i have ever read.
at the time of me reading this i was at a very low point with an eating disorder. i'm not going to sit and preach that it helped me in recovery or anything like that, because i got worse before i got better, but it helped me understand what i was going through, and that an addiction is an addiction- one line in particular stood out to me:
"An addict is an addict. it doesnt matter whether the addict is white black yellow or green rich or poor or somewhere in the middle the most famous person on the planet or the most unknown. it doesnt matter whether the addiction is drugs alcohol crime sex shopping food gambling television or the fuckin Flintstones. the life of the addict is always the same. there is no excitement no glamour no fun. there are no good times there is no joy there is no happiness there is no future and no escape there is only an obsession. an all encompassing fully enveloping completelly overwhelming obsession. to make light of it brag about it or revel in the mock glory of it is not in any way shape or form related to its truth and that is all that matters, THE TRUTH."
sometimes realisation is better than help.
it has since been alleged that some or all of the book is fabricated, but to me it doesn't matter. as far as i'm concerned james frey can write hella well (also read "my friend leonard" and "bright shiny morning") so it doesn't matter if the book is fact or fiction truth or lies, it still made a mark on me, still meant an awful lot, still gave me a realisation, its still a fucking good story whether the story is true or not.
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