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Sunshine Nov 15, 2009
I was reluctant to read Hurry Down Sunshine--yet something about it did appeal to me--because it sounded a bit of a downer. It's not. Mental illness is one of those conditions we hear about, mostly the heart breaking/disastrous results, but not what it's like to be involved in the process.
 A family facing mental illness with eloquence Oct 30, 2009
Michael Greenberg is clearly a loving and devoted father, and a talented writer. He documents his daughter's first experience with bipolar disorder with tenderness, respect and honesty. I am fortunate enough that my family is not afflicted with this disease, so I have no personal experience with it. But I felt educated and humbled after reading his account. His patience and resilience are inspiring, and you cannot help but admire his young daughter's strength and passion. This is not a story of a perfect family, this is not a story of colossal tragedy, it is just a human story that will touch your heart and change the way you see the world.
 Surface, Not Enough Substance Oct 19, 2009
I could not quite get into the depths of the characters' rela-
tionships, or a clear account of the mental illness that precipi-
tated the narrative. I was mystified at the suddenness of onset, and wasn't quite convinced about the transition from troubled teen-
ager to seriously ill patient. I got the feeling that much was
omitted in the telling; that would be all right, if we had enough
emotional connection to this family in crisis. For whatever reason,
the clinical details didn't actually give that emotional connec-
tion.
The pain will echo in your mind long after you put the book aside ... Oct 06, 2009
Sally's brother Aaron was appalled when his beloved sister cracked up one day in 1996. It was July and she had drifted into a madness that frightened everyone around her. She was grabbing at passers by, shouting and rushing into the streets. She somehow began to believe she was a genius. Her best friend began to panic when she realized Sally was not just fooling around. "We have to keep this from getting out," Aaron stated to his father. The stigma of mental illness would ruin her life and the love her family had for her would become fiercely protective.
Michael Greenberg recounts the surreal summer that Sally went mad in his riveting memoir, HURRY DOWN SUNSHINE. His fifteen-year-old daughter was not only "mad," but she was also uninsured. He wondered not only where he would get the money to treat her, but if she were treated would they be able to get her back? The diagnosis of Bipolar I and the drugs seemingly stole her away in an instant. Michael watched her in the "straitjacket of medication." The mania insisted on living in her body and pushing forth to an unappreciative audience.
There was a cast of characters even Nurse Mildred Ratched would have appreciated. Michael, in some desperate Harry Potter fantasy to understand Sally's plight, downed her dose of pills. The stupefying dullness began to hit him. Could he and would he ever understand what his daughter was going through? What she would go through in the future or would Sally ever be able to capture the essence of whom she once was?
I read this book quickly, but had to put it aside for a week or two to think about it. Somehow Sally slipped into the shadows of this book and I realized that I was not reading about her plight, but Michael Greenberg's struggle with the illness instead. Yes, this book is about a young girl in the throes of mental illness, but what I read was the pain and agony of a parent for his child. The pain will echo in your mind long after you put the book aside. The book rambles at times, but is very poignant and well worth taking the time to read.
1 of 2 found the following review helpful:
deeply touching and beautifully written! Oct 03, 2009
I read "Hurry Down Sunshine" quickly, unable to stay away for it, though often I lingered to reread a paragraph. The last few pages I read very slowly, unwilling to end the journey, and then just stayed with the book on my lap for some time, thinking about it. What a deep, loving story of a daughter's sudden madness in her mid teens, and the human, bumbling way we love each other and do the best we can for those dearest to us. So human, so immediate. As a writer, I feel my next book (though very different in time and subject) will be richer for having read this.
I am the author of CLAUDE & CAMILLE: A NOVEL OF MONET (Crown April 2010), and several other novels. [...]
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