Member Reviews

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  2 of 2 members found this review helpful.

  • Rated 5 stars

  “This is my favorite memoir of all time. It has been a number of years since I read it, but it really helped me to feel less alone and misunderstood in my own battle with depression. Maybe it´s because the author and I are the same age and went through some similar experiences, but I could totally relate to what she was going through and it helped me to understand some of my own challenges with "the dark times".”

  Cheryl S wrote this review Thursday, March 20 2008. ( reply | permalink )
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  2 of 3 members found this review helpful.

  • Rated 2 stars

  “This book is Elizabeth Wurtzel's memoir about her struggles coping with depression while she was growing up. I really like reading memoirs and autobiographies about individuals experiences with mental illness. When written well, I find they tell you more than any text book could ever tell you. I also want to say that I feel bad critiquing a memoir because I don't want to take anything away from her personal experiences, but I could not connect with this book at all. The first few chapters and last few chapters were the best part, everything in the middle seemed long winded and redundant. Elizabeth came across as bratty and whiny and I felt worse for the people who where around her than what she was going through. I also had a difficult time connecting some of her experiences together. She talked about her depression in one chapter, going from an A student in high school and slowly watching her grades fall and cutting class to stay home in bed, to starting the next chapter with her mother helping her move into the dorms at Harvard. Elizabeth is obviously extreamly smart, but I could not figure out throughout the book how she pulled herself out of her depression to accomplish some of the huge achievements she describes (like getting into Harvard). It's like she missed a few dots that connect point A to point B. I also felt like I never truely understood how she felt in her depression. I guess the best way to describe it, is it was like I was standing on the outside of her life watching her experiences, and I was never able to become fully immersed in her life or her feelings. If I was to recommend a book to someone that gives a vivid picture about depression I would recommend Girl, Interrupted or An Unquiet Mind (which is about Bipolar Disorder), but not Prozac Nation. ”

  Lisa B wrote this review Saturday, August 2 2008. ( reply | permalink )
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  1 of 1 members found this review helpful.

  • Rated 1 stars

  “Having heard rave reviews of this book for years I opened it, full of expectation and hope. I was sorely (and I do mean sorely from the headaches that ensued while trying to get through these banal pages) disappointed in this drivel. It is nothing more than an angst-ridden, melodramatic love note from a teenager to herself. This is one of those diaries that should have been burned when one graduated from adolescent drama. ”

  Bannefin wrote this review Thursday, February 7 2008. ( reply | permalink )
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  1 of 2 members found this review helpful.

  • Rated 3 stars

  “99.9 % of the book talks about the narrator's crazy life; and the last page or two talks about the recovery process - the reaping of the benefits from therapy and anti-depressants.
  
  If anyone is interested in knowing how to deal with their own depression, I would recommend William Styron's memoir 'Darkness Visible'. Even Susanna Kaysen's memoir "Girl, interrupted" seems to be a better source of inspiration (My comments based on the movie and not the book) than Prozac Nation. ”

  prakash wrote this review Friday, December 7 2007. ( reply | permalink )
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  • Rated 4 stars

  “This book made me feel a little less alone in my battle with depression. My only qualm with this memoir is that she doesn't go into detail about her recovery process, although, I believe there is a sequel to "Prozac Nation".”

  Lector wrote this review 4 days ago. ( reply | permalink )
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  • Rated 3 stars

  “I read this a couple of years ago and don't remember all that much about it... which probably demonstrates that it didn't have much of an impact on me. I remember being able to relate to bits and pieces of it, but not much. Largely, I found Elizabeth Wurtzel to be obnoxious, self-absorbed and whiny. There is certainly a lot of "teenage angst" in this... the majority of it is not very well-written. It is rather jumbled and there are huge gaps. However, I have to give her some credit. She's obviously intelligent (even though I did find myself wanting to shake some sense into her at times) and she managed to be successful despite her depression (got into Harvard, got a good job etc)... I have mixed feelings on this book.”

  Hazel wrote this review Saturday, September 27 2008. ( reply | permalink )
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  • Rated 2 stars

  “There are many schools of thought about manic-depression: chemical imbalance in the brain, evolutionary response to ruptured social circumstance, mature confrontation of existential angst… and then there is the point of view that there are some people who just can’t get their heads out of their own a**. Sadly, this book frequently gives ammunition to that final, least-charitable, theory.
  
  An interesting read, by a talented young woman that you alternately pity and want to smack upside the head. It is hard to say how much Ms. Wurtzel wrote this book, and how much was written by the disease. On the plus side: the experience of reading gave me an idea of how alternately frustrating and rewarding it must be to care about someone in the grips of this illness. And the author was brave voice for her generation in sharing the unappealing realties of depression -- which does frequently (inevitably?) include a certain amount of self-absorption. On the minus side: frequently the reader feels that he/she is just another pawn in the cycle of the author’s elaborate charade. (I shelled out twenty bucks for these in that 90’s – does that make me an enabler?) Ms. Wurtzel seems stuck in the stage of recovery that is self-promoting without being self-aware, which is no doubt part of the illness but makes for a much less worthwhile read than "Darkness Visible" (okay - perhaps tat is an unfair comparison!), "Girl Interrupted" or "Welcome to My Country".
  ”

  Laura and Eric wrote this review Friday, August 22 2008. ( reply | permalink )
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  • Rated 2 stars

  “There were some really wonderfully written and powerful sections of this book. I found it, at times, to be very true to depression and darkness. However, I also got frustrated about half way through the book because she wouldn't stop talking about how her depression was the worst depression and no one else could understand her because no one else had depression like her. She became so self-absorbed and so quick to praise how brilliant yet disturbed that she was, that I found her really annoying and obnoxious. I know that sometimes the main character of a book can do unlikeable things but she really began to grate on my nerves when she became convinced that she was the only one in the world that was as amazing as she and as deranged as she... really? She also began to repeat herself half way through. I had mixed feelings about this book. But it had some great sections.”

  Woman Lost in the Kingdom of the Mind wrote this review Monday, August 18 2008. ( reply | permalink )