The Weight of Zero by Karen Fortunati (2016)

Catherine knows that Zero, the depressive monster of her bipolar disorder, is coming for her, and he’s going to come soon. Things have been going too smoothly, and she knows it’s just a matter of time before Zero comes back. To beat Zero, Catherine plans to kill herself. While she doesn’t know exactly when, she knows it’ll have to happen before Zero comes. Nobody but Catherine knows about her plan, not her mom or the group of kids she goes to intensive therapy. And especially not Michael, who somehow wants to be near her all the time, even though no one else as school will look at her. Michael makes it seem like things are getting better, but Catherine knows that it will never truly get better, because Zero will always be there. Catherine knows the time is right to go, but to do that she must fully let go of any possibility of her life getting better.

The Weight of Zero was an extremely personal book for me, because just like Catherine, I have bipolar disorder. Throughout the novel, I found myself relating to a lot of things Catherine was going through, but at the same time it brought up a lot of red flags for my mental health. Since I did go through a very similar situation as to what Catherine went through about a year ago, the story did bring back some negative feelings for me that I didn’t really like. That being said, I would say that for anyone who has bipolar disorder should be cautious of reading this book, and other books like it. This was definitely not a bad book and should be read, but at the right time. So, for this review I will be writing as if I don’t have bipolar disorder, and from the point of a reader only.

In general, I did really like how this book discussed mental illness, and there were two major points it touched. First, it discussed the culture of bipolar disorder, as well as how it works. I think a lot of people assume that you can just take meds and it the symptoms will leave, but that’s not usually the case. People with bipolar disorder always have the symptoms, they’re simply less noticeable on medication. Unlike some mental illnesses, bipolar disorder is forever, and never goes away. Catherine really communicated that sometimes the disorder does feel like it’s trapping you, which is another thing I think people don’t really think about. That besides from having the symptoms of the disorder, just the knowledge that you have it is debilitating. The second part discussed the actual stigma around mental illness. A huge part of the book is Catherine coming to be comfortable with telling other people with her disorder, since no one but her mom and her doctor knows. She hasn’t even told her therapy group, and the one time she did tell someone, they spread the news around school. The book brought up a really good point about how mental illnesses need to be treated. Honestly, they’re just physical illnesses on the inside, and should be treated just like a physical illness. When someone gets sick, we comfort them, maybe make them soup, and while you don’t necessarily have to make someone with a mental illness soup, it be nice to offer them the same compassion as you would to someone who’s sick.

The Weight of Zero was totally an inspirational book about a girl defeating mental illness, but I didn’t mind that it was. I thought that for the most part, Catherine was a very realistic character. Yes, she did get a happy ending, but it wasn’t the typical ending. All of her life problems weren’t solved, but instead she was still considerably sad about her life, but had enough hope to keep on going. I also love Michael. He was probably a little unrealistic in the sense that he was just so caring and accepting, but I almost feel like we need a character like Michael to be a role model on how to act appropriately toward mental illness.

Ultimately, I thoroughly  enjoyed The Weight of Zero, and hope that it’s positive message helps end the stigma and broaden the conversation around mental illness.

4 Stars