Wanting Normal

This is the story of the ten years I spent with a wonderful woman. Through life, love, illness, happy times and sad. I have never professed to be writer let alone a good writer, in fact I'm not even a great reader, but this was Clare's idea, so I am duty bound to complete this for her. So if the spelling and grammar is a bit off...sorry, but it was written in 8 days, writing 8 hours a day

SEEKING NORMAL is a must read; a chronological narrative in which the author describes dramatic events over significant years with such bracing detail that you feel like you are walking the halls of the psychiatric ward with her on the night she's admitted. As a child, she keeps secrets like her father's alcoholism, his mental illness, and her own trappings . . . As an adult, her suspicions grow concerning her husband's subtle unnatural behavior around young female children but too naive and scared to know where or whom to turn, she doesn't reveal her thoughts until she's sure of . . . .

An inspiring and timely debut novel from Lisa Williamson, The Art of Being Normal is about two transgender friends who figure out how to navigate teen life with help from each other. David Piper has always been an outsider. His parents think he's gay. The school bully thinks he's a freak. Only his two best friends know the real truth: David wants to be a girl. On the first day at his new school Leo Denton has one goal: to be invisible. Attracting the attention of the most beautiful girl in his class is definitely not part of that plan. When Leo stands up for David in a fight, an unlikely friendship forms. But things are about to get messy. Because at Eden Park School secrets have a funny habit of not staying secret for long , and soon everyone knows that Leo used to be a girl. As David prepares to come out to his family and transition into life as a girl and Leo wrestles with figuring out how to deal with people who try to define him through his history, they find in each other the friendship and support they need to navigate life as transgender teens as well as the courage to decide for themselves what normal really means.

Brittanie Reese knows she has a disability, heaven knows she’s been told enough times, and living in a dysfunctional family only intensifies her inability to fit in. Desperately seeking to be viewed as a normal kid, she is shaken to her core when the school places her in the special needs program. Tormented daily by being labeled Britt struggles with her identity and disability. When she finally reaches high school all she can think about is putting the devastating experience of being a special needs kid behind her. When a teenage boy starts to pay attention, Britt naively believes his intentions are pure. What happens next will shatter her and her family’s thoughts of normal.

'One of the funniest books of the year' - Guardian A collection of hilarious personal essays, poems and even amusement park maps on the subjects of insecurity, fame, anxiety, and much more from the charming and wickedly funny creator of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. "It's nice to know someone as talented as Rachel is also pretty weird. If you're like me and love Rachel Bloom, this hilarious, personal book will make you love her even more." - Mindy Kaling "Rachel is one of the funniest, bravest people of our generation and this book blew me away." - Amy Schumer Rachel Bloom has felt abnormal and out of place her whole life. In this exploration of what she thinks makes her 'different', she's come to realise that a lot of people also feel this way; even people who she otherwise thought were 'normal'. In a collection of laugh-out-loud funny essays, all told in the unique voice (sometimes singing voice) that made her a star, Rachel writes about everything from her love of Disney, OCD and depression, weirdness, and female friendships to the story of how she didn't poop in the toilet until she was four years old. It's a hilarious, smart, and infinitely relatable collection (except for the pooping thing). Readers love I Want to Be Where the Normal People Are 'I adore Crazy Ex-Girlfriend and this book was exactly what I needed it to be. Would highly recommend.' 5* 'Rachel's voice is loud and clear from the first lines of the book. I've been missing it since Crazy Ex-Girlfriend . . . this time she's talking right to me, in my head, and it is like being part of this newfound Friendtopia.' 5* 'Heartfelt. Honest. Genuine. And funny as hell . . . Rachel writes about the things that could have broken her, but didn't, in a very funny and raw way, and she doesn't hold back.' 5* 'Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is a hilarious and honest show which does not hold back when confronting the truth of sex, love, mental illness and life. This same comedic and chaotic energy is channelled in Bloom's wonderful book which I would highly recommend, whether you are a previous fan of hers or not.' 5*

"The truth is I hurt people. It's what I do. It's all I do. It's all I've ever done." He lives in your community, he shops in your grocery store, he drives beside you on the highway. What you don't know is that he has an elaborate cage built into a secret basement under his garage, and the food he's shopping for is to feed a young woman he's holding there against her willone in a string of many, unaware of the fate that awaits her. This is how it's been for a long time. It's normaland it works. Perfectly. Then he meets the checkout girl from the 24-hour grocery, and she changes everything. One small problemhe still has someone trapped in his garage. Discovering his humanity couldn't have come at a worse time.

'Mental illness has led to some of the worst times of my life... but it has also led to some of the most brilliant. Bad things happen, but good things can come from them. And strange as it might sound, my mental health has been vastly improved by being mentally ill.' From depression and anxiety to personality disorders, one in four of us experience mental health issues every year and, in these strange and unsettling times, more of us than ever are struggling to cope. In No Such Thing As Normal, Bryony offers sensible, practical advice, covering subjects such as sleep, addiction, worry, medication, self-image, boundary setting, therapy, learned behaviour, mindfulness and, of course - as the founder of Mental Health Mates - the power of walking and talking. She also strives to equip those in need of help with tools and information to get the best out of a poorly funded system that can be both frightening and overwhelming. The result is a lively, honest and direct guide to mental health that cuts through the Instagram-wellness bubble to talk about how each of us can feel stronger, better and just a little bit less alone.