Review: Heartwrenching and beautiful
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 03 15, 2014
The Problem With Crazy blew me away. I stayed up till after midnight -- on a work night, no less -- thinking "just one more chapter". It's such an emotional rollercoaster of a book. Right from the first chapter, Kate, our main character, is left reeling with the sudden changes to her life. Graduation. Her drunk, absentee father turning up and embarrassing her. Discovering that he has Huntington's Disease, and that she might have it too.Her boyfriend's, ah, less-than-stellar reaction to the news.Dave. Ah, Dave. I don't think I've ever hated a character as much as I hate Kate's boyfriend, a wannabe rockstar and lead singer of Dave & the Glories. Even before Dave finds out about Kate's potential illness it's clear he's a jerk, dismissing Kate's organising of the band's tour as "making a couple of phone calls", when clearly she'd worked her butt off. I thought after the way he broke up with her he couldn't sink any lower.But he did.I won't say how due to spoilers, but I was reading this on my Kindle and had to physically restrain myself from throwing it across the room. (That scene was one of the THREE TIMES times I cried reading this book.)On the other hand, there are some truly wonderful characters, including Lachlan -- probably the sweetest book boyfriend ever -- Stacey, and even Kate's dad, as ill as he is. His neurodegenerative disease actually gives him a much more cheerful outlook on life, something that Kate and her mother slowly come to appreciate. Between Lachlan and her dad, Kate learns to live in the moment and appreciate what's happening now rather than being terrified of the future.I have all of the love for this book.