Where are the Cocoa Puffs? is an incredibly entertaining and endearing story because it feels so genuinely real, alive even. The book’s theme, it seems to me, is not merely about what it is like for a teen-aged girl to live with bipolar disorder but what it is like for an entire family to live with the illness. Mental illness, after all, is does not happen in a vacuum. The protagonist here has a caring family, and while her sister, mother and father have varying emotive or distancing responses to Amanda’s diagnosis (her father, a psychiatrist, is the first to diagnose her) I felt as though I was getting a very in-depth portrait of what it means for an entire family to deal with a member’s disorder. This story is heartbreaking and beautiful, and most importantly, it feels real. There is a keen, quick humor throughout that makes this realistic tale quite engaging throughout. I have already promised to loan out my copy to one friend and I have recommended it to many others.

Anyone who has been touched by mental illness, personally or externally, should read this book. It’s a truly important book, and a damn-good read. This is a novel that does what good literature should: it raises awareness about an often misinterpreted problem. In this case, an often-misdiagnosed and misunderstood illness; the way it works, as a ripple, to touch everyone around it. And how important acceptance is to finding a way to cope and live with such a powerful but mysterious gift/curse of the mind.