Once again, I'll be doing the Mental Illness Advocacy reading challenge next year. I need to do this again since I have been getting depression treatment and have been writing a memoir of depression.

You can sign up any time. I did more than 12 books this year and will see how many I get next year.

Mental Illness Advocacy (MIA) Reading Challenge

About the Challenge:
I started the Mental Illness Advocacy (MIA) Reading Challenge in December 2010 in an effort to raise awareness, knowledge, and acceptance of mental illness.  Reading, both fiction and nonfiction, is an excellent way to broaden one’s horizons and expose one to new ideas and ways of thinking and being.  Many reading challenges already existed in the book blogging community to address racism, sexism, and homophobia, but I could not find any to address the stigma faced by those suffering from mental illness.  In spite of mental illnesses being recognized by the scientific community as diseases just like physical ones, many still think those suffering from one are at fault for their own suffering.  I hope reading and reviewing books featuring characters struggling to deal with mental illness, whether their own or another person’s, will help remove the stigma faced on a daily basis by those with a mental illness.  They already have to struggle with an illness; they shouldn’t have to face a stigma too.

Please note that this is the original MIA Reading Challenge. For the years 2010-2014 there were no other reading challenges addressing mental illness.

What books count?Any book, fiction or nonfiction, that is either about mental illness or features characters or real people with a mental illness counts for the challenge.  However, the book must not demonize people with mental illnesses.

So, for example, the movie Fatal Attraction, which features a character with Borderline Personality Disorder, would not count since she is demonized in the movie.  However, Girl Interrupted, which also features a character with Borderline Personality Disorder, would count since that character is presented as a three-dimensional person with good and bad traits.

Challenge Levels:

Acquainted–4 books
Aware–8 books
Advocate–12 books

Here is what I am reading:

1. The Sky is Everywhere--Jandy Nelson
2. Hope--Amanda Berry and Gina DeJesus
3. The Impossible Knife of Memory--Laurie Halse Anderson
4. Are You My Mother?--Alison Bechtel
5. The Language of Flowers--Vanessa Diffenbaugh
6. Killing Reagan--Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard
7. Bitch--Elizabeth Wurtzel
8. Bad Dog (A Love Story)--Martin Kihn
9. Catch Me--Lisa Gardner
10. A Million Little Pieces--James Frey
11. Slaughterhouse Five--Kurt Vonnegut
12. A List of Things That Didn't Kill Me--Jason Schmidt
13. Crenshaw--Katherine Applegate
14. The Boyfriend List--E. Lockhart
15. The Boy Book--E. Lockhart
16. The Treasure Map of Boys--E. Lockhart
17. Nothing--Robin Friedman
18. More, Now, Again--Elizabeth Wurtzel
19. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly--Jean Dominique Baby
20. Welcome to My Country--Lauren Slater
21. Willow Weep for Me--Meri Nana-Ama Danquah
22. The Rules Do Not Apply--Ariel Levy
23. The Girls--Emma Cline
24. The Woman in Cabin 10--Ruth Ware
25. Everything, Everything--Nicola Yoon
26. The Oregon Trail--Rinker Buck
27. Suicide Notes From Beautiful Girls--Lynn Weingarten
28. This Is Where It Ends--Marieke Nijkamp
29. Dear Bob and Sue--Matt and Karen Smith
30. Happier at Home--Gretchen Rubin
31. Manic--Terri Cheney
32. Luckiest Girl Alive---Jessica Knoll
33. The Princess Diaries--Meg Cabot
34. Princess in the Spotlight--Meg Cabot
35. The Glass Castle--Jeannette Walls
36. Beautiful, Brilliant, Borderline--Angelo H. Hudson, Jr.
37. Eleanor Elephant is Completely Fine--Gail Honeyman
38. Beach Blondes--Katherine Applegate
39. Truly Madly Guilty--Liane Moriarty
40. All the Bright Places--Jennifer Niven
41. Holding Up the Universe--Jennifer Niven
42. Lady Audley's Secret--Mary Elizabeth Braddon
43. Ghosts--Raina Telgemeier
44. Goodbye, Vitamin--Rachel Khong
45. The Turn of the Screw--Henry James
46. Nightlight: A Parody--Harvard Lampoon
47. The Nix--Nathan Hill
48. Dear Martin--Nic Stone
49. The Apple Orchard--Susan Wiggs
50. Snow White and Rose Red--Ed McBain

Challenge completed on December 3