Notes On A Nervous Planet – Matt Haig

I am not a non-fiction reader. I usually pick up books with cute covers and great reviews. Once in a while if I am bored with cuteness, I dug into GR and find books that can be different but useful. So, this is one of the books that I picked up on a whim and it turned out to be amazing. A five star for sure and every reader must try to read this book.

The book focuses on depression – reasons, symptoms, consequences and how to stop it from re-occurring. It is a compilation of all the things that the author has suffered from in his life in terms of depression. The author claims that depression can take over your mind even if you know how to control it or what will happen. It is something that requires constant monitoring. The author has given a lot of suggestions in the book in which you can keep a check on yourself and stop from suffering from depression.

There were three main attractions in the book that instantly made me want to read it.

·        The first chapter had a section called ‘Crash’ that compared the mind with a computer. The person feels that there are many tabs open in the brain and they don’t know about which to switch off and that creates a major problem in the end. This line attracted me the most because I can relate to it.

·        The author has very well highlighted the overuse of social media. This made me realize that even being a bookstagrammar, it is not necessary for me to be online round the clock. I just have to devote an hour and give time to things that I like the most and that is READING.

·        And finally, the author won the feminist in me. The author has used the word ‘she’ as a pronoun in almost all examples. Usually, everyone uses ‘he’ when they talk in third person but I noticed that there was not even a single example where the author used ‘he’.

These were some of my major observations. There are so many that I did not acknowledge in this small review but the book is a MUST-READ even if you have not suffered from depression.