Turtles All the Way Down: Anxiety, OCD, and unsupportive "friends"

Before beginning this review I would like to give trigger warnings, in the book and review, about OCD and anxiety.

"... your life is a story told about you, not one that you tell." pg. 1

(Image retrieved from Google Images, couldn't find the original post, if you know, please let me know so I can link them)

Turtles All the Way Down by John Green Hardcover-286 Year: 2017 Publisher: Dutton Books for Young Readers

There are few books in the "YA lit" category that provide an accurate representation of mental health and its effects, not only on the individuals that must live with it every day but on the people around them, this is one of those few books.

"The cast changed over the years, but the roles never did." pg. 2

This story follows Aza a 16-year old student, who suffers from OCD and anxiety. When the disappearance of one of her old childhood acquaintances' father offers a big reward in exchange for information, her best-friend Daisy convinces her to get connected to the son, Davis Pickett, again so they can collect the reward money. But the story does not focus on this mystery, rather on the relationships between the main characters, and how Aza's mental illness affects her and those around her. 

"The terror isn't being scared; it's not having a choice in the matter." pg. 22

John Green is one of the young-adult fiction authors that do not treat their audience like children. One of the biggest complaints I often hear when viewing reviews of his works is how his teenage characters act and speak "too smart," and that because of it they're taken out of the story. I disagree with this, much like when I read Looking for Alaska and The Fault in Our Stars, I connected to characters that were not unintelligent, that felt like sensible people rather than the modern idea that young adults are only interested in superficial things/events. Due to these characters inner monologues and conversations amongst themselves and adults, their inner struggles are more easily presented and understood.

Aza's relationship with her mental illness is the most interesting aspect of the novel. OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) is an anxiety disorder where sufferers have constantly repeated thoughts, and often engage in behaviour in response to these thoughts. Aza's obsessive routine consists of her constantly reading the same Wikipedia articles dealing with her fear for this one bacteria, the inner workings of her stomach, and her disinfecting of a self-inflicted wound on her finger.  In the beginning, Aza is accepting of this as a fact of life, something that will always be steady in her life and that she cannot control or will ever be able to overcome, and although this is true to an extent, her actions are a big part as to why she feels this way. She doesn't take her medication, doesn't tell the truth to her therapist, and doesn't show to her family and friends how much she truly is going through in her mind. 

I have read reviews where they complained they grew annoyed with Aza's inability to take her medication and get help while she had the resources to do so, and where I can see the frustration I also see a misunderstanding of how mental illness is different for everyone. People don't go get help not just because they don't have the means to do so, but sometimes they have reached a point in their lives where they believe they cannot control it or that there truly is no way to manage it, Aza is the later. She has a good support system but it is not enough because mentally she is not at a stage where she wants to accept she needs the help until she finally reaches rock bottom, "... anything to be out of this". This was my favourite part of the novel, the instant where Aza finally realizes the extent of her illness and how it gives her the courage to seek help while also expressing how contrived she feels with the people around her that are "suffocating her". Pages 210-211 and 226-229 are the best part of the novel by far. While in the entire novel we are in Aza's mind, believing that what she is telling herself is the extent of her illness, these scenes give us her aspect as well as the reaction to others as the event unfolds, making it one of the most heart-wrenching depictions in young adult literature, one we desperately needed.

The characters are another strong point in the story, particularly my favourite, Davis Pickett. Aza met Davis when they were children, and although they have not seen each other in years, the connection they made one night looking at the stars has clearly linked them forever. "Anybody can look at you. It's quite rare to find someone who sees the same world you see." pg. 9. Since Davis' father has disappeared, he has taken over the care of his little brother, Noah. The scenes of Davis speaking about how Noah has been affected by the events, as well as Aza's connection to Noah and in turn her help to Davis when it comes to his brother, allow for impassioned and affecting passages that change how we see the dichotomy between the brothers. Another character I quite liked was Aza's mother. She won me over with one of the conversations she has with Aza about the school system being like a prison (pg. 11), but the best one comes after the breakdown point, where Aza tells her mother "...I can't stay sane for you, okay?"(pg. 247)

Now I need to hit on the one character I hated with a passion, her so-called "best-friend" Daisy. Although she is depicted as having "redeemed" herself by the end of the novel, I feel the best course of action would have been for the friendship to end. There are many "micro-aggression" from Daisy towards Aza, fed by Daisy's misunderstanding/lack of knowledge over Aza's OCD, but the pivotal point comes in the passages of pg. 213-217. There is a confrontation once Aza discovers how her "best-friend" truly feels about her ("exhausting" pg. 214), and this should have been the moment Aza breaks off from this friendship. I won't call it an abusive relationship, but it certainly isn't a very functional one when one's closest friend does not truly care to learn how affected you are by your illness while considering you a bad friend for your apparent lack of interest in her life, even as you're showing her you do listen. That entire scene upset me, and I feel like more people should be talking about how damaging this "friend" is to Aza's progress. 

The ending is the disappointing aspect of the novel. Not only is the mystery not solved and the questions not answered (Why did the father leave? Why did he choose that place? Why is his relationship with his kids this way?...) but we are left with an open ending. I don't have anything against open endings, the one in "The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender" left me in tears, but in this story, it felt necessary for us to have some closure.

Either way, no matter how the end is tailored, this is a wonderful and crucial narrative that focuses on character creation and development at the slight sake of the plot, but phenomenal nonetheless.   

"... no one ever says good-bye unless they want to see you again." pg. 286

P.S. On page 15 there is a short sentence that depicts the rich and poor divide, which I thought connects Davis and Aza, while talking about the broader spectrum.  Also, on pg. 31, I am Aza with her favourite form of greeting. 

If you like this book, you should read: We Are the Ants by Shaun David Hutchinson Looking for Alaska by John Green The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King Last Night I Sang to the Monster by Benjamin Alire Sáenz Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman