Six Books That Might Change How You Think About Mental Illness

In 2021, Simone Biles and Naomi Osaka, two of the world’s most highly lauded athletes, walked away from major competitions to protect their mental health. In a field that elevates “toughness” and “grit,” both drew major attention for candidly prioritizing wellness above achievement. Their decisions, and the headlines about them, reflected a new cultural willingness—in sports, in schools, and in the workplace—to be more genuine about mental well-being, seemingly replacing stigma with openness.

But such saturated awareness of mental health doesn’t automatically translate into a robust cultural understanding of mental illness or how it’s managed. The , psychiatry’s so-called bible, might give a name to and describe a condition, but it won’t always define how a person might relate to their symptoms, and treating these ailments remains complex. Psychiatry has been helpful for many, but it’s also a complicated field, and medication is rarely an immediate, or permanent, cure; plenty of can be , even though these oversimplifications and illuminate instead the scores of stories that don’t necessarily unfurl as expected. Each of the six books below provides a unique perspective on the subject, sitting with both the ugly and painful as well as the beautiful and hopeful.