Reading Nook: Mental Health Month

Mental health is something that's just as vital to maintain as a healthy heart or strong bones, yet many people shy away from discussing it.

As such, the Huntington City Commission passed a resolution earlier this month declaring May as Mental Health Month to correspond with a nationwide observance by the nonprofit Mental Health America.

Mental illness touches most families in some way – in fact, "60 million Americans are diagnosed with a mental health condition in any given year, that’s 1 in 4," Mental Health America's website says. So, let's bring this issue out into the open: One of the greatest resources in the path to recovery or coping is the support of friends and family.

Click here for more information or pick up one of these titles, selected by Director Anne Hage, that touch on mental health issues.

Adult books

• Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman, 2010. Twelve-year-old CeeCee Honeycutt, who has grown up with a mentally unstable mother, is taken in by a previously unknown great-aunt in this Southern tale.
• Lit by Mary Karr, 2009. This is a memoir about the author’s alcoholism and journey to sobriety.
• The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain: The Surprising Talents of the Middle-Aged Mind by Barbara Strauch, 2010. The author has proven that the middle-age brain is more active and nimble than previously believed.

Teen books

• Tales of the MADMAN Underground by John Barnes, 2009. This book tells the story of Karl Shoemaker, a high school senior living in Ohio who wants to avoid school therapy and just feel normal. But that isn’t easy when he is working five jobs to pay the bills of his alcoholic mother and must wake up early to clean up after their cats.
• Tangled by Carolyn Mackler, 2010. The lives of four teenagers – Jena, Skye, Owen and Dakota –  become entwined while on vacation in the Caribbean as the teens get to know each other and themselves.