Title: A Danger to Herself and Others
Author: Alyssa B. Sheinmel
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Publication Date: February 5, 2019
I was sent an eARC of this through NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire in exchange for my honest review.
Hannah Gould knows that there’s been a mistake; she doesn’t need to be here, she doesn’t need to be institutionalized. Everything that happened with Agnes was just a mistake. The sooner the doctors here figure that out, the sooner she can get back on track. She just has to convince them that she isn’t a danger to herself or others. When Lucy arrives, Hannah jumps on the opportunity to show them that she can get along with other people. But her relationship with Lucy reveals more than Hannah ever though possible.
I requested this for review from NetGalley because both the cover and premise intrigued me. And once I started reading, I didn’t want to put the book down. There’s something about the way Hannah narrates the novel that just makes you want to keep reading; she’s unflinchingly honest and is so sure about herself in the beginning; she knows how to manipulate people. The writing style reminded me a bit of Mindy McGinnis, with a not-so-likable narrator that you grow to like as you move further into the novel. Hannah is the reason that I kept reading, desperate to know where her story was going to take her.
The plot itself was a bit predictable to me, but I’ve also read quite a few texts that deal with mental health. The portrayal of mental health, overall, in this novel is more fleshed out than some, showing that mental health can affect anyone anywhere. Hannah is from a very privileged background; I only wish that we got more interactions with here family because these were most interesting to me. Since her parents value appearance so much, it’d be interesting to see how their family relationships change after the diagnosis.
There’s a little bit of a thriller element to this novel as well, as Hannah tries to remember what happens with her summer school roommate, Agnes (who is in a coma at the beginning of the novel). All of these elements work well together to create a novel that will be difficult to put down once you pick it up.
4/5 stars