Here are 100 books that The Opposite of Falling Apart fans have personally recommended if you like
The Opposite of Falling Apart.
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I’m a YA writer who likes to tackle difficult subject matter. My books cover things like euthanasia, drug abuse, coming out, and accessing sex as someone with a disability. If my books are found by even just one person who needs to see themselves in a story, then I feel like my job is done.
This book deals with two different experiences of being a cancer survivor which is not something I've seen in a book before.I liked the way the book explored the idea of visible and invisible disabilities and how people view them differently. It's not a subject I've seen covered often in YA books and it's something so many people deal with every day. Jase was a jerk through a lot of the book, but I felt like this behavior was realistic given his past and his desire not to be seen through the cancer lens. His growth through the book was the most significant and it was gratifying to see the way his friendship with Mari changed his perspective on the world and his place in it.
Jase Ellison doesnt remember having acute lymphocytic leukemia when he was three years old. His cancer diagnosis only enters his mind twice a year. Once at his yearly checkup at the oncology clinic and one when he attends Camp Chemo in the summer. No one in his real life knows about his past, especially his friends at Atlanta West Prep. Mari Manos has never been able to hide her cancer survivorship. She wakes every morning, grabs her pink forearm clip crutches, and starts her day. Mari loves Camp Chemowhere shes developed a healthy crush on fellow camper Jase. At Camp,…
I’m a YA writer who likes to tackle difficult subject matter. My books cover things like euthanasia, drug abuse, coming out, and accessing sex as someone with a disability. If my books are found by even just one person who needs to see themselves in a story, then I feel like my job is done.
All the characters in this book felt totally real and the situations they find themselves in and live through are honest. And I’m not just talking about the main characters here – all the supporting characters have their own personalities and don’t resort to stereotypes as shorthand. The romance developed organically and felt like something healthy that both Josh and Skylar needed in order to really accept who they are.
If Skylar Evans were a typical Creek View girl, her future would involve a double-wide trailer, a baby, and the graveyard shift at Taco Bell. But after graduation, the only thing separating straightedge Skylar from art school is three months of summer… until Skylar's mother loses her job, and Skylar realizes her dreams may be slipping out of reach. Josh had a different escape route: the Marines. But after losing his leg in Afghanistan, he returned home, a shell of the cocksure boy he used to be. What brings Skylar and Josh together is working at the Paradise―a quirky motel…
I’m a YA writer who likes to tackle difficult subject matter. My books cover things like euthanasia, drug abuse, coming out, and accessing sex as someone with a disability. If my books are found by even just one person who needs to see themselves in a story, then I feel like my job is done.
Perry has created two great characters in Aidan and Kate. Both are damaged in their own ways – Kate has diabetes and Aidan lost an arm in Afghanistan - and certain their problems are the only things that define them. Watching them grow and change and accept that they are so much more than their problems makes this a satisfying read.
Kate's dream boyfriend has just broken up with her and she's still reeling from her diagnosis of type 1 diabetes.
Aidan planned on being a lifer in the army and went to Afghanistan straight out of high school. Now he's a disabled young veteran struggling to embrace his new life.
When Kate and Aidan find each other neither one wants to get attached. But could they be right for each other after all?
I’m a YA writer who likes to tackle difficult subject matter. My books cover things like euthanasia, drug abuse, coming out, and accessing sex as someone with a disability. If my books are found by even just one person who needs to see themselves in a story, then I feel like my job is done.
Minnow is a fascinating character having narrowly escaped the cult she’s been living in for twelve years. They took her hands, but she’s alive and away from the daily cruelties the cult subjected her to. The authorities want her to tell them everything, but Minnow wants her freedom and won’t give up her secrets for anything less. So she’s stuck in a detention center with too much time to remember the events that led to her escape and the carnage she left behind.
Brought to the Community at age five, the cult has taken so much from Minnow: her childhood, her family, her ability to trust. And when she rebelled, they took her hands, too. Now their Prophet has been murdered and their camp set aflame, and it's clear that Minnow knows something -but she's not talking. Sent to juvie, Minnow must learn how to survive in a new situation, and she struggles to make sense of the events that have landed her there
Chicago-born and now living in Spain, I was a community organizer in South America and the US before earning a PhD in sociology and becoming a college professor and author. I’ve written five nonfiction books and articles for publications including The New York Times, The Nation, Counterpunch, etc. Of my collection of short stories,Welcome to My Contri, theNY Times Book Reviewsaid that it “leaves us aware that we are in the presence of a formidable new writer.” In Rabble! I’ve called on my organizing experience as well as analysis and fiction to bring to life the actors in the first worker-run, self-governing society in the modern world.
Moon Browdescribes the social tensions between ideals of freedom, religion, and authoritarianism that provoked Iran’s 1978 revolution, but only increased under Islamic rule. Amir, a formerly rich, wild playboy, flogged by the morality police after a drunken orgy, joins the army to escape shame and find meaning for his life in the brutal and futile 10-year war against Iraq. Commanding artillery in the borderland, he encounters the mysterious, sprite-like woman he calls “Moon Brow,” who, after an Iraqi shell maims him, becomes a magical force in his PTSD hallucinations. Her true identity will come as a rebuke for his comparatively pointless existence, while his sister’s spurning of her rich, pretentious suitor will be another rebuke, of his machismo. A brilliant evocation of the illusions that sustain violence.
From “one of Iran's most important living fiction writers” (The Guardian) comes a fantastically imaginative story of love and war narrated by two angel scribes perched on the shoulders of a shell-shocked Iranian soldier who’s searching for the mysterious woman haunting his dreams.
Before he enlisted as a soldier in the Iran–Iraq War and disappeared, Amir Yamini was a carefree playboy whose only concerns were seducing women and riling his religious family. Five years later, his mother and sister Reyhaneh find him in a mental hospital for shell-shocked soldiers, his left arm and most of his memory lost. Amir is…
As an author I emerged from a divergent path in life. Having navigated a hard childhood, new adulthood, and careers I didn’t love, I found my passion. I want to evoke deep emotions, drawing from the depths of my and others past experiences. Finding myself came with the realization that PTSD was something I didn't have to only suffer from. I wanted to advocate for PTSD. My dream is to continue The Hearts Redress series by taking others' pasts and weaving them into fiction. Giving them a voice they didn't have. Everyone deserves love, belonging, and redemption!
I highly recommend the Torpedo Ink series by Christine Feehan for its exceptional portrayal of characters who face trauma head-on.
Savage Road is the book in the series that I love the most. It shows that even someone so far gone from their past can have redemption. It was hard for me to put these books down. I needed to know how they would overcome the trials that trauma introduced into their relationships. Would they be able to persevere?
It made me hopeful that I would find someone despite my PTSD.
No.1 New York Times bestselling author Christine Feehan explores uncharted territory in the new Torpedo Ink Motorcycle Club novel.
When Savin 'Savage' Pajari and Seychelle Dubois first met, their connection was instant, their attraction undeniable. Their relationship has been full throttle since day one. Even though months have passed, the passion and love between them has only increased.
Savage completely owns what he is: a sadist in the bedroom who can only get off on his partner's pain. He believes he's not a good man, but he loves Seychelle with a fierceness that shocks him. He wants all of her,…
Seeing couples that are still in love after being with one another for 50+ years has always warmed my heart. Seeing my grandparents hold one another’s hands and look at each other with love always made me hopeful to find such a love. I have not been blessed to have that kind of love in my life (yet) but that does not stop me from looking for it and finding it in books. The characters in my favorite books are ones I identify with on some level. They are loyal, do not give up and they love wholeheartedly, even if they make some missteps along the way, the end destination always ends up being deeply in love. And I love cheering on characters when they deal with everyday issues and roadblocks on this journey of love.
This romance caught me off guard. It was a dark romance about a kidnapped man and a woman. The heroine and her sister's fiancé who she disliked. I have to say this book isn’t for everyone as the sensitive subject matter is written about, such as rape and also a suicide attempt. However, because of Hartmann’s amazing way with words, I can’t stop thinking about this book and the characters. Hartmann’s exquisite writing style took me into the basement where the couple was kept. I felt fear and sadness for them. I felt hope. I felt so many things that left me confused at times, but as I was struggling with emotions, I found myself falling in love with these characters. This book was unlike any I have read before. It is a must-read.
WARNING: This book contains subject matter that may be sensitive for some readers, including dark and triggering content. 18+ only. Please read responsibly. When Cora attends her sister’s birthday party, she expects at most a hangover or a walk of shame. She doesn’t anticipate a stolen wallet, leaving her stranded and dependent on Dean—her arch nemesis and ultimate thorn in her side. And she really doesn’t anticipate waking up in shackles in a madman’s basement. To make matters worse, Dean shares the space in his own set of chains. After fifteen years of teasing, insults, and practical jokes, the ultimate…
With 37 years as a professional umpire, the last 32 with MLB, you can’t help but have a ton of stories. The umpire books I recommend have those and more. Funny, entertaining, revealing, and educational, hearing what happened from the person it was happening to give a unique look to America’s pastime. Being the first active male big 5 sports official (Baseball, Football, Basketball, Hockey, Soccer) to come out as gay in 2014, I also understand the added stress that brings and the courage it takes to live your true self on such a big stage.
A different look at the dream of being in the big leagues, this time not from an umpire but the person who puts the field in field of dreams.
David Mellor was a talented player whose aspirations were crushed, literally, after a car struck him in a McDonald’s parking lot. Setbacks, traumas, and unbelievably getting mowed down again by a deranged driver, he unwarily suffered PTSD.
Through it all he persevered to rise up as the Head Groundskeeper of his beloved Boston Red Sox, renowned as one of the best in all of baseball.
"Dave Mellor has built one of baseball's most inspirational stories over the last half-century. Anchored by a love for his family and the game, he survived incomprehensible catastrophes and PTSD to become a pioneering ballfield artist and head groundskeeper for Fenway Park."
-Buster Olney, ESPN
On July 10, 1981, David Mellor was just a baseball-crazed kid, a star high school pitcher preparing to go to college and dreaming of one day taking the mound in Fenway Park for his beloved Boston Red Sox. His dream was derailed as he crossed the parking lot of a McDonald's. He heard the racing…
My passion for the Kennedy family dates to seeing JFK in person as a young child. Shortly after his death, my mother purchased a children’s book about the 35th president, which I read repeatedly and still have in my extensive “Kennedy library.” It led me to pursue a professional career as a political scientist, specializing in the presidency and First Ladies. I now direct Presidential Studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center, am a member of the Advisory Board of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library Foundation, and serve on the Board of the White House Historical Association, founded by Mrs. Kennedy in 1961.
Many books have been written about Mrs. Kennedy’s post-White House life, especially her 1968 marriage to Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis, her jet-set lifestyle, and her second widowhood as a successful New York book editor, but I find Leaming’s deeply researched look at how JFK’s horrific assassination may well have afflicted the former First Lady with PTSD to be as credible as it is moving.
For almost six decades, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis has fascinated people worldwide. The subject of numerous books and thousands of articles, her life has probably been documented in millions of words. And yet, there has always remained something mysterious, something private about this very public woman. With extraordinary skill and great sensitivity, Barbara Learning explores the seemingly magical world of Jackie's youth, her fairy-tale marriage to a wealthy and handsome Senator and Presidential candidate and her astonishing transformation into a deft political wife and unique First Lady. This spirited young woman's rejection of the idea of a safe marriage" as the…
I am a writer and advocate for survivors of sexual abuse. Since 1998, I have encouraged them to find their voice and use it through my organization, Time To Tell. Being isolated is foundational to our experience, and our culture perpetuates the isolation by often refusing to address it, acknowledge it, or expose it, as well as not listening to–nor believing–survivors. This forces us to remain silent. I am certain that telling is healing. I lead writing circles for survivors to experience community and get support and encouragement. I recommend all these books not only for the wisdom offered but also the direct experience of not being alone in the reading.
This was by far the most essential book in supporting my healing. Reading it at age 45, eight years into my recovery, so many times Herman described the exact thing I was either going through or had to go through to recover.
Explaining that being abused in a family was like being a prisoner of war blew my mind. Like a POW, seven-year-old me couldn’t escape. She helped explain so much of my trauma, my reactions, and my struggle and gave me a mountain of hope to climb!
When Trauma and Recovery was first published in 1992, it was hailed as a ground-breaking work. In the intervening years, Herman's volume has changed the way we think about and treat traumatic events and trauma victims. In a new afterword, Herman chronicles the incredible response the book has elicited and explains how the issues surrounding the topic have shifted within the clinical community and the culture at large. Trauma and Recovery brings a new level of understanding to a set of problems usually considered individually. Herman draws on her own cutting-edge research in domestic violence as well as on the…
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