This startlingly honest book by the journalist Oliver Kamm “documents his experience of – and recovery from – severe clinical depression”, said Stuart Ritchie in The Times. It was after a romantic break-up in 2013 that the “darkness started coming”. For nearly a year, Kamm was seized by a “constant, crushing sense of dread and self-hatred”. Entire days would be spent “sitting at his desk in tears or on the verge of them”. In the end, by combining antidepressants with cognitive therapy, Kamm recovered. In this book, he moves beyond his own story to consider the various possible causes of depression – but acknowledges that the research remains “disconcertingly inconclusive”.
Even so, Kamm is sure of one thing, said Sophie McBain in the New Statesman: that depression is a “disorder of a physical organ” – the brain. This “biomedical perspective” is understandable, but it sometimes seems like a way to fend off any suggestion that his illness was a “personal failing”. At the very least, the fact that talking therapies can be so successful for treating it suggests that “if depression is a biological disease, it is unlike any other”.
Weidenfeld & Nicolson 320pp £16.99; The Week Bookshop £13.99
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The Week Bookshop
To order this title or any other book in print, visit theweekbookshop.co.uk, or speak to a bookseller on 020-3176 3835. Opening times: Monday to Saturday 9am-5.30pm and Sunday 10am-4pm.
-
Friendship: 'bromance' comedy starring Paul Rudd and Tim RobinsonThe Week Recommends 'Lampooning and embracing' middle-aged male loneliness, this film is 'enjoyable and funny'
-
The Count of Monte Cristo review: 'indecently spectacular' adaptationThe Week Recommends Dumas's classic 19th-century novel is once again given new life in this 'fast-moving' film
-
Death of England: Closing Time review – 'bold, brash reflection on racism'The Week Recommends The final part of this trilogy deftly explores rising political tensions across the country
-
Sing Sing review: prison drama bursts with 'charm, energy and optimism'The Week Recommends Colman Domingo plays a real-life prisoner in a performance likely to be an Oscars shoo-in
-
Kaos review: comic retelling of Greek mythology starring Jeff GoldblumThe Week Recommends The new series captures audiences as it 'never takes itself too seriously'
-
Blink Twice review: a 'stylish and savage' black comedy thrillerThe Week Recommends Channing Tatum and Naomi Ackie stun in this film on the hedonistic rich directed by Zoë Kravitz
-
Shifters review: 'beautiful' new romantic comedy offers 'bittersweet tenderness'The Week Recommends The 'inventive, emotionally astute writing' leaves audiences gripped throughout
-
How to do F1: British Grand Prix 2025The Week Recommends One of the biggest events of the motorsports calendar is back and better than ever
