I have lived with bipolar disorder symptoms for 14 years after I was diagnosed with bipolar I in my freshman year of college. Recently, my diagnosis changed to schizoaffective disorder bipolar type, which basically means I still have all the symptoms of bipolar I, but I also experience schizophrenia symptoms, though not at the same time. Still, I’ve spent 14 years with bipolar, and that’s meant a lot of research on the best books on bipolar disorder.. In this post, I’m sharing the 20 best books about bipolar disorder. First, we’ll look at 10 essential nonfiction books about bipolar. Then we’ll turn to the top 10 fiction books about bipolar disorder. Whether you’re looking for a memoir, a self-help guide, or just fiction books about bipolar disorder, you’ll find great bipolar books in this list.
Top 10 Nonfiction Books about Bipolar Disorder
The Bipolar Disorder Survival Guide by David J. Miklowitz
There are so many books out there about bipolar disorder, but none have been as helpful to me as The Bipolar Disorder Survival Guide by David J. Miklowitz. This comprehensive book goes into detail about every possible topic related to diagnosing, treating, and living with bipolar disorder. During many times when my symptoms seemed so overwhelming, I turned to this book for comfort in knowing that what I was experiencing was part of the illness. I also like how this book focuses on what’s life like with bipolar, covering many subjects beyond the symptoms and meds, like tips on employment and work and personal relationships.
How to read it: Purchase The Bipolar Disorder Survival Guide on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
The Collected Schizophrenias by Esmé Weijun Wang
I read The Collected Schizophrenias not long after I was rediagnosed with schizoaffective disorder bipolar type. This book made me feel seen in a way that few books have. Weijun Wang’s experience mirrors mine; for an awful long time, her diagnosis was bipolar I disorder. Then she got rediagnosed with schizoaffective disorder bipolar type. The Collected Schizophrenias is about her journey to getting the correct diagnosis and living with both psychosis and bipolar symptoms, just like me. I’m putting this book on here in this list of the best books about bipolar because Weijun Wang’s essays discuss many of the symptoms of bipolar, plus life with a major mental illness. I’m also including this one because it’s my hope someone might read it and find out they are actually schizoaffective. Having the right diagnosis is so key to getting the best treatment.
How to read it: Purchase The Collected Schizophrenias on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
The Dialectical Behavioral Therapy Skills Workbook for Bipolar Disorder by Sheri Van Dijk
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, or DBT, was originally created to treat patients with borderline personality disorder. I have that diagnosis, too, but I find that DBT also has many useful skills to offer those with bipolar disorder. I learned several DBT strategies during my last intensive outpatient group therapy program, and you can learn all of those and more with The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for Bipolar Disorder. In this important workbook for people with bipolar, you’ll discover how to integrate DBT into your daily routine for a more balanced life. The exercises are practical and, when used correctly, can offer quick relief of distress and surging emotions.
How to read it: Purchase The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for Bipolar Disorder on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
The Fire Never Goes Out by N.D. Stevenson
I was astonished by this poignant graphic memoir by N.D. Stevenson. After finding acclaim as a cartoonist and artist early in life, Stevenson felt a deep depression settle, feeling the weight of expectations to sustain success. Meanwhile, Stevenson was also dealing with a “fire” (a.k.a. mania) that wrought unhealthy behavior, like staying up in marathon work sessions, that eventually brought him to seek help. The Fire Never Goes Out is about Stevenson’s initial reluctance to get treatment and eventual peace he makes with himself balancing the creative force of “fire” with his health needs.
How to read it: Purchase The Fire Never Goes Out on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Haldol and Hyacinths by Melody Moezzi
One of the most important bipolar memoirs, Haldol and Hyacinths tells the riveting tale of Melody Moezzi’s battle with bipolar disorder. Moezzi brings a unique viewpoint as an Iranian-American Muslim woman whose culture did not initially embrace her struggle with mental illness. Moezzi’s book brings a vital look at how different cultures treat their mentally ill members.
How to read it: Purchase Haldol and Hyacinths on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Loving Someone with Bipolar Disorder by Julie A. Fast and John D. Preston
Living with bipolar disorder is tough on the person with the illness, but it’s also difficult for the loved ones of someone with the diagnosis. To smooth the process, read this classic work of bipolar self-help books. Loving Someone with Bipolar Disorder introduces allies to the symptoms and treatment options for bipolar and also offers coping tools and strategies to best take care of someone with the diagnosis without getting burnout in the process. This book is a must-have for books on bipolar relationships and books on living with someone who is bipolar.
How to read it: Purchase Loving Someone with Bipolar Disorder and add it on Amazon
Madness: A Bipolar Life by Marya Hornbacher
I’ve experienced the hell that Marya Hornbacher describes in her bipolar memoir, Madness. Hornbacher suffers from rapid cycling bipolar I disorder. For those unfamiliar, rapid cycling means your bipolar episodes swing up and down and up and down and even mix together. Some of us who have rapid cycling cycle between mania and depression in a matter or months, days, or, as is the case with ultra-rapid cycling bipolar, a single day, which is how I experience it. I thought it was important to include Hornbacher’s Madness here to bring awareness to the grueling, exhausting, and dangerous form of bipolar disorder.
How to read it: Purchase Madness on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Mental: Lithium, Love, and Losing My Mind by Jaime Lowe
The cover of Mental: Lithium, Love, and Losing My Mind instantly drew me in. And I’m happy to say Jaime Lowe’s bipolar memoir was just as electric as the cover. This funny and candid memoir about bipolar disorder focuses on Lowe’s relationship to lithium, which turned out to be a wonder drug for her but one she eventually had to come off of due to long-term side effects like liver damage. Lithium is a medical curiosity, and Lowe does her research interviewing doctors and scientists about this strange but effective drug. Personally, I take lithium and have had a rocky relationship with it. Ultimately it’s a good drug for me. I’m glad we have Mental to better understand this strange but necessary for many drug.
How to read it: Purchase Mental on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Rock Steady: Brilliant Advice from My Bipolar Life by Ellen Forney
I really struggled between including Ellen Forney’s memoir Marbles and her newer book, Rock Steady. In the end, I chose to include Rock Steady because this book is designed as advice and actionable tips for people living with bipolar disorder. Though I fully, 100% recommend you check out her memoir Marbles, which changed my life and those of other people I’ve met who’ve read it, too.
Anyway, Rock Steady is a balm to those suffering from bipolar. This nonjudgmental illustrated guide to life with bipolar is funny and deeply relatable. Forney’s writing is authentic and accessible for all. When you’re going through a bipolar episode, it can be challenging to connect with a book that’s just text. With Rock Steady, the graphic art format makes it easier to understand. Plus, sometimes we need a visual vocabulary through art, illustration, and graphic literature in order to express our mental illness experience when words fail.
Self promo alert: I would be remiss if I didn’t point you in the direction of my interview with Forney about Rock Steady, which I wrote for Book Riot.
How to read it: Purchase Rock Steady on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
An Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison
Perhaps no memoir about bipolar disorder has been as influential as Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison’s An Unquiet Mind. This classic must-read book has been stigma-busting ever since its first publication in the mid-90’s. When I was diagnosed, scared and overwhelmed, this was the first book I bought from the Columbia University bookstore. Little did I know that my mother was reading it at the same time to better understand me and my condition. Jamison’s memoir is clear and easily accessible as she relates her journey to getting the right diagnosis to finding treatment that works and—ultimately—becoming a leading physician in the bipolar field. Jamison would later go on to write Touched with Fire, another influential book, about the link between creativity and madness.
How to read it: Purchase An Unquiet Mind on Amazon and add it on Goodread
Top 10 Fiction Books about Bipolar Disorder
All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
Recently adapted into a feature film, All the Bright Places is one of the most groundbreaking books in mental health fiction. A young adult contemporary novel, Jennifer Niven’s All the Bright Places tells the love story between Violet and Theodore a.k.a. “Finch.” Violet is dealing with depression and is first charmed, then smitten with Finch, though she feels helpless to save him from his bipolar demons. This book is definitely on any list of must-read fiction books about bipolar disorder.
How to read it: Purchase All the Bright Places on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Juliet the Maniac by Juliet Escoria
Though Juliet, the heroine of Juliet Escoria’s autobiographical novel, is a teenager, this book is definitely not YA. Escoria’s book adapts the author’s real life experience battling adolescence with bipolar disorder in a visceral debut novel. After a downward spiral, Juliet the character is sent to a remote therapeutic boarding school, her parents’s last hope. Juliet the Maniac spares nothing in this hyper-real novel that is also quite funny at times.
How to read it: Purchase Juliet the Maniac on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Little & Lion by Brandy Colbert
Brandy Colbert’s YA contemporary novel Little & Lion tells of the epic relationship between Suzette and her brother, Lionel. Back home in Los Angeles after leaving boarding school in New England, Suzette is alarmed to see how her brother’s bipolar disorder is spiraling out of control. Suzette tries to be there for him, but things get complicated when she falls for the same girl he’s courting. This raw and real novel embodies the helplessness that many loved ones feel when trying to help someone with bipolar disorder.
How to read it: Purchase Little & Lion on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Marriage Plot is loosely based off the life of the author David Foster Wallace, most known for his book, Infinite Jest. Foster Wallace was believed to have bipolar disorder. In The Marriage Plot, Eugenides writes of a love triangle between three college students: Madeleine, an English major; Mitchell, a friend whose enamored with Madeleine and with religion; and Leonard, a moody writer with bipolar traits. I read this book and was struck by how authentic it feels to be young and suffering from mental illness, and how that affects you as a friend, lover, and ally.
How to read it: Purchase The Marriage Plot on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Odes to Lithium by Shira Erlichman
In a category of its own, Shira Erlichman’s Odes to Lithium straddles the line between fiction and nonfiction. I’ve decided to classify it here as a work of literature first and foremost. Odes to Lithium comprises poetry about Erlichman’s experience with bipolar disorder and taking lithium in particular. Told with sharp, precise words and vivid imagery, Odes to Lithium is instantly relatable for anyone who’s dealt with bipolar disorder.
How to read it: Purchase Odes to Lithium on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Shelter in Place by Alexander Maksik
Alexander Maksik brings a dose of sobering lyricism to Shelter in Place, a literary novel about a family dealing with the hereditary nature of mental illness. Set in 1990s in rural Washington, Shelter in Place follows Joe, a twenty-one year old recent college graduate, whose bright future is jeopardized when he exhibits symptoms of bipolar disorder. Joe’s condition challenges him as well as his mother, who may share his diagnosis and has recently been jailed for murder. A poignant coming-of-age novel, Shelter in Place is also a gritty yet tender story.
How to read it: Purchase Shelter in Place on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
The Silver Linings Playbook by Matthew Quick
A book I recommend most frequently at TBR is Matthew Quick’s The Silver Linings Playbook. Why? Because this quirky tale of two mental misfits falling for each other is a hopeful, funny, and feel-good read that also manages to stay true to the seriousness of main character Pat’s bipolar illness. I definitely feel like Pat is one of the truest, best fictional characters with bipolar disorder I’ve ever read in fiction. I read this novel before seeing the Academy Award-winning film adaptation and absolutely recommend checking the film out, too.
How to read it: Purchase The Silver Linings Playbook on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Stop Pretending: What Happened When My Sister Went Crazy by Sonia Sones
Looking for ya books with bipolar characters? Check out this novel in verse. I read this book for my young adult literature and services course in library school. I was blown away by how accurate it feels to both having bipolar disorder and living with someone who has bipolar disorder. Sure, the title feels a little sensationalized, but the story here and the lyrical novel in verse format blew me away. Stop Pretending: What Happened When My Big Sister Went Crazy is told from Cookie, who watches her beloved older sister descend into bipolar illness and eventual hospitalization. This is a quick read that flexes its poetry muscles.
How to read it: Purchase Stop Pretending: What Happened When My Big Sister Went Crazy on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Too Bright to Hear, Too Loud to See by Juliann Garey
Mania can be hard to translate into literature. In the fiction and nonfiction that I’ve written about my experiences with bipolar, I’ve found mania tricky to depict. One great example of a manic episode in literature is Juliann Garey’s Too Bright to Hear Too Loud to See. The hero of this story is Greyson Todd, a successful studio executive in the entertainment industry, who abandons his wife and young daughter to travel the world and follow his bipolar whims. This inventive story is told to us by Greyson as he undergoes shock therapy at a New York psychiatric ward. Garey’s novel is a great pick for those seeking books with bipolar main characters.
How to read it: Purchase Too Bright to Hear Too Loud to See on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
When We Collided by Emery Lord
Whether we are young or we are old, many of us with bipolar constantly feel the tension between wanting to go off meds and try to make it on our own without treatment. Especially artists. I totally feel that. And that’s one of the central dilemmas at the heart of Emery Lord’s YA contemporary romance, When We Collided. This emotional, heartfelt story follows two teens who “collide” just when they need someone else who understands the struggle. I appreciate how When We Collided depicts a young person with bipolar who is also an artist; Lord dismisses the “brooding manic depressive artist” stereotype without diminishing her character’s validity as a creator. It’s definitely one of the best bipolar disorder fiction books.
How to read it: Purchase When We Collided on Amazon and add it on Goodreads
Want more bipolar books? Check out my list of books about bipolar moms:
And my article about bipolar heroes in romance literature:
