“Dead kids are put on pedestals, but mentally ill kids get hidden under the rug.”

                                                                 -Challenger Deep

Young Adult literature has become a compelling genre to read due to its coverage of a multitude of problems affecting the young mind. Books in this genre deal with the coming of age protagonist who suffers from some kind of flaw or disability that enlightens them to the reality of the world. Similarly Caden Bosch, the protagonist of Neal Shusterman’s latest novel Challenger Deep, sufferers from a mental illness that distorts Caden’s real world from his imagined one.

Shusterman does a great job portraying the reality of what goes on in the mind of a person who is suffering with a mental illness. He delves deeper into the condition by describing what happens with the medications, relationships and personality changes.

Caden’s experience is a heart-breaking sensation that infuses emotion into the reader. They are immediately captured by Caden’s humor and personality and are taken through the journey with him as he goes through a duality of life at sea and life in reality.

Challenger Deep can be a bit tricky at first. Some chapters are short and realistic, and then there are those that are completely detached from reality. To add to that, the unrealistic chapters are deeply allegorical, although it becomes clear what they represent, getting to that point can be a bit tedious. But everything readers have to go through to fully experience this book is more than worth it.

This is a personal book too, and I felt that while reading it. As the book came to end, I read the author’s note. He quotes that 1 in 3 people suffer from mental illness, and most of the experiences in this book come from his own personal family life, particularly his son. His son did the artwork for the book.Having so much of your family’s past in the novel is incredibly brave and it makes a huge difference.

At the Texas Teens for Libraries convention, Shusterman spoke about how he had personally dealt with a family member who was diagnosed with mental illness. Recently, he has become more active in raising awareness about mental illness and encourages people who know or suspect a person with any type of mental illness to seek help.

Overall Challenger Deep was one of the most eye-opening books I’ve read. It was different from many of the other books/movies that glorify mental illness and give unrealistic hopes for something that is as hard and devastating as dealing with the horror of one’s mind.