A Sad Story, But It Isn’t Sad

By Shylah Hansen, Staff Writer

It’s Kind of a Funny Story

Ned Vizzini

“Everybody has problems. Some people just hide their crap better than others.” Ned Vizzini’s book It’s Kind of a Funny Story does not hesitate to touch on sensitive topics such as self-harm, suicide, and LGBTQ+ members. Its contented subjects compared to the book's title contradicts quite a bit, as it isn’t a sad story, and is rather “Kind of a Funny Story.”

Ned Vizzini’s New York Times bestseller does an amazing job describing what it may be like, for someone who’s going through depression, to recover in an unexpected way. On the back of the book, readers can learn that Vizzini “spent time in a psychiatric hospital” which helped “[create] a remarkably moving tale about the sometimes unexpected road to happiness.”

The story begins in Manhattan, with the main character Craig Gilner bluntly stating, “It’s so hard to talk when you want to kill yourself.” Although this beginning is a bit of a downer, the plot slowly progresses into introducing Craig’s friends and family. Craig’s family isn’t unaware of his behavior; they know there’s something wrong, so he goes to therapy. Craig brushes his family off most of the time, mainly aiming for his academic achievements while ignoring his mental health.

Further on in the story, Craig slowly eases into planning his suicide because he starts to get more and more stressed about the high-end school he’s going to; Executive Pre-Professional. All these stresses that feel heavy are something Craig calls his “tentacles.” As weird as it is to use this word to describe these stresses, it isn’t completely odd and is rather understandable once you really think about it; tentacles are a part to a few living things and if you were to think of it as you being stuck in them, you’d have to struggle to get out and it wouldn’t be easy.

There’s one moment in the story where Craig stands by the local bridge and something inside him stops his current intentions, something he calls an anchor, which is such a small but powerful word choice chosen by the author, so Craig goes home and calls the suicide hotline where he then admits himself into his local hospital. 

Unfortunately, the hospital was going under renovations so Craig had to stay in the adult psychiatric wing. The characters who are then introduced are tremendously developed; the characters seem real. Yet, there is one character that sticks out; a transgender character. I find it rather odd that this transgender character, Jennifer, was portrayed as aggressive and temperamental. I believe that Vizzini twisted this character more than they needed to be.

Throughout Craig’s entire experience at the hospital, he finds his “anchor,” an activity that holds him and pulls him back to the earth that isn’t suffocating; making maps. These maps are very relevant throughout the whole book once the idea is introduced. The idea came from Craig’s childhood, he used to draw maps and when he did he would try to make them perfect until he ultimately got frustrated that they weren’t perfect. His mom suggested that he create maps of his own, maps that would depict how he felt and that none of them had to be real or perfect.

Craig meets a lot of people who help him get better although they aren’t in the best mental state. The ending is almost like a pull back from the book, it makes you take a step back and look at the whole story and what exactly happened; it is an eye-opening book to the world of people suffering from mental illnesses, and it portrays these subjects beautifully.

It’s Kind of a Funny Story

By Ned Vizzini

Can be found at:

Barnes&Noble - Paperback: $8.23; Hardcover: $20.85

Amazon - Paperback: $7.99; Hardcover: $33.93

Morrill Memorial Library