Reviewed by Maria Victoria Beltran for Readers' Favorite

From Madness to Mad Pride by Thom Kudla is a telling memoir of a man grappling with a bipolar mental condition. The only child of a teacher and a professor, Thom is an above average junior high student. In Hudson High School, he is quite active in many extra curricular activities, being a co-founder of the table tennis league for goofy fun and Profound Society for Deadly Poetic Reflections, as well as writing for the school newspaper and literary magazine, among a number of things. Intelligent and popular, he seems to have everything to look forward to in life. Suddenly, at the age of seventeen, his whole world crumbles around him as he experiences an all-encompassing feeling of sadness and is unable to function normally at home and at school. This is his story.

Thom Kudla's From Madness to Mad Pride is an honest story that offers us a good look at the tumultuous journey of a diagnosed bipolar patient. A gifted writer, Thom Kudla writes with candor and sincerity that is truly refreshing. Written in a non-linear chronological order, the plot unravels in a somewhat oblique way that has the reader always trying to string the twists and turns together. This is perhaps one of the reasons why the story grips you in such a way that you are loath to put the book down without reading to the very end, in one sitting. And as we accompany Thom Kudla in From Madness to Mad Pride, we relate how it feels to live with a bipolar mental condition and, hopefully, understand him and others like him a lot more.