Zetty

Zetty is heart breaking, emotional, hopeful, tragic and necessary all at the same time. We are following the formative years of young Zetty whose mother was taken away with a mental illness and never spoken of again. As a teenager, Zetty has all kinds of questions about where her mother is, why she left and what this means for her.
There are a lot of things that happen to Zetty (no spoilers here) that pile on to make her life seem endlessly tragic. The biggest tragedy and message that I want to take away from this book is about the stigma around mental illness and talking about your feelings and emotions, so that you can learn from them and grow. There are so many great examples of this through Zetty's father and how he can't grow and move on, Sue Willy who shows incredible maturity, Dennis who has to go through the worst to grow. In today's world we are trying to start these conversations, but we still have so far to go. It was interesting to see it set in the 1970’s, because there would have obviously been even more stigma around some of these issues back then. I did wonder how true to that 70’s era it was in the way that Doctor Sparling helped Zetty. I imagine a female doctor back then would have been extremely rare for Zetty to find, especially one that was world famous.
Since motherhood and the symbolic and real idea of being a mother was so woven into everything that happened in the book, it was nice to see such a wide range of strong female characters. Most of the women in the book felt real with a range of depth. Scarlett was the “ideal” mom, but then had a husband who treated her kind of poorly instead of being a perfect one note character that she could have been portrayed as.
The prose felt really lovingly written, especially when we got a glimpse of the story from Margie's perspective. It was respectful and didn't feel like we were taking advantage of or mocking mentally ill issues or feelings.
I got this book from Netgalley and Backlit PR and I’m so glad I did. I hope more people discover it. I can picture this as a beautiful film or something getting it more attention.

I want to thank NetGalley, the publisher, and author Debra Whiting Alexander for providing me with an ARC of Zetty.

This was a wonderful exploration into the stigmas that surround mental illness and how we deal with our emotions. This novel was heartbreaking at times, but it was also hopeful and fulfilling too. I really enjoyed the cast of strong, driven female characters as well. This was a great read that I recommend to everybody!

Thank you again to those named above for providing me with an ARC of this novel!

When a family member gets closed in a psychiatric hospital never to get out again, it's not only tragic for the one who is ill, but also for the rest of the family. As a nine-year-old Zetty can't understand what happened to her mother. Her father wants to protect her but makes things worse. How much honesty does a child need?