Recommended reading
The Best Books on Bipolar Disorder
Six books we return to again and again — memoirs that make you feel less alone, practical guides for managing episodes, and the clinical texts behind them. Every one has earned its place.
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Our recommendations
An Unquiet Mind
Kay Redfield Jamison — The definitive bipolar memoir. Jamison is the world's leading clinical authority on the illness and has lived with it since adolescence. If you read one book on this list, read this one.
View on AmazonTouched with Fire
Kay Redfield Jamison — Jamison's study of the link between bipolar disorder and artistic temperament - the scholarly backbone of everything this website is about.
View on AmazonWishful Drinking
Carrie Fisher — Fisher's hilarious, unsparing account of bipolar disorder, addiction and being a Star Wars action figure. Read our biography of Carrie Fisher alongside it.
View on AmazonThe Bipolar Disorder Survival Guide
David J. Miklowitz — The most practical handbook available for managing the illness day to day - mood charting, warning signs, medication questions, and family strategies.
View on AmazonManic-Depressive Illness
Goodwin & Jamison — The clinical reference text. Expensive and dense, but this is the book psychiatrists themselves reach for.
View on AmazonMadness: A Bipolar Life
Marya Hornbacher — An unflinching first-person account of living with severe bipolar disorder from childhood. Difficult, honest, and widely recommended by people who have been there.
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