A video letter to you + a book on the crookedness of being

It is hard to sit in judgment over the archive of someone’s hurt. There is something immoral about quibbling over the literary merit of a book containing someone’s rawest vulnerabilities. There is only one yardstick to assess the value — value, not quality, because quality is subjective but value is concrete — of such a book. Does it appear honest? Can you rely on it? If it were the only book you ever read on the subject, would it be enough?

Urvashi Bahuguna’s No Straight Thing Was Ever Made is a book that comes across as just that — enough. This is a book of considerable quality, but as a map of a mind in turmoil, unique to the writer and yet profoundly universal, it is a book of even greater value. That it manages to do its work in under 200 pages is particularly welcome, considering mental illness isn’t exactly a breezy topic to read about.