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Summary: Touched my soul!
Review: I loved all of Danielle Steele books, but this one about her son Nick hit extremely close to home. My 26 year old sister was diagnosed with bipolar disorder two years ago and we almost lost her on several occasions, when she tried to take her own life to escape the pain. Danielle did an incredible job of trying to make sense of a complicated mental illness and the effects it has on not only the person afflicted with the disorder but the family as well. I commend her courage in being able to share her story with the world.
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Summary: Absorbing
Review: Nick Traina's life story is both touching and shocking! It is an insight and an inspiration! I thank Ms.Steele for sharing such personal feelings and experiences.
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Summary: Wonderful book about love, understanding, and compassion!!!
Review: I have read this book three times already, I like it so much. Every time I read it, I am just as touched as the time before. Ms. Steel does a great job on showing the reader why Nick was such a bright light! They lived a really tough struggle and I think it's great that she is willing to write this book, to cherish Nick, but also to help others in the same situation. I even went out and bought Nick's music, he was just as talented as Ms. Steel says he was!!! Awesome book!!!
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Summary: AWESOME BOOK, NO DOUBT ABOUT IT
Review: THIS BOOKO IS A GREAT STORY OF HOW A YOUNG MAN CAN LOOK SO HEALTHY BUT BE SO UN HEALTHY, BUT IT WASNT HIS OR ANYONE ELSES FAULT.
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Summary: a life wasted through misdiagnosis - a medical tragedy
Review: I am a psychiatrist who regularly sees adolescents misdiagnosed by numerous doctors/psychiatrists. This child was clearly bipolar from his early years, and struggled, unneccessarily, with a brain chemical disorder that was beyond his control. I am appalled at the ignorance and inability of my colleagues to figure out what was going on right in front of their faces. I feel for Ms. Steele and all the other parents who get told their children are difficult and disturbed, when they could be successfully treated. There is hope and life, if only psychiatrists would realize that these disorders manifest not only in adults but often very early in life. This kid was typical of how bipolar disorder manifests in early childhood and adolescence and in our practice would have been diagnosed and treated sucessfully, most likely preventing his death and an unneccessary tragedy for the family.
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Summary: A wonderful tribute
Review: I loved "His Bright Light" I live in the town that Nick Traina was living in when he died. To say that Danielle Steel is "captializing" on her son's death is disgusting. She wrote this book as a tribute to him and to help others with manic depression. Manic Depression is something you are BORN with. It's not Danielle's fault, not Nick's dad's fault, not his step-father's fault. No one is to blame for this. As to the charges she is a "bad mother" because she stays up nights writing, Ms. Steel spends her days with her children. She stops writing to have breakfast with them, writes when they are in school, then stops after school to spend time with them and when they go back to sleep, she takes a nap and starts writing all over again. Before you judge a person, I urge you to see how they feel in their shoes. Then I think you would feel differently.
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Summary: No words to describe......just the sadiest but loving book
Review: This book touched my heart in so many ways. I felt like I was part of what they went through with Nick. My many thought go to all of those who tried their best to help Nick.
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Summary: Cold as Steele
Review: Danielle Steele's revealing novel about her adopted son Nick Traina and his alleged bipolar disorder and manic depression is an unconvincing attempt to exonerate pure, unadulterated child abuse by Nick's mental health professionals.What scant glimpses offered into Nick's mindset leaves the reader with passionately scribed diary excerpts of abuse from his numerous lock-ups in seclusion (in one of the numerous "best interest" psychiatric hospital Mrs. Steele delivered him to). These writings, many of which are indistinguishable from something out of a Holocaust documentary, show him to be a textbook victim of psychiatric malpractice complete with mind-numbing drug therapies that have nothing to show for their effort, paternalistic token economy systems, and cold-as-steel family dynamics reaction to every single problem in her adopted son's adolescent life. Every new problem can only be found in yet another psychiatric hospitalization for her son. Professor and Dean of the School of Social Work at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Ira Schwartz, refers to such adolescent psychiatric practices as the "medicalization of behavior" in his book Injustice for Juveniles as constituting child abuse in and of themselves. (Interestingly, Dr. Ira Schwartz was the same person behind the telling expose on the medical fraud practices uncovered at Charter psychiatric hospital chain in North Carolina) After numerous treatments and therapies, Mrs. Steele is left with nothing but a dead son who she declares emphatically suffered from and died of a bipolar disease and a 5,3-serotonin deficit. Of course, what else could it be? Not surprisingly, this bipolar disorder theory is never supported with any kind of lab result or blood test other than mere psychiatric declaration (along with ADD) that amounts to nothing less than psychiatrese rhetoric - all of which conveniently exonerates the people in Nick's life who he himself described as abusing him in his diary entries to the brink of "madness." In even the slightest deviation of adolescent normalcy, author Danielle Steele speed dials 911 and convenes a team of righteous do-gooders to rush 'sick Nick' to the next psychiatric hospital in what goes over as a melodramatic "cruel-to-be-kind" play to find a medical answer to what many maternal readers will surely see as nothing but the pangs of normal adolescent development. In one chapter, Nick runs away and is then taken to a psychiatric hospital. In another chapter, recreational drug use results in a psychiatric hospitalization. In none of these case does the treatment appear to have even a minimal therapeutic benefit, and more often than not author Danielle Steele notes a worsening affect on Nick's 'condition.' Yet the hospitalizations continue unabetted as does the witches brew concoction of psychotropic drugs that Mrs. Steele is convinced her son now needs to imbibe with his breakfast cereal every morning in order to let Nick function like a 'normal' teenager. Any 'normal' child subjected to the indignities and unproven techniques employed by token economy social workers who never-took-a-science-course-in -their-life and the wonderful institutions they work in (some with with "human waste in the stairwell" to quote from one page in the book) need not point the finger of blame at an exotic neurotransmitter hypothesis for what any emotionally complete person can readily see is simply the failure of Nick's mother (and AWOL father) to jettison their heroin-like dependency on the lame psychiatric profession that appears to be using Nick as their primary means to pay for their own children's college tuition. This book belongs in the murder mystery section with a Cliff Notes version replete with footnotes that itemize the numerous examples of psychiatric acts of malpractice Nick battled (and documented in his diary) throughout his life that drove him to take his own life to make the pain go away. The treatment of Nick Traina as described in this book is a cookbook recipe to make ANY child want to kill him or herself - stigma, drugs, loss of self-esteem, missing years of school in psychiatric institutions - what a disgrace.
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Summary: My heart was touched deeply.
Review: Thiswas a difficult book to read as I too lost a son to suicide after many struggles fighting the evil monster depression.I have always admired DS's fictional writing, but this true, loving, and soulful story is such a precious tribute to the son she loved so much....thanks for sharing, DS.
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Summary: One of the most moving books I've ever read
Review: This book moved me so immensly. I read the wole thing in a matter of hours. I was completely amazed at the measure of Danielle's effort and neverending struggle for Nicky's life as well as his sanity. I admire her greatly for her strength; she is the model of a perfect mother. From the moment I began the book, I was hooked. I was also in love with Nicky the moment he came into the book. Danielle did a great thing by writing this book. I'm sure it was very difficult to do but it was worth it. Again I admire her for her srtength and bravery. Nicky was such a neat guy and I wish he would have been able to live a long and prosperous life. I was really affected by this book and I don't hink my life will ever be the same. As Danielle said in the book..."if Nicky could get have the strength to live day to day then I can be strong enough to face my struggles" He was truly a great man and will be missed very much by all, including myself.
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