A Kind of Magic

July 19, 2022
It’s still quite something to read a book that speaks the truth about mental health. A Kind of Magic is Anna Spargo-Ryan’s epic, relentlessly honest autobiography of a life lived under the many umbrellas of mental illness. It is a wonderful, wide-ranging feat. We move with Spargo-Ryan through debilitating mental health challenges, from childhood through to unattended book launches, but rarely in chronological order, as her illness often disrupts space and continuity. No matter what happens, however, Spargo-Ryan’s anxiety is ever present and pervasive, both in her life and in her writing. Needling. Never-ending. This is the way to write it: as it really is. There is hope at the end of this book, but thank god it’s the sort of hope we actually need: the hope, slowly emerging in mainstream society, that those of us with mental health challenges will be seen and heard rather than being wished better. With each new book that a woman writes about herself in this way we are gifted with an invitation to empathy. Spargo-Ryan shows us, with grace and brutal experience, just how much there is to wade through before people eventually acquire the tools to survive. Readers who enjoyed Spargo-Ryan’s first two books, The Paper House and The Gulf—or who have latched on to her Twitter feed—will absorb A Kind of Magic with gusto. Rebecca Whitehead is a freelance writer from Melbourne.