Final­ist, Books for a Bet­ter Life Award

“The Van Gogh Blues is a mind-blowingly won­der­ful book.” — The Mid­west Book Review

“Maisel per­sua­sively argues that cre­ative indi­vid­u­als mea­sure their hap­pi­ness and suc­cess by how much mean­ing they cre­ate in their work.” — Library Jour­nal

“Maisel’s book has help­ful sug­ges­tions for artists and writ­ers search­ing for encour­age­ment and emo­tional respite.” — Pub­lish­ers Weekly

“Rather than shun­ning con­ven­tional treat­ments such as anti­de­pres­sants and ther­apy, Maisel espouses con­fronta­tion with what seems like the exis­ten­tial pit of despair, the place cre­ators often find them­selves when look­ing for mean­ing in their work and the world. The Van Gogh Blues will help you remain true to your artis­tic call­ing and give you a med­i­cine chest of tips and advice you can lever­age if the Black Dog or another per­ni­cious emo­tional booby trap snarls behind your can­vas.” – Jef­frey Freed­man, screen­writer, Vivaldi, and journalist-author

“Cau­tion: If you are a cre­ative per­son — which in the con­text of this book means an artist, writer, sci­en­tist, math­e­mati­cian, com­puter pro­gram­mer or any­one else involved in the tricky men­tal process of mak­ing some­thing new — then read­ing this book may be a dif­fi­cult and painful expe­ri­ence for you. How­ever, try to tough your way through it, because the ben­e­fits of suc­cess­fully com­plet­ing Maisel’s pro­gram could mean a per­sonal and pro­fes­sional renais­sance for you.” – April Chase, Mentalhelp.net

“The iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of the cen­tral con­cerns and processes involved in depres­sion rang true for me, while also pro­vid­ing new insight that helped me begin to recast my own expe­ri­ences in a dif­fer­ent, more hope­ful, light. The under­stand­ing and encour­age­ment con­veyed by the book are stronger for being real­is­tic and for plac­ing respon­si­bil­ity on the reader.

“A sec­tion at the end of the book pro­vides a “vocab­u­lary of mean­ing,” a list of phrases designed to help read­ers con­tem­plate, under­stand, and man­age the ebb and flow of mean­ing in their lives. Maisel gives exam­ples of how each term might be used, and invites read­ers to con­sider for them­selves how they might cope with a mean­ing dis­rup­tion, seek out mean­ing adven­tures, or deal with mean­ing risks. For the cre­ative per­son, work­ing with this list and digest­ing the lessons of the book may well pro­vide, as the title promises, a path through depres­sion.” – Mary Hrovat, Metapsy­chol­ogy Online Reviews

 

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