A Million Little Pieces: Response Blogs

Response #1:

So far in the novel, the story is very realistic and vivid in its descriptions to the point where you are the one who is going through the experience of detoxifying and healing your entire mind and body after many years of extreme abuse of very dangerous drugs and alcohol. The author is able to really capture the feelings of confusion and persistence to attain some sort of substance through his style of writing which is that he writes almost in the form of a screen play without the use of any quotation marks at all. This technique forces the reader into reading a more frantic and scattered manner. This book is turning out to be a quick and entertaining read despite the dark mood of it.

Response #2

A Million Little Pieces By James Frey was a book that I had always wanted to read and high expectations for and it certainly lived up to those expectations. I enjoyed this book very much and it actually inspired me. Not because I am addicted to any form of drugs or alcohol at all, but rather it inspired me in ways that I can now apply to different areas of my life. It may sound silly but, an example of a way that I can now apply my newly gained knowledge and perspectives from this novel is next time I go to reach for a candy bar or for the T.V. remote when I have unfinished work to do I can draw from what I read about in this book and the perspective I gained and I can now think, if a heavily addicted drug addict can pull away and resist his drugs and alcohol, I can resist this. The ways in which he thought in order to keep himself from giving in also work for me. At first it sounded as though it were destined to fail, but his coping mechanisms of just simply saying to himself, I will not take a single sip, or his tactic of allowing himself to smell, be near and imagine what it would be like to drink or do drugs, but not to act on those sensations was also a coping mechanism that works very well for me as well. I also now know (or at least partially know) what my uncle was going through when I was so young and the degree of extremeness of which his addictions were at when I was at such a young age and these newly gained perspectives are beneficial to me as well. I really enjoyed this book and I hope to inspire more people to read it too.