Name: Lycanthropy and Other Chronic Illnesses
Rating: 3.816666666666667 (15 reviews)
ISBN: 9781683692348

Kristen O'Neal

Forced to leave Stanford's pre-med program after contracting Lyme disease, Priya finds solace in an online chronic-illness support group and with best friend Brigid, whose own illness may be more unique than Priya suspected.

Lycanthropy and Other Chronic Illnesses

Alli King

** After reading other reviews by POC, I realized that I very much overlooked the harmful nature of a white woman writing a Desi protagonist and including harmful stereotypes, like the overbearing family. **

This was a highly enjoyable read. While, yes, there’s a werewolf... it very much reads as a contemporary piece. While that’s not usually my jam, I was completely invested in the story.
 The protagonist, Priya, is dealing with the fall out of a nasty case of Lyme disease. She ends up joining an online support group with her virtual (at least in the beginning) friend, Brigid... who is dealing with lycanthropy. 
As someone who was in a support group in college, I have to say the author really nailed the dynamic. Half silly and absurd, half extremely vulnerable confessions. This isn’t something I have seen addressed before, and I very much appreciated it. It also was an interesting way to break up the prose- although the text of links and attachments was a bit distracting (but only because I tried a couple to see if they actually worked😄). 

It managed to be both a fun and thoughtful read- very well done.

JacQueline Roe

Oh, so many feelings about this book. 💜 I love the way Priya’s family looks out for her. Are they overbearing? Not really, they are adjusting to her being an adult, but an adult who needs extra care. I had to come home my junior year of college due to chronic illness. It is seriously hard, but so worthwhile to find this balance. Now that I have a daughter with chronic illness (who is fiercely independent) I feel this on a different level. Am I helping her grow and explore, or keeping her small, scared of, & limited by her illness? No one wants that! 

Onto werewolves, I have never been a fan. Something that takes over your body and changes you, making you dangerous to everyone? Oh wait, that kinda does sound like the chronic illness I’ve lived with since high school. So yes, I appreciate the correlation here. Also, I am glad to have a window into what my teens are dealing with now. The profanity (that totally makes me sound old 😂), the confusion about sexuality and gender…all great insights for me as I discuss this with my awesome kids. (Who brought the book to me and said, “Please read this!”) 

Finally, I love the platonic love between the best friends in this book. They reference Anne of Green Gables and Diana—is there a better example of besties??? Nope! I love how they struggle through what caring for a best friend looks like as you grow from adolescent to adult. I have been blessed with some of the most amazing best friends who have seen me through chronic illness, difficult pregnancies, grief, etc. I am grateful to God for them and love that this book has that as the core component.

Southern Today Gone Tomorrow

Written by Kristen O’Neal, this novel follows Priya, a young college student whose life has been turned on its head because she had a severe case of Lyme’s disease that left who with chronic pain, fatigue, and other issues. Being stuck at home, her closest friend has become Bridget, a girl who she met through her blog, and a discord group for folks with chronic illness.

And, yes, there is a werewolf in this novel.

And, y’all, I had feelings about this book. At first I loved it, I loved that this is about people who suffer from chronic illness, particularly the bit about others thinking they are fine etc. I liked the idea of this exploring a discord server and how you interact and can become so close with those people.

But, and there is a big but, at some point I stopped being invested in the story. It wasn’t a poorly written story, far from it in many instances. Again, but, it felt like the author choose to write about a subsection of India that I don’t think she knows much about, because they are Christian and she is a Christian writer. There are points when she says that the family talks in a mixed language of English and another, yet she still has the character refer to her parents as ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’. I’m pretty sure that most other languages don’t use Mom and Dad for their parents… and a lot of the ‘references’ felt SUPER forces. At one point the mother draws a bath for Priya and puts epsom salts and coconut oil in the water and Priya says it smells like curry. Um, I’m sorry, but I do NOT agree with that statement. Curry smells of spices. That statement just… it makes ABSOLUTELY no sense. I’m sorry, but I don’t think it does.

And, let’s talk about how terrible and annoying the discord part is – nothing has time stamps, it is implied that, with a TEXT CHANNEL, when she isn’t online she can’t see previous messages. If it wasn’t for the fact that I use that service, maybe it wouldn’t bother me so much. But not having the images that are listed actually on the page DOES REALLY, REALLY BOTHER ME.

Okay. So, who would like this? I read this because of the werewolf, and once we get to that part of it, it is really interesting. And parts are good. But parts are also really frustrating. If you like werewolf novels, if you like reading about chronic illness folk, I suppose give this a shot?

Heather Killeen

Rating: 4.5/5 unexplained symptoms 

Format: ebook. I’d like to thank the author and QuirkBooks for a copy of this ebook in exchange for an honest review!

To sum up:
Priya had a plan. She was going to med school when she got Lyme disease and had to take a leave of absence. Now back with her loving, but slightly overbearing family, Priya dives into the world of her chronic illness support group on discord to try to process how her life has been derailed. There she meets some amazing people, including a sarcastic and witty Bridget. When Bridget disappears from the discord for a few days, Priya gets worried and finds a way to track her down. What she discovers is a Bridget no one would have expected. 

What I enjoyed: 
This book made my heart happy! I don’t talk about this on social often, but I have also been diagnosed with chronic Lyme. Seeing Priya work through the thoughts I have over and over was SO validating and emotional for me. So many times I found myself nodding in understanding or just silently weeping because of how easily I could connect with this character. Priya is kind, thoughtful, smart and trying her best to be a good friend, things that I also strive to be. She is discouraged by her diagnosis but also grappling with her new reality the best way she can. 

I absolutely loved Priya and Bridget’s growing friendship. Their banter reminded me SO MUCH of my friends in high school! I laughed so hard at their conversations and their banter, it made me feel transported to another time. Everyone should be so lucky to have a Bridget (and an amazing chronic illness support group!) in their life. The way the whole group talks about the uncertainty of their symptoms, their struggles with treatment and getting what they need, and how it affects their family is SO complex and truly a wonderful thing to see in YA. We definitely don’t get enough chronic illness rep in YA and this was a really great way to bring in that topic while also adding in a wild, fantastical element with wonderful friendships. 

What was meh:
The only thing I struggled with was the discord chat format. Although I started this on ebook, I had a hard time connecting with the characters reading it that way. I checked out the audio from the library however and I LOVED IT. I definitely suggest people give the audio a try if they can’t get into the ebook, the narrator is fantastic!

Overall, I am so happy this book exists. Anyone that has struggled with chronic illness or knows someone going through it should definitely pick this book up!

Milea Webb

Teen Wolf meets Emergency Contact in this sharply observed, hilarious, and heartwarming debut young adult novel about friendship and the hairy side of chronic illness. Priya worked hard to pursue her premed dreams at Stanford, but a diagnosis of chronic Lyme disease during her sophomore year sends her back to her loving but overbearing family in New Jersey—and leaves her wondering if she’ll ever be able to return to the way things were. Thankfully she has her online pen pal, Brigid, and the rest of the members of “oof ouch my bones,” a virtual support group that meets on Discord to crack jokes and vent about their own chronic illnesses. When Brigid suddenly goes offline, Priya does something out of character: she steals the family car and drives to Pennsylvania to check on Brigid. Priya isn’t sure what to expect, but it isn’t the horrifying creature that's shut in the basement. With Brigid nowhere to be found, Priya begins to puzzle together an impossible but obvious truth: the creature might be a werewolf—and the werewolf might be Brigid. As Brigid's unique condition worsens, their friendship will be deepened and challenged in unexpected ways, forcing them to reckon with their own ideas of what it means to be normal.

Lycanthropy and Other Chronic Illnesses

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