The Silver Linings Playbook

If I could give this book 10 stars, I would. It's unusual for me to have seen a movie before reading the novel on which it was based, but that's what happened here. The movie, if you haven't seen it, is fantastic and totally deserving of all its Oscar nominations. Yet, as with most books made into movies, the novel is so much more and equally fabulous in an entirely different way. Even more amazing, it's Matthew Quick's (known to his friends as "Q") debut novel.

The premise revolves around Pat Peoples, recently released from some kind of mental health institution in Baltimore into the custody of his parents in his hometown in New Jersey, outside Philadelphia. During his time at "the bad place," Pat became convinced that his life is a movie in which God wants him to see the silver lining in everything and that he needs to practice being kind and not right. He's sure that, if he does so, the "apart time" being imposed on him and his wife will end and they can get back together, despite the restraining orders currently in place. Soon after returning home, he's introduced to Tiffany, his friend's sister-in-law, who turns out to be as emotionally damaged as Pat, and much of the book follows their relationship and their journey from worlds of their own making to accepting reality.

There's so much to love about this novel, and it goes beyond what can be covered in a movie. Easy to overlook but oh-so-important is the setting that Quick evokes. You can hear the autumn leaves crackling, see the tree-lined streets, feel the enthusiasm for Eagles. I love a town that loves its team, even though I'm no sports fan. Pat's family and friends are big Eagles fans, and the ups and downs of season during which this takes place mimics Pat's recovery as he regains his mental health. While he's somewhat confused over what has happened while he was away, he is certain that his perseverance will result in reuniting with his wife. Pat being determined to find the silver lining in everything makes me feel hopeful that all of us can do the same. Pat does not remember a lot of what's happened recently to bring about this alone time from his wife, and a lot of the novel follows his discovery of the kind of person he used to be and the kind of person he is now, giving the impression that we have some control over the person we are. Everyone around Pat wants him to succeed, to get better, even though they all have lives and problems of their own. He doesn't appreciate this early on but learns to do so over the course of the novel.
 

Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper  in the movie

Much of joy in the novel comes from watching Pat reluctantly become closer to Tiffany. Pat does not particularly see himself as damaged or emotionally unstable, so he doesn't immediately recognize this as something he and Tiffany have in common. The reader is viewing Pat's world strictly through Pat's first-person eyes--we're all living in Pat's imagination--and he sees Tiffany as pretty much nuts. I loved that even so, he is able to see beyond that to Tiffany's other qualities, beyond her problems to the person she used to be and might be again. It's possible for him to see beyond someone's issues to a person he can love. This is a slow build relationship that almost sneaks up on Pat, and it would be possible to enjoy the book just on the level of watching Pat and Tiffany get together.

Bradley Cooper and Robert DeNiro in the movie

Each of Pat's other relationships are fascinating on their own, particularly that between him and his father, a complicated man who uses their shared love of the Eagles to find common ground with Pat. Yet I was most intrigued by Pat's therapist, Cliff, who turns out not only to be an unusual counselor at best but a fellow football fan who seems to know just what Pat needs at the right time.  Pat is someone who tends to compartmentalize, so seeing his therapist in other surroundings first puzzles, then inspires him.

Quick wrote this novel from the basement of his in-laws house during a rather dark period of his life. He is a former English teacher, which goes a long way towards explaining Pat's interest in reading the classic novels his wife teaches her high school classes (and his ongoing query as to why classics always seem to have depressing endings when God's promised Pat a silver lining). His wife convinced him to follow his dream of actually being the one to do the writing, so after a lot of soul-searching that included a ride down the Amazon, backpacking around southern Africa, and forming a two-man literary circle, he landed in his in-laws basement. Three years later he emerged with Silver Linings Playbook, and now none of us will be the same.

Silver Linings Playbook reminds me a bit of Quick's later novel, Sorta Like a Rock Star, in that both protagonists have every reason to see the world as a terrible place but choose to see it as a world of opportunities. I wanted Pat to see things as they really are, yet the fact that he was wary to do so is what made me love him.