Am I Crazy, Danny? - by Dan Morain (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

One family's harrowing journey through America's broken mental health care system.

When Frank Morain suffered a devastating brain injury after a late-night car crash in 1969, his life, and the lives of those who loved him, changed forever. In an instant, his family became his caretakers and advocates.

Frank's brother, veteran journalist Dan Morain, takes readers inside his family's decades-long struggle to navigate the increasingly dysfunctional and crumbling mental health care system. Framing his narrative around Frank's story, Morain examines the rise and decline of mental health care in postwar America and the political decisions that helped create today's mental health crisis. The book blends memoir, history, and investigative journalism to reveal how leaders from both parties dismantled systems of care, creating one of the most consequential public policy failures in modern American history. Clear-eyed about the human costs of that failure, Morain also points toward practical solutions for rebuilding a system that better serves individuals, families, and communities.

From the Back Cover

"California has been the epicenter for the good, the bad, and the ugly in America's story of mental health care. Dan Morain, who as a political journalist in California has covered that story for decades, now gives us Am I Crazy, Danny?--an insightful guide to the politics, people, and policies that have shaped both state and national attempts to provide for people with serious mental illness. By sharing his own family's story, he grounds this narrative in an intimate perspective, reminding us that mental health is always personal as well as political. For anyone trying to understand our nation's mental health crisis, Am I Crazy, Danny? is a must-read resource."--Thomas Insel, MD, former Director of the National Institute of Mental Health and author of Healing: Our Path from Mental Illness to Mental Health

"Heralded journalist Dan Morain, motivated by brotherly love and a sense of moral outrage, has performed a great public service in exposing the history of failed mental health policy--and charting a path forward for California and the nation."--Steve Lopez, Los Angeles Times columnist and author of The Soloist: A Lost Dream, An Unlikely Friendship, and the Redemptive Power of Music

"Morain has crafted a superb and essential account of the crisis of serious mental illness in America at a time when the subject is more crucial than ever. With an unparalleled depth and breadth of knowledge and insight into our shattered 'system' of mental health care policy and politics--one born of decades of both professional and personal experience--Morain powerfully fuses intimate storytelling and broad reportage. He brings a seasoned journalist's eye and ear for detail, a historian's grasp of the subject's sweep, and a family member's deeply caring voice. This book can reach, and touch, a wide swath of readers, who will come away with empathy and a keen understanding of those who live with mental illness (along with their families), as well as the public policy failures that form a societal stain. And maybe, just maybe, readers will join the growing call for massive systemic reform."--Gail Freedman, award-winning documentary filmmaker of No One Cares About Crazy People

About the Author

Dan Morain is the author of the best-selling Kamala's Way: An American Life. He served as a California-based journalist covering politics and policy for more than four decades for the Los Angeles Times, The Sacramento Bee, CalMatters, and other news outlets.