
This Close to Happy
A Reckoning with Depression
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $24.47
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Suzanne Toren
-
By:
-
Daphne Merkin
About this listen
A gifted and audacious writer confronts her lifelong battle with depression and her search for release
This Close to Happy is the rare, vividly personal account of what it feels like to suffer from clinical depression, written from a woman's perspective and informed by an acute understanding of the implications of this disease over a lifetime.
Taking off from essays on depression she has written for The New Yorker and The New York Times Magazine, Daphne Merkin casts her eye back to her beginnings to try to sort out the root causes of her affliction. She recounts the travails of growing up in a large, affluent family where there was a paucity of love and basics such as food and clothing despite the presence of a chauffeur and a cook. She goes on to recount her early hospitalization for depression in poignant detail as well as her complex relationship with her mercurial, withholding mother.
Along the way Merkin also discusses her early redemptive love of reading and gradual emergence as a writer. She eventually marries, has a child, and suffers severe postpartum depression, for which she is again hospitalized. Merkin also discusses her visits to various therapists and psychopharmocologists, which enable her to probe the causes of depression and its various treatments. The book ends in the present, where the writer has learned how to navigate her depression, if not "cure" it, after a third hospitalization in the wake of her mother's death.
©2017 Daphne Merkin (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Furiously Happy
- A Funny Book About Horrible Things
- By: Jenny Lawson
- Narrated by: Jenny Lawson
- Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Audie Award, Humor, 2016. In Furiously Happy, number-one New York Times best-selling author Jenny Lawson explores her lifelong battle with mental illness. A hysterical, ridiculous book about crippling depression and anxiety? That sounds like a terrible idea. But terrible ideas are what Jenny does best.
-
-
Review by a Social Worker
- By dudley1125 on 10-21-15
By: Jenny Lawson
-
Lost Connections
- Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression - and the Unexpected Solutions
- By: Johann Hari
- Narrated by: Johann Hari
- Length: 9 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the New York Times best-selling author of Chasing the Scream, a radically new way of thinking about depression and anxiety. What really causes depression and anxiety - and how can we really solve them?
-
-
Heartfelt, but not convincing
- By Brett on 03-18-18
By: Johann Hari
-
Darkness Visible
- A Memoir of Madness
- By: William Styron
- Narrated by: William Styron
- Length: 2 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A work of great personal courage and a literary tour de force, this bestseller is Styron's true account of his experience of crippling depression. Styron is perhaps the first writer to convey the full terror of depression's psychic landscape, as well as the illuminating path to recovery.
-
-
Intimate and revealing
- By S. Yates on 01-31-18
By: William Styron
-
Sure, I'll Join Your Cult
- A Memoir of Mental Illness and the Quest to Belong Anywhere
- By: Maria Bamford
- Narrated by: Maria Bamford
- Length: 7 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Maria Bamford is a comedian’s comedian (an outsider among outsiders) and has forever fought to find a place to belong. From struggling with an eating disorder as a child of the 1980s, to navigating a career in the arts (and medical debt and psychiatric institutionalization), she has tried just about every method possible to not only be a part of the world, but to want to be a part of it. In Bamford’s “trademark blend of disarming intimacy and dark whimsy” (Publishers Weekly), Sure, I’ll Join Your Cult brings us on a quest to participate in something.
-
-
Hilarious and sincere
- By B. Bazzell on 09-06-23
By: Maria Bamford
-
Reasons to Stay Alive
- By: Matt Haig
- Narrated by: Matt Haig
- Length: 4 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Aged 24, Matt Haig's world caved in. He could see no way to go on living. This is the true story of how he came through crisis, triumphed over an illness that almost destroyed him, and learned to live again. It has helped millions of people do the same. Moving, funny, and even joyous, these are the lessons Matt learned. His reasons to stay alive.
-
-
Beware of Tuesdays and October. I cried laughing
- By colin on 12-05-23
By: Matt Haig
-
I'm Fine...and Other Lies
- By: Whitney Cummings
- Narrated by: Whitney Cummings
- Length: 9 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A hilarious and emotional personal account of the life, times, mistakes, and crippling codependence of comedian, producer, director, actress, and writer Whitney Cummings. Full of intellect, pathos, and profundity, I'm Fine...and Other Lies is, in Whitney's words, her first book, which means her last date. With her signature incendiary edge and self-deprecation, Whitney comes clean about what has shaped her into the trailblazing comic that she is today.
-
-
I've been waiting for this woman to write a book!
- By Giggle Pants on 10-09-17
By: Whitney Cummings
-
Furiously Happy
- A Funny Book About Horrible Things
- By: Jenny Lawson
- Narrated by: Jenny Lawson
- Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Audie Award, Humor, 2016. In Furiously Happy, number-one New York Times best-selling author Jenny Lawson explores her lifelong battle with mental illness. A hysterical, ridiculous book about crippling depression and anxiety? That sounds like a terrible idea. But terrible ideas are what Jenny does best.
-
-
Review by a Social Worker
- By dudley1125 on 10-21-15
By: Jenny Lawson
-
Lost Connections
- Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression - and the Unexpected Solutions
- By: Johann Hari
- Narrated by: Johann Hari
- Length: 9 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the New York Times best-selling author of Chasing the Scream, a radically new way of thinking about depression and anxiety. What really causes depression and anxiety - and how can we really solve them?
-
-
Heartfelt, but not convincing
- By Brett on 03-18-18
By: Johann Hari
-
Darkness Visible
- A Memoir of Madness
- By: William Styron
- Narrated by: William Styron
- Length: 2 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A work of great personal courage and a literary tour de force, this bestseller is Styron's true account of his experience of crippling depression. Styron is perhaps the first writer to convey the full terror of depression's psychic landscape, as well as the illuminating path to recovery.
-
-
Intimate and revealing
- By S. Yates on 01-31-18
By: William Styron
-
Sure, I'll Join Your Cult
- A Memoir of Mental Illness and the Quest to Belong Anywhere
- By: Maria Bamford
- Narrated by: Maria Bamford
- Length: 7 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Maria Bamford is a comedian’s comedian (an outsider among outsiders) and has forever fought to find a place to belong. From struggling with an eating disorder as a child of the 1980s, to navigating a career in the arts (and medical debt and psychiatric institutionalization), she has tried just about every method possible to not only be a part of the world, but to want to be a part of it. In Bamford’s “trademark blend of disarming intimacy and dark whimsy” (Publishers Weekly), Sure, I’ll Join Your Cult brings us on a quest to participate in something.
-
-
Hilarious and sincere
- By B. Bazzell on 09-06-23
By: Maria Bamford
-
Reasons to Stay Alive
- By: Matt Haig
- Narrated by: Matt Haig
- Length: 4 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Aged 24, Matt Haig's world caved in. He could see no way to go on living. This is the true story of how he came through crisis, triumphed over an illness that almost destroyed him, and learned to live again. It has helped millions of people do the same. Moving, funny, and even joyous, these are the lessons Matt learned. His reasons to stay alive.
-
-
Beware of Tuesdays and October. I cried laughing
- By colin on 12-05-23
By: Matt Haig
-
I'm Fine...and Other Lies
- By: Whitney Cummings
- Narrated by: Whitney Cummings
- Length: 9 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A hilarious and emotional personal account of the life, times, mistakes, and crippling codependence of comedian, producer, director, actress, and writer Whitney Cummings. Full of intellect, pathos, and profundity, I'm Fine...and Other Lies is, in Whitney's words, her first book, which means her last date. With her signature incendiary edge and self-deprecation, Whitney comes clean about what has shaped her into the trailblazing comic that she is today.
-
-
I've been waiting for this woman to write a book!
- By Giggle Pants on 10-09-17
By: Whitney Cummings
-
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
- By: Maya Angelou
- Narrated by: Maya Angelou
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sent by their mother to live with their devout, self-sufficient grandmother in a small Southern town, Maya and her brother, Bailey, endure the ache of abandonment and the prejudice of the local “powhitetrash.” At eight years old, Maya is attacked by a man many times her age - and has to live with the consequences for a lifetime. But years later, she learns about love for herself and the kindness of others, her own strong spirit, and the ideas of great authors.
-
-
Emotional & Powerful
- By Miss Toni on 06-30-13
By: Maya Angelou
-
Stash
- My Life in Hiding
- By: Laura Cathcart Robbins
- Narrated by: Laura Cathcart Robbins
- Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After years of hiding her addiction from everyone—stockpiling pills in her Louboutins and elaborately scheduling her withdrawals between PTA meetings, baby showers, and tennis matches—Laura Cathcart Robbins is running out of places to hide. She has learned the hard way that even her high-profile marriage and Hollywood lifestyle can’t protect her from the pain she’s keeping bottled up inside. Facing divorce, the possibility of a custody battle, and the insistent voice of internalized racism that nags at her as a Black woman in a white world, Laura wonders just how much more she can take.
-
-
Best Mom/wife alcoholism memoir I’ve read
- By Allison M. Billet on 04-06-23
-
Reading My Father
- A Memoir
- By: Alexandra Styron
- Narrated by: Alexandra Styron
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Alexandra Styron's parents—the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Sophie’s Choice and his political activist wife, Rose—were, for half a century, leading players on the world’s cultural stage. Alexandra was raised under both the halo of her father’s brilliance and the long shadow of his troubled mind. Reading My Father portrays the epic sweep of an American artist’s life. It is also a tale of filial love, beautifully written with humor, compassion, and grace.
-
-
William Styron Ranks...
- By Douglas on 12-22-13
By: Alexandra Styron
-
River of Time
- My Descent into Depression and How I Emerged with Hope
- By: Naomi Judd, Marcia Wilkie
- Narrated by: Naomi Judd, Carolyn Cook
- Length: 9 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The world knows Naomi Judd as one of the most successful and best-loved country music stars ever. What the world hasn't known - until now - is that after her 2010 and 2011 North American tour with Wynonna, Naomi fell into a debilitating and terrifying depression that seemingly came out of nowhere. Just months after the successful tour ended, Naomi truly believed she had every reason to end her life.
-
-
Horrible Book
- By SLR on 03-12-17
By: Naomi Judd, and others
-
You Could Make This Place Beautiful
- A Memoir
- By: Maggie Smith
- Narrated by: Maggie Smith
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In her memoir You Could Make This Place Beautiful, poet Maggie Smith explores the disintegration of her marriage and her renewed commitment to herself in lyrical vignettes that shine, hard and clear as jewels. The book begins with one woman’s personal, particular heartbreak, but its circles widen into a reckoning with contemporary womanhood, traditional gender roles, and the power dynamics that persist even in many progressive homes.
-
-
Beautiful, relatable, profound
- By Betty Blue on 04-16-23
By: Maggie Smith
-
Broken (in the Best Possible Way)
- By: Jenny Lawson
- Narrated by: Jenny Lawson
- Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As Jenny Lawson’s hundreds of thousands of fans know, she suffers from depression. In Broken (in the Best Possible Way), Jenny brings listeners along on her mental and physical health journey, offering heartbreaking and hilarious anecdotes along the way. With people experiencing anxiety and depression now more than ever, Jenny humanizes what we all face in an all-too-real way, reassuring us that we’re not alone and making us laugh while doing it.
-
-
The perfect follow up
- By Anonymous User on 04-07-21
By: Jenny Lawson
-
The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man
- A Memoir
- By: Paul Newman, David Rosenthal - editor, Melissa Newman - foreword, and others
- Narrated by: Jeff Daniels, Melissa Newman, Clea Newman Soderlund, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1986, Paul Newman and his closest friend, screenwriter Stewart Stern, began an extraordinary project. Stuart was to compile an oral history, to have Newman’s family and friends and those who worked closely with him, talk about the actor’s life. And then Newman would work with Stewart and give his side of the story. The only stipulation was that anyone who spoke on the record had to be completely honest. The result is The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man—revelatory and introspective, personal and analytical, loving and tender in places, always complex and profound.
-
-
A lot of navel gazing, and yet….
- By Ben on 10-24-22
By: Paul Newman, and others
-
An Unquiet Mind
- A Memoir of Moods and Madness
- By: Kay Redfield Jamison
- Narrated by: Kay Redfield Jamison
- Length: 2 hrs and 46 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dr. Jamison is one of the foremost authorities on manic-depressive (bipolar) illness; she has also experienced it firsthand. For even while she was pursuing her career in academic medicine, Jamison found herself succumbing to the same exhilarating highs and catastrophic depressions that afflicted many of her patients, as her disorder launched her into ruinous spending sprees, episodes of violence, and an attempted suicide.
-
-
It Says Unabridged. That is incorrect.
- By Casey Wagner on 10-17-11
-
Good Morning, Monster
- A Therapist Shares Five Heroic Stories of Emotional Recovery
- By: Catherine Gildiner
- Narrated by: Deborah Burgess
- Length: 13 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this fascinating narrative, therapist Catherine Gildiner presents five of what she calls her most heroic and memorable patients. Among them: A successful, first-generation Chinese immigrant musician suffering sexual dysfunction; a young woman whose father abandoned her at age nine with her younger siblings in an isolated cottage in the depth of winter; and a glamorous workaholic whose narcissistic, negligent mother greeted her each morning of her childhood with "Good morning, Monster". Each patient presents a mystery, one that will only be unpacked over years.
-
-
some things shouldn't be consumed
- By Jess on 12-28-22
-
Drinking Games
- A Memoir
- By: Sarah Levy
- Narrated by: Sarah Levy
- Length: 6 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On paper, Sarah Levy’s life was on track. She was 28, living in New York City, working a great job, and socializing every weekend. But Sarah had a secret: her relationship with alcohol was becoming toxic. And only she could save herself. Drinking Games explores the role alcohol has in our formative years, and what it means to opt out of a culture completely enmeshed in drinking. It’s an examination of what our short-term choices about alcohol do to our long-term selves and how they challenge our ability to be vulnerable enough to discover what we really want in life.
-
-
Surface Level, Young Adult Essays
- By dr8901 on 03-29-23
By: Sarah Levy
-
In Love
- A Memoir of Love and Loss
- By: Amy Bloom
- Narrated by: Amy Bloom
- Length: 4 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Amy Bloom began to notice changes in her husband, Brian: He retired early from a new job he loved; he withdrew from close friendships; he talked mostly about the past. Suddenly, it seemed there was a glass wall between them, and their long walks and talks stopped. Their world was altered forever when an MRI confirmed what they could no longer ignore: Brian had Alzheimer’s disease.
-
-
A helpful,healing memoir
- By Helen on 03-31-22
By: Amy Bloom
-
People of the Book
- A Novel
- By: Geraldine Brooks
- Narrated by: Edwina Wren
- Length: 13 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This ambitious, electrifying work traces the harrowing journey of the famed Sarajevo Haggadah, a beautifully illuminated Hebrew manuscript created in 15th-century Spain. When it falls to Hanna Heath, an Australian rare-book expert, to conserve this priceless work, the series of tiny artifacts she discovers in its ancient binding—an insect wing fragment, wine stains, salt crystals, a white hair—only begin to unlock its deep mysteries.
-
-
Amazing, fabulous, wonderful!!!
- By Yvette on 03-13-09
By: Geraldine Brooks
Featured Article: The Best Audiobooks to Help You Cope with Depression
Sometimes when the world feels like too much, it can be helpful to listen to an audiobook that explores similar feelings. Maybe you're looking for a first-person narrative about struggling with or recovering from depression, or maybe you just need a fiction title featuring characters with whom you can relate. Here are a few of the best books on depression—but before you dive in, please be aware that the subject matter might be triggering for some people.
What listeners say about This Close to Happy
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Silverthorne
- 03-29-17
Enough!
Daphne Merkin is a good writer, a truly literary and literate person. She is also a huge pain. Although I detest the fashion for "positive thinking," as I made my way laboriously through Daphne's endless preoccupation with suicide, I heard myself saying, "Do it already!" I can only imagine how terrible a task it must be to live with someone who fantasizes about suicide day after day, year after year. Let alone to be such a person. And, of course, it's all her parents' fault, especially Mom, who after all, was only a Holocaust survivor. How could she be expected to understand real needs? But if you can tolerate the author's ceaseless, selfish preoccupation, this is a good book about depression, and the narration is very well done. Toren has a pleasant voice, a good pace and pronunciation, and makes Merkin almost bearable.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Mariaposa
- 03-04-17
I should be the last person to recommend this book
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
I would recommend this book to anyone trying to understand what depression feels like.
Any additional comments?
I have always said I don't have time for depression, despite having faced a very difficult (and impoverished) childhood, followed by close calls with death (first by assault, then by disease). Let's just say I couldn't imagine having much sympathy for someone with a Park Avenue upbringing. Yet I found myself intrigued by Daphne's story and amazed at how much she is willing to reveal. I don't understand exactly why but I have ended up liking her and giving her props for getting this all down, no matter how long it took. I plan to read more pieces by her.
I do have one problem though -- I don't think she is totally forthcoming about how much her parents footed the bill for some things, like her psychiatric hospitalizations during her 30s and it's kind of unclear if, after her father says he'll buy her an apartment if she promises to keep kosher, and she says no way, who does end up buying the 3 br apartment? I have a suspicion that although her loaded parents are stingy Daphne has that security of knowing that bottom line they are still there for her. Her situation is so different from those who are totally financially on their own. I just wish she would acknowledge that. Because not having to worry about where your next dollar is coming from provides a person with a certain freedom to make choices not available to someone who does have that worry.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
11 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Factual
- 02-13-17
Riveting
Excellent book and amazing narration.
A must for anyone has depression or who knows anyone who does.
Powerfully written and artistically read- a very worthwhile read- I highly recommend it.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Kendra
- 02-28-17
excellent book on depression
loved it. as a fellow depressive it provided consolation that I'm not alone in the struggle.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Sudi
- 04-03-17
If You Aren't Depressed When U Start This....
You might get depressed, if you lean that way.
I lean toward depression... this book echoed some of my thoughts. It is well written.
The narrator tended to read every line as though they were dripping acid; I'm not sure Ms. Merkin wrote it that way.
It is a useful insight into one person's eternal wrestling match with a mind that will not be calmed and cannot be tamed to any extent with medicine or therapies.
Sometimes, though, I think if you're NOT depressed, you're not paying enough attention to life.
This book is a good introduction to the caverns of depression for those of you who are NOT depressed but live with someone who is.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Jacquelin Atabong
- 05-22-19
I loved it . the narrator was excellent
I loved it . the narrator was excellent. I will share with others good job
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Story
- Amanda
- 05-22-17
I was unable to finis this book.
For someone who enjoys and has studied literature & poetry perhaps, but not for me.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful