Rachel Aviv
Rachel Aviv is an inquisitive and thoughtful character who is open to all possibilities and conclusions when it comes to the mental health of her subjects. She is patient and attentive and has an eye for detail that allows her to craft subtle biographies. Aviv is also an advocate for her subjects, believing that their stories are their own and should not be dismissed or ignored. Aviv is committed to finding a balance between biological, genetic, psychological, and environmental factors, to gain a more accurate understanding of mental illness. Lastly, Aviv is an honest storyteller, relating her midlife re-entry into the orbit of psychiatry and her experiences with taking antidepressant medications.
Hava
Hava is a 12-year-old girl who is a patient in the anorexia unit where Rachel Aviv is also admitted. She is described as "beguiling and charismatic" and is seen as a leader in the unit, inducting the other patients into the rituals of calorie counting and exercise. Hava is highly sociable and knowledgeable about the illness, though it is clear that she, like the other patients, is struggling with her illness. Despite her struggles, Hava eventually finds happiness with a loving partner and keeps a lively and insightful journal up until her eventual death in her mid-forties. She is able to find joy and contentment in her life and serves as an example of how mental illness can be faced with courage and determination.
Ray
Ray is a driven and successful businessman who is struggling with intense feelings of regret and despair that cause him to check himself into a mental institution. There he engages in psychotherapy but is frustrated by the slow process. He is later transferred to a hospital where he is prescribed antidepressants and experiences a breakthrough - feeling real sadness over the loss of his family. Ray is willing to try different approaches to managing his mental health. He is eventually discharged and decides to sue the first hospital for malpractice. Ray embodies the clash between psychotherapy and psychopharmacology and his story highlights the complexity of mental illness and the difficulty in finding a cure.
Bapu
Bapu is a woman from India who is struggling with loneliness and a sense of disconnection after marrying into a hostile family. In order to fill the void, she turns to religion and becomes deeply devoted to the 16th-century poet Mirabai, who turned away from her family to be with Lord Krishna. Bapu's religious devotion leads her to run away to a temple, where she is found and sent to a mental hospital. Bapu is portrayed as a complex and nuanced character. She is not simply a "holy woman" who has been colonized by an alien psychiatric tradition but is instead a "person who was quite lost" in her struggles. Bapu's story reflects the complexity of mental illness and its causes, as her struggles are an interplay between biological, genetic, psychological, and environmental factors.
Naomi
Naomi is an African American woman from Chicago who suffers from mental illness. She is driven by a constant sense of persecution and hatred, so much so that she believes the end of the world is imminent. Naomi is so desperate to protect her family that she jumps off a bridge with her two children in her arms, tragically killing one of them. She is sentenced to 15 years in jail for the tragedy. Naomi is a complex character, driven by a combination of fear, desperation, and the oppressive racism of her surroundings.
Laura
Laura is an overachiever from Greenwich, Connecticut. Despite being very successful, her mental illness gives her a break from the high expectations of her milieu and allows her to take a step back. She is prescribed medication to help her stay at the top of her game but eventually decides she’s had enough and becomes an advocate for pharmacological abstinence. She is intelligent and independent, trying to make sense of her illness and the treatments available to her, and ultimately coming to the conclusion that she needs to make her own choices about her mental health.
