Zig-Zag Boy
A Memoir of Madness and Motherhood
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Narrated by:
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Tanya Frank
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By:
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Tanya Frank
About this listen
One night in 2009, Tanya Frank finds her nineteen-year-old son, Zach—gentle and full of promise—in the grip of what the psychiatrists would label a psychotic break. Suddenly and inexplicably, Tanya is thrown into a parallel universe: Zach's world, where the phones are bugged, his friends have joined the Mafia, and helicopters are spying on his family.
In the years following Zach's shifting psychiatric diagnoses, Tanya goes to war for her son, desperate to find the right answer, the right drug, the right doctor to bring him back to reality. Meanwhile, the boy she raised—the chatty, precocious dog-lover, the teenager who spent summers surfing with his big brother, the UCLA student—suffers the effects of multiple hospitalizations, powerful drugs that blunt his emotions, therapies that don't work, and torturous nights on the streets. Holding on to startling moments of hope and seeking solace in nature and community, Tanya learns how to abandon her fears for the future and accept the mysteries of her son's altered states.
With tenderness, lyricism, and generous candor, this compelling story conveys the power of a mother's love. Zig-Zag Boy is both a moving lamentation for things lost and a brave testament to the people we become in difficult circumstances.
©2023 Tanya Frank (P)2023 TantorListeners also enjoyed...
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Finding Chika
- A Little Girl, an Earthquake, and the Making of a Family
- By: Mitch Albom
- Narrated by: Mitch Albom
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Chika Jeune was born three days before the devastating earthquake that decimated Haiti in 2010. She spent her infancy in a landscape of extreme poverty, and when her mother died giving birth to a baby brother, Chika was brought to The Have Faith Haiti Orphanage that Albom operates in Port Au Prince. With no children of their own, the 40-plus children who live, play, and go to school at the orphanage have become family to Mitch and his wife, Janine. But at age five, Chika is suddenly diagnosed with something a doctor there says "no one in Haiti can help you with."
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BUY READ AND RECOMMEND THIS BOOK
- By The Birds. on 11-05-19
By: Mitch Albom
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Driving Miss Norma
- One Family's Journey Saying ""Yes"" to Living
- By: Tim Bauerschmidt, Ramie Liddle
- Narrated by: Christopher Grove, Nan McNamara
- Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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When Miss Norma was diagnosed with uterine cancer, she was advised to undergo surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. But instead of confining herself to a hospital bed for what could be her last stay, Norma - newly widowed after nearly seven decades of marriage - rose to her full height of five feet and told her doctor, "I'm 90 years old. I'm hitting the road." Packing what she needed, Norma took off on an unforgettable cross-country journey with three professional nomads - her retired son, Tim; his wife, Ramie; and their standard poodle, Ringo.
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so moving and inspiring
- By Travis Stone on 07-10-19
By: Tim Bauerschmidt, and others
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The Undocumented Americans
- By: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Narrated by: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Length: 4 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Writer Karla Cornejo Villavicencio was on DACA when she decided to write about being undocumented for the first time using her own name. It was right after the election of 2016, the day she realized the story she'd tried to steer clear of was the only one she wanted to tell. So she wrote her immigration lawyer's phone number on her hand in Sharpie and embarked on a trip across the country to tell the stories of her fellow undocumented immigrants—and to find the hidden key to her own.
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Raw, heartbreaking - we can do better by others
- By RapaciousReader on 04-11-20
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The Book of Help
- A Memoir in Remedies
- By: Megan Griswold
- Narrated by: Megan Griswold
- Length: 11 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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A hilarious and heartbreaking memoir-in-remedies by a self-described "professional soul-searcher" that details a journey of self-discovery through more than 160 tonics, seminars, regimens, and transformative therapies. With a voice that is at once intimate and hilarious, Megan captures the openness and honesty necessary for people to take a new path in life. Listeners will open the audiobook with curiosity about all the different healing therapies that Megan tries, but leave with a new understanding of themselves.
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Mr. Toad's Wild Ride has some serious competition!
- By Elisa R. Goodman on 02-15-19
By: Megan Griswold
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Everything You Ever Wanted
- A Memoir
- By: Jillian Lauren
- Narrated by: Jillian Lauren
- Length: 8 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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In her younger years, Jillian Lauren was a college dropout, a drug addict, and an international concubine in the Prince of Brunei's harem, an experience she immortalized in her best-selling memoir, Some Girls. In her 30s, Jillian's most radical act is learning the steadying power of love when she and her rock star husband adopt an Ethiopian child with special needs.
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Great for adoptive families
- By berry bomb on 07-06-22
By: Jillian Lauren
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This Is How I Save My Life
- From California to India, a True Story of Finding Everything When You Are Willing to Try Anything
- By: Amy B. Scher
- Narrated by: Amy B. Scher
- Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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When Amy B. Scher was struck with undiagnosed late-stage, chronic Lyme disease, the best physicians in America labeled her condition incurable and potentially terminal. Deteriorating rapidly, she went on a search to save her own life - from the top experts in Los Angeles and the world-renowned Mayo Clinic in Minneapolis to a state-of-the-art hospital in Chicago. After exhausting all of her options in the US, she discovered a possible cure - but it was highly experimental, available only in India, and had as much of a probability of killing her as it did of curing her.
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A great comfort
- By Sue on 07-07-18
By: Amy B. Scher
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Not Fade Away
- A Memoir of Senses Lost and Found
- By: Rebecca Alexander, Sascha Alper
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert
- Length: 7 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Thirty-four-year-old Rebecca Alexander is a psychotherapist, a spin instructor, a volunteer, and an athlete. She is also almost completely blind, with significantly deteriorated hearing. Not Fade Away is a deeply moving exploration of the obstacles we all face-physical, psychological, and philosophical. Rebecca's story is an exquisite reminder to live each day to its fullest.
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Loved this!
- By Daryl on 11-24-14
By: Rebecca Alexander, and others
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The Map of True Places
- By: Brunonia Barry
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan
- Length: 12 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Zee Finch has come a long way from a motherless childhood spent stealing boats—a talent that earned her the nickname Trouble. She’s now a respected psychotherapist working with the world-famous Dr. Liz Mattei. She’s also about to marry one of Boston’s most eligible bachelors. But the suicide of Zee’s patient Lilly Braedon throws Zee into emotional chaos and takes her back to places she thought she’d left behind.
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Bad Narrator
- By Samantha on 06-30-10
By: Brunonia Barry
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Before the Storm
- By: Diane Chamberlain
- Narrated by: Abby Craden, Kris Koscheski
- Length: 11 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Laurel Lockwood lost her son once through neglect. She's spent the rest of her life determined to make up for her mistakes, and she has succeeded in becoming a committed, protective parent-maybe even overprotective. Still, she loosens her grip just enough to let Andy attend a local church social-a decision that terrifies her when the church is consumed by fire. But Andy survives...and remarkably, saves other children from the flames.
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Great book...HORRIBLE performance
- By Andrea on 03-10-15
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Your Voice in My Head
- A Memoir
- By: Emma Forrest
- Narrated by: Emma Forrest
- Length: 5 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Emma Forrest, a British journalist, was just 22 and living the fast life in New York City when she realized that her quirks had gone beyond eccentricity. In a cycle of loneliness, damaging relationships, and destructive behavior, she found herself in the chair of a slim, balding, and effortlessly optimistic psychiatrist--a man whose wisdom and humanity would wrench her from the dangerous tide after she tried to end her life.
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Great, quick read
- By Amazon Customer on 02-12-21
By: Emma Forrest
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Until I Say Good-Bye
- My Year of Living with Joy
- By: Susan Spencer-Wendel, Bret Witter
- Narrated by: Karen White
- Length: 9 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Susan Spencer-Wendel's Until I Say Good-Bye: My Year of Living with Joy is a moving and inspirational memoir by a woman who makes the most of her final days after discovering she has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). After Spencer-Wendel, a celebrated journalist at the Palm Beach Post, learns of her diagnosis of ALS, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease, she embarks on several adventures, traveling to several countries and sharing special experiences with loved ones.
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Until I Say Good-Bye is a paradox for me.
- By Bonny on 03-19-13
By: Susan Spencer-Wendel, and others
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Strangers Assume My Girlfriend Is My Nurse
- By: Shane Burcaw
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 4 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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With his signature acerbic wit and hilarious voice, 20-something author, blogger, and entrepreneur Shane Burcaw is back with an essay collection about living a full life in a body that many people perceive as a tragedy. From anecdotes about first introductions where people patted him on the head instead of shaking his hand, to stories of passersby mistaking his able-bodied girlfriend for a nurse, Shane tackles awkward situations and assumptions with humor and grace.
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Uplifting
- By PhinzPride on 04-12-20
By: Shane Burcaw
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Hope and Other Luxuries
- A Mother’s Journey Through a Daughter’s Anorexia
- By: Clare B. Dunkle
- Narrated by: Abby Craden
- Length: 22 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Clare Dunkle seemed to have an ideal life - two beautiful, high-achieving teenage daughters, a loving husband, and a satisfying and successful career as a children's book novelist. But it's when you let down your guard that the ax falls. Just after one daughter successfully conquered her depression, another daughter developed a life-threatening eating disorder.
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Potent and Real
- By Susie on 09-17-15
By: Clare B. Dunkle
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I'm Telling the Truth, but I'm Lying
- Essays
- By: Bassey Ikpi
- Narrated by: Bassey Ikpi
- Length: 7 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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In I’m Telling the Truth, but I’m Lying, Bassey Ikpi explores her life - as a Nigerian-American immigrant, a black woman, a slam poet, a mother, a daughter, an artist - through the lens of her mental health and diagnosis of bipolar II and anxiety. Her remarkable memoir in essays implodes our preconceptions of the mind and normalcy as Bassey bares her own truths and lies for us all to behold with radical honesty and brutal intimacy.
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Full, poignant, purposeful
- By Bree on 08-21-19
By: Bassey Ikpi
What listeners say about Zig-Zag Boy
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Me
- 12-09-23
Wonderful, Courageous, Compassionate
Thank you so much for sharing and standing against stigma. So similar to my child's and my story.
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- D. Edwards
- 05-07-23
Lessons in love and acceptance
From the very first moment that Tanya Frank’s son gave an indication that he was having frightening thoughts of people listening to him through landline wires, the journey begins. The journey into the confusing and inhospitable landscape of visits to medical professionals, the myriad of diagnoses, the smorgasbord of prescriptions. While the author and her family are dealing with this crisis, she finds solace in nature and in the people she finds along the way who are going through their own journeys with their own family members. Having my own family member who was diagnosed with possible schizophrenia, I felt a kinship with this author. She is brave and honest. Traits to be commended considering what she, her beautiful son, Zach, and the rest of her family have dealt with and are still dealing with. I loved the chapter about the sea lions and the author’s work as a docent at the nature preserve in Northern California. You can tell that nature is her respite. Her refuge. I would highly recommend this book. She tells her story beautifully. Having the author read it was a lovely bonus.
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- Christianna S
- 03-24-23
Beautiful and captivating story of a mothers love and learning
A friend recommended this read (well, listen).
As the mother of a non verbal toddler, while not the same in any way, I felt this story deeply. The love, worry and rollercoaster we all go through as parents is always there. I cried a lot listening to this.
Thank you for sharing your story of Zach with us.
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- melany levenson
- 04-14-23
A courageous journey of parenting
I appreciate the authors willingness and courage to share a deeply personal experience with others outside her support group. Tan captured the lonely, frightening, isolating journey parenting a child struggling with mental illness. There is no road map for the myriad of challenges a parent must navigate. Tan’s fraught journey included additional hurdles, besides the usual(doctors, psychiatric hospitals, diagnoses, medications): finding an anchor and stability of a home base for herself and family.
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