Book dossier

The ghost in the house

by Tracy Thompson

Award-winning reporter Tracy Thompson was thirty-four when she was hospitalized and put on suicide watch during a major depressive episode. Later she documented her personal struggle with the disease in The Beast, a groundbreaking book that shattered stereotypes and inspired countless readers to confront their own battles with mental illness. But when Thompson took on one of the most emotionally demanding jobs of all—motherhood—her depression returned with a fresh vengeance. Virtually everything she had learned was now either inadequate or useless; maternal depression was a different beast altogether.A striking blend of memoir and journalism, Thompson's The Ghost in the House is the first book to address maternal depression in layman's terms as a lifelong illness that can have profound ramifications for mother and child. Based on the latest scientific research and the collected true stories of nearly four hundred mothers with depression, this book is an invaluable resource for the millions of women who are white-knuckling their way through what should be the most satisfying years of their lives, providing essential information, deftly written prose, and above all, hope.