Mental Illness in YA Month: Lydia Ruffles with A Tale of Two Lists + Giveaway

I'm so excited to have Lydia Ruffles, UKYA author of The Taste of Blue Light and upcoming Colour Me In, stopping by today to talk about why she writes about mental health in her novels.

A Tale of Two Lists

I said an enthusiastic and, as it turns out, complacent 'yes, please' when Jo invited me to do a guest blog on why I write about mental health for her Mental Illness in YA month. It seemed like the question was made for me. This'lll be easy, I thought.

(Spoiler alert: it wasn't.)

The main characters in my two books - 17-year-old art student Lux Langley in The Taste of Blue Light and 19-year-old actor Arlo Thomas in Colour Me In – both have a mental illness. (They also have friends, family, first love, adventures, goals, agency, etc – more on this later.)

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Mental Illness in YA Month Review: Colour Me In by Lydia Ruffles

Colour Me In by Lydia Ruffles (eProof) - Nineteen-year-old actor Arlo likes nothing more than howling across the skyline with best friend Luke from the roof of their apartment.

But when something irreparable happens and familiar black weeds start to crawl inside him, Arlo flees to the other side of the world, taking only a sketchbook full of maps.

With its steaming soup and neon lights, this new place is both comforting and isolating.

There, Arlo meets fellow traveller Mizuki. Something about her feels more like home than he's felt in a while. But what is Mizuki searching for?

HOW FAR CAN YOU OUTRUN YOURSELF . . .
BEFORE YOU LOSE YOUR WAY BACK? From Goodreads.

I received this eProof for free from Hodder Chlildren's Books via NetGalley for the purposes of providing an honest review.

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Review: The Taste of Blue Light by Lydia Ruffles

The Taste of Blue Light by Lydia Ruffles (eProof) - An incandescent, soul-searching story about a broken young woman's search for a truth buried so deep it threatens to consume her, body and mind.

'Since I blacked out, the slightest thing seems to aggravate my brain and fill it with fire'

These are the things Lux knows:
She is an Artist.
She is lucky.
She is broken.

These are the things she doesn't know:
What happened over the summer.
Why she ended up in hospital.
Why her dreams are etched in red.

'The nightmares tend to linger long after your screams have woken you up ...'

Desperate to uncover the truth, Lux's time is running out. If she cannot piece together the events of the summer and regain control of her fractured mind, she will be taken away from everything and everyone she holds dear.

If her dreams don't swallow her first. From Goodreads.

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