Type of read: Commuter Read.

What made me pick it up: 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' has always been on my TBR and I'm slowly making my way through that very long list.

Overall rating: I'm sure I read 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' sometime during high school, but I can't for the life of me remember. As I make my way through a miles-long TBR, I've been deliberate about making sure that classics are included. There's a certain brilliant mundanity to 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' that almost makes you forget who the characters are and what setting they are in. McMurphy, Brombden, and the other chronics and acutes at the institution are simply trying to live their lives and maintain what sense of individuality and freedom they have - whether that be when or where they can go somewhere, what they watch on the television, or how they interact with one another and those charged with their welfare. In a classic us versus them mentality, the patients of the institution work to see how far they can push it before they, and the institution's staff, reach their breaking point.

Reader's Note: 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Next' takes place in a psychological institution and focuses heavily on the mental health, patterns, habits, and day-to-day of the patients and staff of the institution. It should also be noted, the original publication year of the book was 1962. Times have changed from 1962 to 2024 and certain phrases, terms, and imagery that were once unquestioned may have a different response as we have grown and learned as people.